The Future of Advertising?

I was looking through the guardians tech page and I found this article about personalised advertising billboards. In Steven Spielberg's sci-fi film Minority Report, an interactive advert shouts to Tom Cruise's character "John Anderton, you could use a Guinness!" – having identified him by scanning his eye. "Produced by the electronics giant NEC, the ad signage uses facial recognition software and can identify the shopper's gender (with 85-90% accuracy), ethnicity and approximate age."

A virtual mannequin appearing in the digital billboards

My opinion is that obviously this technology is in its early stages but in future it could lead to more personalised adverts, and leading to a better shopping experience, however some people could be scared of being automatically identified wherever they go and may fear their privacy is being invaded.

Guardian Article (Click Here) 

My Favourite Advert

John Lewis Ad 2010 (YouTube Link)

Still from John Lewis ad.

This is an advert for the department store John Lewis,  

I find this advert to be very interesting because of its context. It does not drive a specific product or show any of its particular services or tell the intended audience anything whatsoever about John Lewis department stores.

However what I think it is there to do is promote the name John Lewis as a reliable family brand. The advert itself follows a girl through maturity to an old woman with a family, there are shots of marriage, good times and sunny days. the music played over the video is: Fyfe Dangerfield 'She's Always A Woman' which is a soft gentle piece of music, this promotes warmth and safety within the advert. 

The first mention of a message for the advert comes in at 1 minute 15 seconds of the video where the message 'Never Knowingly Undersold on quality, price and service' followed by 'Our Lifelong Commitment to You'

This advert is in my opinion a good example of brand building tactics to drive sales rather than a particular product focus. By building the brand name John Lewis put themselves on an invisible pedestal above other department stores like Debenhams or M&S.