It’s for anyone in the defense industry - contractors, government workers, ministers, and think tanks. It’s no more over the top than some of the ads in The Economist seeking applicants for the directorship of this or that government agency.
The market for this publication is limited, but it exists.
I work for a defense contractor, and I do read it from time to time.
When I was in the Navy, Jane’s reference materials (Fighting Ships, All the Worls’d Aircraft, Naval Weapons Systems, etc.) were valuable reference materials maintained on every ship and operational command.
Kind of a parallel in the auto industry. Living in Detroit as I do (normally), you hear advertisements for certain automotive parts and subsystems that you know must be targeted at the auto industry, which, as you may or may not know, employs thousands and thousands of people in the Detroit area. This is a 50Kw station, so it’s potentially broadcasting several hundred miles and being listened to by hundreds of thousands of people. But who’s going to investigate active stability systems? Oh, yeah, the thousands that work in the auto industry, like the assembly line workers? Their supervisors? Automation engineers? Carpenters? No – only the chassis systems engineering group, maybe 50 people in the entire broadcast area!
At least Jane’s is targeted, i.e., it’s not going out to everybody that happens to pick up the signal!
The defense industry is huge, and has it’s own specialist publications and websites, like for instance this one
They look a bit odd because the subject matter is not usually something you see advertised, but then have you ever picked up any really specialist magazine?Medical ones have ads for million-dollar MRI scanners and such, engineering ones have ads for power stations, flight ones have ads for jets, defence ones have ads for defence systems.
Surely you don’t imagine that these things are bought as a result of some totally objective and rational process? :eek: Which brand would you trust to defend you against mixed-mode sudden-emergence threats in the littoral arena? Only Tether-Ferret™ has demonstrated 98% effectiveness in a combat environment
There you go - random bureacrat sees that phrase in a procurement document a few months later and makes sure an RFP goes out to the Tether-Ferret people. Job done.
Plus they can be highly entertaining reading. The founder of Jane’s went to my school so they gave us a complete set of the books for some anniversary or other. Always good to browse through on a rainy afternoon.
I remember reading a forum populated by a wargame designer… one of the guys who wrote the ill-fated Superpower video game.
He remarked that a good set of Jane’s publications was hideously, remarkably expensive.
I’d wager this guy had never seen subscription prices to academic journals or other low-circulation documents.
archmichael, my friend, you have not seen the tip of the iceberg. Come to Washington DC sometime: the whole city and the airwaves are plastered with ads for military equipment. Boeing has run ads here for the missile defense system that costs billions each year to build; I saw an ad on the subway the other day for high grade encryption equipment; there are endless print and TV ads about the Joint Strike Fighter, and on and on and on.
The defense industry is really, really big, and involves lots and lots of money. The audience for the ads include other industry types, defense officials, and the multitudes of people who are involved in making budget decisions, from the White House to Congress and everyone inbetween.
It’s all about face time. The more people know your company is out there building the latest whatever the better chance that people will remember that your company has a history building the latest whatever. This is besides the fact that Janes is one of the biggest spy organizations out there. When I was stationed on a nuke sub we used their books all the time when we were on deployments. The special books we would get before deployment were usually way out of date.
I’m a military history nut, so I got a special kick out of seeing those ads.
I was just trying to figure out if the majority of reader are actual industry people, or military otakus.
Makes you wonder what other funny things happen in the Defence Industry.
“Would you be interested in buying the extended warranty on that Aegis System?”
“Did you see the booth babes at the Heckler & Koch booth?”
“Fabrique Nationale always has the best tchotchkes and the best after party”
“President Mubarak. I know you can get a much better deal on the Rafales, and you can save a lot of money. But when they are all shot down by the F-22’s I just sold to Israel, you are going to be wondering what your savings really were. Now these are friend prices I’m quoting you…”
Dodger Stadium, like most stadiums in the United States, has rotating signboards with ads. Last year the one behind home plate would from time to time come up with an ad for Boeing.
Just in case, I was watching the game and felt the need to buy a jet.
Defense contractors and agribusiness all show up a lot on the Sunday morning talk shows with government figures and pundits.