"Did you know that marketers lobbied for underground design and architecture? Long labyrinths and slow escalators allow marketers to exhibit hundreds of hypnotising billboards." I did not. Are there any evidences for this? Tried google something but found nothing.<p>Marketers must be really powerful if they can affect the way underground stations are designed, I thought design is done to be as cheap as possible, since digging all those tunnels is expensive anyway, so making it even more expensive by digging some more tunnels to make them longer sounds indeed horribly.<p>Next:<p>"Angel is the station with the longest escalator in London. The vertical rise is 27.5 meters and the total length is 61 meters, making it 3rd longest in Europe. Flashing pictures don't bring me joy but the long escalator reminds me of the time when I was living in St. Petersburg. The average underground escalator in there is deeper and longer than the average escalator in London, and probably anywhere else. "<p>Ok, so marketers were so powerful also in Soviet Union, as most of the Underground was built then. This gets really interesting. I would never say communists fell into ads tech stuff too.<p>There are obvious shortcomings of ads tech, like intrusive tracking, gathering information that can be used against people (to sell them products for a higher price, refuse job, renting flat, selling insurance, etc.). But article is not mentioning that, only the fact that "ads are selling a dream".<p>Well, they are, believe or not, on the markets of ancient Rome, Babylon or Cuzco sellers were also selling the dream of having the tastiest vegetables, the most durable pots, the best spears and daggers.