5 ms·

> more than eight out of ten admitted using an ad blocker As if we should feel guilty about it.

by m0nty 11y ago

jacquesm 11y ago
Hey, at least he spread the knowledge to the remaining two. We're a step or two away from getting internet content delivered as one giant .png file with the ads embedded in the page and an oldfashioned clickable map (remember those?) for links and advertising. That's one way of delivering advertising that can't be blocked that I can think of.
- aikah 11y ago
  > We're a step or two away from getting internet content delivered as one giant .png Well at least it would be a bit more secure ;) but they won't do this. They'll first block users that use ad-blockers then they will just do some sponsored article with brands or just paywall their news sites. Either way it's the end of ad networks as we know them.
  - jacquesm 11y ago
    > They'll first block users that use ad-blockers then they will just do some sponsored article with brands or just paywall their news sites. That requires a website publisher to act against their visitors. Now, some websites will no doubt do this but they're signing their own deathwarrant with a strategy like that. The advertising industry is relatively powerless when it comes to adblocking, the first ad network that blocks access to the pages of the sites it is running on for users of adblockers will surely see a pretty steep drop in the number of websites they're still allowed to serve. So only publishers have that power (and I'm fine with that, if they wish to force me to consume their ads I'm perfectly ok with getting my content elsewhere, it's not as if there is a shortage of content on the internet). Adblockers are forcing a whole class of websites into a variation of the freemium model where the base service is free but only a small percentage is paying because they are still consuming ads. The bigger the ratio between free:paid users the higher the pressure on the remainder to monetize. This will in turn drive some of the remainder towards installing an ad-blocker themselves and so on. This won't end well for the advertising industry, but it is self inflicted wounds for the most part. If advertisers had not structurally overstepped the bounds of the reasonable then adblockers would have never existed in the first place. Sloppy oversight on what ads they allowed to be served up didn't help either. If they really wanted to fix this situation they could simply stop digging the hole any deeper. An actionable plan would look something like this: - immediately stop tracking and profile building, announce this very loudly and stick to it also in the future. - strict oversight on the kind of payloads they allow to be sent out - get rid of the crazy layering of the industry, stick to a simple 3 party model, publisher, advertising agency, consumer (this is a very complex step, agencies do not have the in-house knowledge required to actually serve ads) and take responsibility towards publishers and consumers for the ads served. Lots of people would lose their jobs, lots of websites would likely go under but the industry as a whole would survive. If they can't make a move like this they are in fact milking the cow until it dies and die it will, their actions to date have only accelerated the process. One of the problems that is hard to address is that the advertising industry is in an arms race internally, if one party starts using a new and even more invasive technique to outperform its competitors it gets all the business and this then results in adoption of that technique across the board. And all this to (sarcasm mode on) 'improve your online experience and serve you more relevant content'.
    - TeMPOraL 11y ago
      > That requires a website publisher to act against their visitors. Some do try, but then Google stepped in and told them that if you want to paywall stuff, get ready to disappear from search results. > If they wanted to fix this situation they could simply stop digging the hole any deeper. (...) > (...) > One of the problems that is hard to address is that the advertising industry is in an arms race internally, if one party starts using a new and even more invasive technique to outperform its competitors it gets all the business and this then results in adoption of that technique across the board. Indeed. This is your standard, garden-variety coordination problem. They are not able to execute your plan even if every single ad company was internally on-board with it - because they don't have a way to enforce coordination. Proliferation of ad-blockers may force them to by basically destroy their business model. Typically a government entity is another proven way, but it's hard to enact and enforce something like this on a global Internet sector. Traditionally, I feel obliged to link to this excellent treatment on coordination problems: http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/07/30/meditations-on-moloch/ http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/07/30/meditations-on-moloch/.
      - jacquesm 11y ago
        I've seen that before, that's a great link for individual submission.
        gjm11 11y ago
        It sank pretty much without trace the last two times people submitted it (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9211628 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9211628, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8108619 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8108619). Let's see if it does better this time: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10532551 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10532551.
        jacquesm 11y ago
        It's got my vote. Added a tweet in case that helps too.
  - tdsamardzhiev 11y ago
    I think the future model will be built on compromise. If you tell the users "Please turn the adblocker off for my site, I promise to be reasonable", most of them would actually do it.
    - jacquesm 11y ago
      The problem is that the 'future model' will still involve an ad network (because publishers can't be bothered to do their own direct-to-agency sales and agencies can't be bothered to negotiate directly with publishers). And as soon as that happens the responsibility for enforcing the 'reasonableness' has been passed to a third party and we're back to square one because at least one of them will figure out they can make more money that way. That's what got us into this mess in the first place, we already had your model and it slowly got replaced by the one generating this backlash.
      - ultramancool 11y ago
        Don't worry, once every site is asking users to disable their ad blockers, people will get sick of that and install additional countermeasures. There are already extensions and filtersets to prevent detection and hide these messages, I make sure to enable them for everyone who I install adblock for (usually after removing all the malware they got by clicking ads). It's an unfortunate reality that unless you're fairly tech savvy, ads will not only track you but infect you. I've given up completely, no request to disable an adblocker is "reasonable" and there's no such thing as an "acceptable ad" anymore.

