Once we know something, it becomes hard to imagine what it feels like not to know it.
More quotesAn explained joke is an autopsy with worse catering. Advertising committees perform the same procedure with a straight face: a good image and headline create one satisfying connection, then review adds a sentence in case anyone missed it. Legal adds precision. Sales adds a feature. A senior approver repeats the proposition in larger type. The result cannot be misunderstood because it can no longer be experienced.
Humour and advertising both depend on calibrated collaboration. One inference rooted in familiar knowledge gives the audience the pleasure of arriving half a second early. The visual reveals the saved step. The product name completes the line. Too much work turns communication into an exam; too little turns it into dictation. Obscure references are particularly flattering to their creators because bafflement can be mistaken for sophistication. Different audiences move the boundary. A line that feels beautifully implicit to six people who have reviewed it for a fortnight may be entirely absent to someone seeing the work between two unrelated messages. The useful evidence is what people conclude and which cue got them there before the defence speech begins. When the intended connection appears unaided, the underlining was excess. When five unrelated conclusions appear, the clue was inadequate. Knowing which failure occurred requires the rare creative skill of shutting up long enough to hear somebody else.