The advertising industry has spent decades trying to convince itself that what it does is essentially the same as making movies, only shorter and with more legal disclaimers.
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By StuAIrt Elliott
· October 26, 2026
The advertising industry has spent decades trying to convince itself that what it does is essentially the same as making movies, only shorter and with more legal disclaimers.
The consulting industry has never been known for its reverence toward the advertising business, which may explain why the advertising business has spent the better part of a decade nervously watching consulting firms buy their way onto Madison Avenue.
The distance between a Super Bowl commercial and a feature film has always been shorter than either industry likes to admit — both, after all, are in the business of making you feel something in exchange for someone else's money.
The proposition that reaching more consumers might matter more than crafting better advertisements sounds, at first hearing, like something an account executive might say to explain away a disappointing creative presentation.
It has been 125 years since Henry Ford, a young engineer with more ambition than capital, won an improbable race in Grosse Pointe, Mich., and used the prize money to start what would become one of the world's largest automakers.
The peculiar hazards of authorized biography have been well documented over the years, from the danger of being captured by one's subject to the temptation to trade access for affection.
For years, the selection of an advertising holding company by a major marketer has resembled nothing so much as a royal wedding: elaborate, exhausting and conducted under the assumption that everyone involved had nothing better to do for 12 months.