[...] The work that audiences do, according to Smythe, "is to learn to buy particular 'brands' of consumer demands, and to spend their income accordingly. In short, they work to create demand for advertised goods" (1977, 6). The fact that not all viewers see the ads or respond in anticipated fashion is taken into consideration by Smythe's argument, which considers the overall transformations associated with the rise of consumer society at the aggregate rather than the individual level. Whether or not a particular user responds in a particular way is largely immaterial with respect to the substance of his claims--not last because this diversity is also factored into marketing calculations. What matters is that the rise of a consumer society would have been impossible without a pervasive and powerful advertising industry. As Smythe's analysis in Dependency Road suggests, viewers of advertising "work" at becoming trained consumers--at embracing a consumer-oriented lifestyle, the values that go along with it, and the vocabulary of images and associations upon which it builds. The media industries are not the sole participants in the creation of the audience commodity and its productivity from the perspective of capitalism; they are assisted in this endeavour by the range of social institutions that produce and reproduce consumption-driven lifestyles, including the school system, family, and peer groups.