In 2005, Coca Cola, Speedo and others spent a paltry one million on research into embedding ads in our dreams. eMarketer predicts that companies will be spending more than three billion on in-sleep advertising by 2020.
Here’s how it works (but not really):
All in-sleep subjects have a procedure to implant a nanobot (a tiny robot about the size of a blood cell) into that part of the brain where dreams originate — the pons in the brainstem. Once the chip is in place, it acts something like a wireless base-station, sending and receiving signals from other nanobots.
Before an in-sleep subject goes to bed they put a small device in their ear, not dissimilar to a cochlear implant. When the subject moves into REM (rapid eye movement) sleep, the implant is triggered (by the increase in delta waves) and a nanobot containing the appropriate advertising message is released into the spiral artery of the ear and down through to the cochlear canal. Once it reaches the blood brain barrier, it is programmed to wirelessly send an electrical signal (the advertisement) to the nanobot located in the pons. That nanobot receives the signal, sources the appropriate neuroreceptor and implants the ad.
How did I not think of that?
If this comes to pass, what else could 2020 have in store for the discriminating consumer? Flying cars for sure. No baldness. Flexibile, rubbery skin, eyesight like hawks, virtual sex that’s better than even the kind of sex that is really, really good?
I can’t wait!