The Times Square Victor(s)

There has been much talk about the "me" generation. For those of you that haven't heard, the chatter is all about our new generations' fascination with the "me." Since we now have the power to easily post the happenings of our lives on sites like Facebook and Twitter, we have become way too preoccupied with ourselves. What fun is it to go to a party if we cannot post the pictures up on Facebook the next day? It seems like every smart company out there is taking advantage of our mesmerization and have somehow incorporated it into their advertising campaigns. This fact rears it ugly head when I walk through Times Square every morning on my way to work and see a huge gathering of people outside of Forever 21 trying to catch a glimpse of themselves on the interactive billboard. Everyone stands there with their cell phones out, snapping pictures of themselves. Every picture inevitably includes the numbers 21, which are placed strategically within the display. Not only is Forever 21 amassing a huge crowd of tourists outside its stores every day, but I bet many of these people choose to share this picture with all of their Facebook friends, becoming brand advocates in the process. As I walked through Times Square staring squeamishly at these people who seemed to have lost sight of themselves, I saw ANOTHER group gathered doing the exact same thing in front of another store. I didn't catch what other store it was since I was still rushing to work, but I bet it was American Eagle, who has recently rolled out an interactive billboard of its own. With all of the billboards on Times Square fighting for attention, may I present you the victors!  As I conducted research online trying to figure out if this constituted copyright infringement (it doesn't) I learned that the Forever 21 billboard also features individual people who have tweeted or written about the company. Talk about capitalizing on the "me" generation!