The enduring anachronisms of American TV selling
Stephen White and Charles Dawson
Jim Croce's Ballad Time in a Bottle became a posthumous hit in America in 1974. In an eerie way the words also reveal the attitudes behind America's vast television advertising sales market, and how it sells its wares:
'If I could save time in a bottle The first thing that I'd like to do Is to save every day Till eternity Passes away'
In the US, time is traditionally 'bottled' for sale to advertisers like jars of dill pickles. Tradition...