Why it matters: Advertisements are showing up everywhere as brands get increasingly desperate for sales amid a rocky economic stretch, as Axios' Sara Fischer and Hope King recently reported.Companies that run such shows promote them as the future of aerial advertising — the 21st century equivalent of having a banner ad towed slowly across the sky.Background: Using aircraft to get consumers' attention is a time-honored tradition — the country's oldest banner plane outfit, Paramount Air Service based in southern New Jersey, has been operating since 1945.Go deeper: Some communities are embracing drone shows as a climate-friendly fireworks alternative, as Jennifer A. Kingson has reported.What's next: Forget the sky just over your head — researchers are hard at work figuring out how to develop satellite-based "space billboards.""