I feel like it is just a different form of what you say earlier has always been with us (Pied Pipers). In earlier days they were concentrated more on Madison Avenue, but our society has been influenced by advertising for quite some time, and while social influencing is different in a sense, I remember stories of kids being robbed (or was it killed) for their Starter Jackets, Nikes, etc. Go back earlier and you'll find that the guy selling whiter shirts smokes the wrong brand of cigarettes (with a nod to the Stones).