> more than eight out of ten admitted using an ad blocker As if we should feel guilty about it.

by m0nty 11y ago

> more than eight out of ten admitted using an ad blocker As if we should feel guilty about it.

Hey, at least he spread the knowledge to the remaining two. We're a step or two away from getting internet content delivered as one giant .png file with the ads embedded in the page and an oldfashioned clickable map (remember those?) for links and advertising. That's one way of delivering advertising that can't be blocked that I can think of.

aikah 11y ago
> We're a step or two away from getting internet content delivered as one giant .png Well at least it would be a bit more secure ;) but they won't do this. They'll first block users that use ad-blockers then they will just do some sponsored article with brands or just paywall their news sites. Either way it's the end of ad networks as we know them.
- jacquesm 11y ago
  > They'll first block users that use ad-blockers then they will just do some sponsored article with brands or just paywall their news sites. That requires a website publisher to act against their visitors. Now, some websites will no doubt do this but they're signing their own deathwarrant with a strategy like that. The advertising industry is relatively powerless when it comes to adblocking, the first ad network that blocks access to the pages of the sites it is running on for users of adblockers will surely see a pretty steep drop in the number of websites they're still allowed to serve. So only publishers have that power (and I'm fine with that, if they wish to force me to consume their ads I'm perfectly ok with getting my content elsewhere, it's not as if there is a shortage of content on the internet). Adblockers are forcing a whole class of websites into a variation of the freemium model where the base service is free but only a small percentage is paying because they are still consuming ads. The bigger the ratio between free:paid users the higher the pressure on the remainder to monetize. This will in turn drive some of the remainder towards installing an ad-blocker themselves and so on. This won't end well for the advertising industry, but it is self inflicted wounds for the most part. If advertisers had not structurally overstepped the bounds of the reasonable then adblockers would have never existed in the first place. Sloppy oversight on what ads they allowed to be served up didn't help either. If they really wanted to fix this situation they could simply stop digging the hole any deeper. An actionable plan would look something like this: - immediately stop tracking and profile building, announce this very loudly and stick to it also in the future. - strict oversight on the kind of payloads they allow to be sent out - get rid of the crazy layering of the industry, stick to a simple 3 party model, publisher, advertising agency, consumer (this is a very complex step, agencies do not have the in-house knowledge required to actually serve ads) and take responsibility towards publishers and consumers for the ads served. Lots of people would lose their jobs, lots of websites would likely go under but the industry as a whole would survive. If they can't make a move like this they are in fact milking the cow until it dies and die it will, their actions to date have only accelerated the process. One of the problems that is hard to address is that the advertising industry is in an arms race internally, if one party starts using a new and even more invasive technique to outperform its competitors it gets all the business and this then results in adoption of that technique across the board. And all this to (sarcasm mode on) 'improve your online experience and serve you more relevant content'.
  - TeMPOraL 11y ago
    > That requires a website publisher to act against their visitors. Some do try, but then Google stepped in and told them that if you want to paywall stuff, get ready to disappear from search results. > If they wanted to fix this situation they could simply stop digging the hole any deeper. (...) > (...) > One of the problems that is hard to address is that the advertising industry is in an arms race internally, if one party starts using a new and even more invasive technique to outperform its competitors it gets all the business and this then results in adoption of that technique across the board. Indeed. This is your standard, garden-variety coordination problem. They are not able to execute your plan even if every single ad company was internally on-board with it - because they don't have a way to enforce coordination. Proliferation of ad-blockers may force them to by basically destroy their business model. Typically a government entity is another proven way, but it's hard to enact and enforce something like this on a global Internet sector. Traditionally, I feel obliged to link to this excellent treatment on coordination problems: http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/07/30/meditations-on-moloch/ http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/07/30/meditations-on-moloch/.
    - jacquesm 11y ago
      I've seen that before, that's a great link for individual submission.
      - gjm11 11y ago
        It sank pretty much without trace the last two times people submitted it (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9211628 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9211628, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8108619 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8108619). Let's see if it does better this time: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10532551 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10532551.
        jacquesm 11y ago
        It's got my vote. Added a tweet in case that helps too.
- tdsamardzhiev 11y ago
  I think the future model will be built on compromise. If you tell the users "Please turn the adblocker off for my site, I promise to be reasonable", most of them would actually do it.
  - jacquesm 11y ago
    The problem is that the 'future model' will still involve an ad network (because publishers can't be bothered to do their own direct-to-agency sales and agencies can't be bothered to negotiate directly with publishers). And as soon as that happens the responsibility for enforcing the 'reasonableness' has been passed to a third party and we're back to square one because at least one of them will figure out they can make more money that way. That's what got us into this mess in the first place, we already had your model and it slowly got replaced by the one generating this backlash.
    - ultramancool 11y ago
      Don't worry, once every site is asking users to disable their ad blockers, people will get sick of that and install additional countermeasures. There are already extensions and filtersets to prevent detection and hide these messages, I make sure to enable them for everyone who I install adblock for (usually after removing all the malware they got by clicking ads). It's an unfortunate reality that unless you're fairly tech savvy, ads will not only track you but infect you. I've given up completely, no request to disable an adblocker is "reasonable" and there's no such thing as an "acceptable ad" anymore.