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I don't understand the total allergy to advertising expressed above. I personally don't like commercial television (I hate interruptions in the middle of a sho

I don't understand the total allergy to advertising expressed above. I personally don't like commercial television (I hate interruptions in the middle of a show), or pop-ups that get in the way of me reading a page, or pages that are so plastered with ads that it's hard to find the content. But when I search on Google for a particular kind of product, and it shows me ads for a new instance of that product (that doesn't yet have the organic PageRank), I'm happy to click on the ad to find out about it. "A bit of advertising" that's well enough targeted and tastefully presented is absolutely a good thing. Every show in a TV series or movie is an advertisement for the next show or installment. Every book is an advertisement for its sequel. Every blog post is an advertisement for the next blog post. Every blog post, Facebook comment, video, or friend telling you about a product is an advertisement for that product. Many of those aren't paid advertisements, but many secretly are. Saying that "advertising" is blanket wrong is the same as saying "learning about new things is wrong." Because how could you find out about something new if it weren't advertised somehow? What exactly are you protesting?

roymurdock 11y ago
Great point. People need to define which ads they are talking about during these sorts of arguments, as "ads" can be thought of as any sort of content that spreads information about a new product or idea as you point out.
- copsarebastards 11y ago
  I don't think it's a great point, I think it's a point that shows no understanding of context. This thread is about ad blockers. Ad blockers don't block blog posts, books, or any of the things he brought up. If you know what "ads" means here, it's not because people need to define what ads they are talking about, it's because you're not paying attention.
  - SomeCallMeTim 11y ago
    Ad blockers absolutely block the ads at the top and of Google searches, which I specifically sited as useful.
    - copsarebastards 11y ago
      Well, I don't agree. I don't find those useful. If it's what I am searching for, it should be the top search result, otherwise I don't want to see it. And for the record, I would pay for a search engine without ads (probably DuckDuckGo).
  - throwaway2048 11y ago
    puppies are basicly ads, you wouldnt brutally slaughter puppies would you????
RodericDay 11y ago
Well, I don't have a magic machine that allows me to suss out the intent of someone when they make a recommendation. However, if the recommendation is not truly heartfelt or organic, if the purveyor of the recommendation is a specialist not in the domain of the product but in the domain of making recommendations, it's an "advertisement" and not just a casual recommendation. And I would prefer a life of haphazard discovery and missing out on a few good products, than a life of having to battle salesmen trying to butt into every aspect of my experience. Saying that "advertising" is blanket wrong is saying that becoming an expert on selling things regardless of what the things actually are is wrong. It may be a bit of an old-fashioned idea in our age of professional specialization and whatnot, but I stand by it.
copsarebastards 11y ago
> "A bit of advertising" that's well enough targeted and tastefully presented is absolutely a good thing. Every show in a TV series or movie is an advertisement for the next show or installment. Every book is an advertisement for its sequel. Every blog post is an advertisement for the next blog post. Every blog post, Facebook comment, video, or friend telling you about a product is an advertisement for that product. Many of those aren't paid advertisements, but many secretly are. If you want to include those things in your definition of advertising, fine, but let's be clear here: that's not what most people here are talking about. Ad-blockers don't block those things. That's certainly not the definition of "advertisement" I use, either. I have no problem with individuals asking me to check out their thing. It's entirely a different thing for someone to tie this request in with a piece of content in a way that isn't easily separable, using psychologically studied manipulation techniques to invade the very chemistry of my brain, and decrease the quality of my overall experience while doing so, invading my space with their noise and light, telling me my girlfriend isn't hot enough, my clothes aren't nice enough, my penis isn't large enough, I don't make enough money. Fuck those people. There's no way that this is subtle enough that I'm going to be okay with it.
- SomeCallMeTim 11y ago
  "No True Scotsman." You're saying that you define "advertisements" as the things you don't like. Google ads sometimes miss the mark, but often are for exactly what I'm searching for. Why would I condemn them along with penis enlargement ads? And ad blockers absolutely block those things -- Google ads in particular. I just saw, in another thread, how one ad blocker would pull out an ad embedded in the page that was tasteful and relevant, just based on its css class. And the ad block developer was proud of doing this, to the point of mocking the web site creator in the same thread. My point is that advertising is a spectrum, and you can't just "block all ads" without throwing out the good as well. And a related point is that some advertising is good. What I was responding to was the allegation that all advertising is bad. And until you're willing to pay for the content you create, that advertising is necessary to pay for it. I pay for Netflix and Amazon Prime to avoid commercials.
  - 11y ago
pdkl95 11y ago
Advertising has approximately the same "context switch" problem[1] that programmers often complain about. By definition, an advertisement is not the thing I'm currently involved with. At best, a even a "tasteful" ad requires you to 0. Interrupt whatever you were doing. 1. Parse text or recognize the basic features of an image. 2. Run whatever heuristics you use to decide if the parsed data is an ad. 3. Try to skip past the ad, either temporally or spatially. 4. *Continue* to monitor the ad until you recognize that it no longer impedes the thing you interrupted in #0. These are complex behaviors that have non-trivial costs. The only reason you don't see those costs some of the time is because you've invested a lot of time and effort learning these skills. If you abstain from all advertising for a few months, the parsing costs will become much more obvious. > every If your definition of "advert" is so broad it includes everything, it's not a particularly useful definition. Ad blockers (and this discussion in general) are talking about ads that are not the content the user requested; otherwise ad blockers would ban the entire page. [1] http://heeris.id.au/2013/this-is-why-you-shouldnt-interrupt-a-programmer/ http://heeris.id.au/2013/this-is-why-you-shouldnt-interrupt-...
- SomeCallMeTim 11y ago
  >Advertising has approximately the same "context switch" problem[1] that programmers often complain about. By definition, an advertisement is not the thing I'm currently involved with. No, it doesn't. A good Google ad will be about the exact thing you're searching for. And yet ad blockers will aggressively attempt to block every such ad. >Ad blockers (and this discussion in general) are talking about ads that are not the content the user requested; otherwise ad blockers would ban the entire page. They block Google ads, and so are blocking content that can be useful to the user.
  - throwaway2048 11y ago
    If its exactly what I want, why is it an ad, and not the first result.
    - SomeCallMeTim 11y ago

roymurdock 11y ago

Great point. People need to define which ads they are talking about during these sorts of arguments, as "ads" can be thought of as any sort of content that spreads information about a new product or idea as you point out.

copsarebastards 11y ago
I don't think it's a great point, I think it's a point that shows no understanding of context. This thread is about ad blockers. Ad blockers don't block blog posts, books, or any of the things he brought up. If you know what "ads" means here, it's not because people need to define what ads they are talking about, it's because you're not paying attention.
- SomeCallMeTim 11y ago
  Ad blockers absolutely block the ads at the top and of Google searches, which I specifically sited as useful.
  - copsarebastards 11y ago
    Well, I don't agree. I don't find those useful. If it's what I am searching for, it should be the top search result, otherwise I don't want to see it. And for the record, I would pay for a search engine without ads (probably DuckDuckGo).
- throwaway2048 11y ago
  puppies are basicly ads, you wouldnt brutally slaughter puppies would you????

RodericDay 11y ago

Well, I don't have a magic machine that allows me to suss out the intent of someone when they make a recommendation. However, if the recommendation is not truly heartfelt or organic, if the purveyor of the recommendation is a specialist not in the domain of the product but in the domain of making recommendations, it's an "advertisement" and not just a casual recommendation. And I would prefer a life of haphazard discovery and missing out on a few good products, than a life of having to battle salesmen trying to butt into every aspect of my experience. Saying that "advertising" is blanket wrong is saying that becoming an expert on selling things regardless of what the things actually are is wrong. It may be a bit of an old-fashioned idea in our age of professional specialization and whatnot, but I stand by it.

copsarebastards 11y ago

> "A bit of advertising" that's well enough targeted and tastefully presented is absolutely a good thing. Every show in a TV series or movie is an advertisement for the next show or installment. Every book is an advertisement for its sequel. Every blog post is an advertisement for the next blog post. Every blog post, Facebook comment, video, or friend telling you about a product is an advertisement for that product. Many of those aren't paid advertisements, but many secretly are. If you want to include those things in your definition of advertising, fine, but let's be clear here: that's not what most people here are talking about. Ad-blockers don't block those things. That's certainly not the definition of "advertisement" I use, either. I have no problem with individuals asking me to check out their thing. It's entirely a different thing for someone to tie this request in with a piece of content in a way that isn't easily separable, using psychologically studied manipulation techniques to invade the very chemistry of my brain, and decrease the quality of my overall experience while doing so, invading my space with their noise and light, telling me my girlfriend isn't hot enough, my clothes aren't nice enough, my penis isn't large enough, I don't make enough money. Fuck those people. There's no way that this is subtle enough that I'm going to be okay with it.

SomeCallMeTim 11y ago
"No True Scotsman." You're saying that you define "advertisements" as the things you don't like. Google ads sometimes miss the mark, but often are for exactly what I'm searching for. Why would I condemn them along with penis enlargement ads? And ad blockers absolutely block those things -- Google ads in particular. I just saw, in another thread, how one ad blocker would pull out an ad embedded in the page that was tasteful and relevant, just based on its css class. And the ad block developer was proud of doing this, to the point of mocking the web site creator in the same thread. My point is that advertising is a spectrum, and you can't just "block all ads" without throwing out the good as well. And a related point is that some advertising is good. What I was responding to was the allegation that all advertising is bad. And until you're willing to pay for the content you create, that advertising is necessary to pay for it. I pay for Netflix and Amazon Prime to avoid commercials.
- 11y ago

pdkl95 11y ago

Advertising has approximately the same "context switch" problem[1] that programmers often complain about. By definition, an advertisement is not the thing I'm currently involved with. At best, a even a "tasteful" ad requires you to 0. Interrupt whatever you were doing. 1. Parse text or recognize the basic features of an image. 2. Run whatever heuristics you use to decide if the parsed data is an ad. 3. Try to skip past the ad, either temporally or spatially. 4. *Continue* to monitor the ad until you recognize that it no longer impedes the thing you interrupted in #0. These are complex behaviors that have non-trivial costs. The only reason you don't see those costs some of the time is because you've invested a lot of time and effort learning these skills. If you abstain from all advertising for a few months, the parsing costs will become much more obvious. > every If your definition of "advert" is so broad it includes everything, it's not a particularly useful definition. Ad blockers (and this discussion in general) are talking about ads that are not the content the user requested; otherwise ad blockers would ban the entire page. [1] http://heeris.id.au/2013/this-is-why-you-shouldnt-interrupt-a-programmer/ http://heeris.id.au/2013/this-is-why-you-shouldnt-interrupt-...

SomeCallMeTim 11y ago
>Advertising has approximately the same "context switch" problem[1] that programmers often complain about. By definition, an advertisement is not the thing I'm currently involved with. No, it doesn't. A good Google ad will be about the exact thing you're searching for. And yet ad blockers will aggressively attempt to block every such ad. >Ad blockers (and this discussion in general) are talking about ads that are not the content the user requested; otherwise ad blockers would ban the entire page. They block Google ads, and so are blocking content that can be useful to the user.
- throwaway2048 11y ago
  If its exactly what I want, why is it an ad, and not the first result.
  - SomeCallMeTim 11y ago