4 ms·

Playing the devil's advocate here but are ads really worse these days? If anything, I remember them being a lot worse in the early 2000s (e.g remember "you are

Playing the devil's advocate here but are ads really worse these days? If anything, I remember them being a lot worse in the early 2000s (e.g remember "you are the 1000000th visitor, claim your price" popups, the flashy gifs and the large header banners). These days, I feel they are more tasteful and better targeted. I personally would be sad to see ads go away completely as they form a system of price discrimination which allows poorer people (and kids) to have free access to content (the rich effectively subsidising their access).

jacquesm 11y ago
We must be on different world-wide-webs. I've had the distinct displeasure to use the web without an adblocker for a day or so recently and I couldn't wait to get back to my other browser. It's gotten much worse since the 2000's, the amount of screen real estate given over to ads and the number of animations dwarfed anything I remember from long ago. Ads left, right, above and in the middle of the content, and even in the footer. One page I looked at (the homepage of a popular dutch news site) has no less than six adverts on it, two of them animated and one a 'rotator', taking up a very large fraction of the total available space. Compared to a 1980's newspaper or a 2001 website that's absolutely horrific, all this besides the tracking and other implications. So yes, it's gotten really worse, and not just a little bit. The creatives look better and the 1000000th visitor ads (that were spread through 24x7 mostly) were dumb but there are other metrics than the 'level' at which an ad addresses the audience.
- olalonde 11y ago
  Back then, the majority of amateur websites used to have ads due to being hosted on one of the ad supported platforms (e.g Geocities [1], Angelfire [2], Tripod.com, etc.). Even major web portals had flashy ads at the very top of their home page [3][4][5][6]. Remember at 800x600 resolutions, those ads took a good chunk of the screen. Download portals (where most people got their software) were routinely serving adware/spyware with little risk of backlash [7]. I could go on and on... (thanks for bringing back memories by the way!) I'm not saying you're completely wrong but you seem to remember the past through rose colored glasses. [1] http://www.cnet.com/news/geocitizens-fume-over-watermark/ http://www.cnet.com/news/geocitizens-fume-over-watermark/ [2] http://web.archive.org/web/19990208003328/http://angelfire.com/ http://web.archive.org/web/19990208003328/http://angelfire.c... [3] http://web.archive.org/web/19990208014605/http://www.lycos.com/ http://web.archive.org/web/19990208014605/http://www.lycos.c... [4] http://web.archive.org/web/20000229043301/http://www.altavista.com/ http://web.archive.org/web/20000229043301/http://www.altavis... [5] http://web.archive.org/web/20031012062202/http://yahoo.com http://web.archive.org/web/20031012062202/http://yahoo.com [6] http://web.archive.org/web/20010402054709/http://www.msn.com/ http://web.archive.org/web/20010402054709/http://www.msn.com... [7] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claria_Corporation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claria_Corporation
  - jacquesm 11y ago
    - full screen pop-ups obscuring the entire article - popups that obscure the article after you start reading and scroll down - campaigns that follow you everywhere - advertising in the middle of the text you're reading, in the same font as the article - entire articles written simply to be able to place a product or an ad (advertorials) - pages on which 50% or more is taken over by ads and on and on. Really the web of 2000 was so much more innocent in this respect. Those 640x480 ads were relatively easy to ignore, usually above the fold and maybe a skyscraper along the side but that was about it. Irritating, sure. But nothing compared to being hounded by ads for a specific product because you once googled a particular term or that feeling halfway through reading something that it is simply an un-declared ad. Btw, I host a copy of geocities today and it is entirely ad free :)
lotsoflumens 11y ago
I think it's a lot worse. Once you take yourself out of the cesspool (I cut the TV cable 4 years ago), and start really being careful about your exposure to worst of it, the impact of the few that manage to get past your defenses is magnified.

jacquesm 11y ago

We must be on different world-wide-webs. I've had the distinct displeasure to use the web without an adblocker for a day or so recently and I couldn't wait to get back to my other browser. It's gotten much worse since the 2000's, the amount of screen real estate given over to ads and the number of animations dwarfed anything I remember from long ago. Ads left, right, above and in the middle of the content, and even in the footer. One page I looked at (the homepage of a popular dutch news site) has no less than six adverts on it, two of them animated and one a 'rotator', taking up a very large fraction of the total available space. Compared to a 1980's newspaper or a 2001 website that's absolutely horrific, all this besides the tracking and other implications. So yes, it's gotten really worse, and not just a little bit. The creatives look better and the 1000000th visitor ads (that were spread through 24x7 mostly) were dumb but there are other metrics than the 'level' at which an ad addresses the audience.

olalonde 11y ago
Back then, the majority of amateur websites used to have ads due to being hosted on one of the ad supported platforms (e.g Geocities [1], Angelfire [2], Tripod.com, etc.). Even major web portals had flashy ads at the very top of their home page [3][4][5][6]. Remember at 800x600 resolutions, those ads took a good chunk of the screen. Download portals (where most people got their software) were routinely serving adware/spyware with little risk of backlash [7]. I could go on and on... (thanks for bringing back memories by the way!) I'm not saying you're completely wrong but you seem to remember the past through rose colored glasses. [1] http://www.cnet.com/news/geocitizens-fume-over-watermark/ http://www.cnet.com/news/geocitizens-fume-over-watermark/ [2] http://web.archive.org/web/19990208003328/http://angelfire.com/ http://web.archive.org/web/19990208003328/http://angelfire.c... [3] http://web.archive.org/web/19990208014605/http://www.lycos.com/ http://web.archive.org/web/19990208014605/http://www.lycos.c... [4] http://web.archive.org/web/20000229043301/http://www.altavista.com/ http://web.archive.org/web/20000229043301/http://www.altavis... [5] http://web.archive.org/web/20031012062202/http://yahoo.com http://web.archive.org/web/20031012062202/http://yahoo.com [6] http://web.archive.org/web/20010402054709/http://www.msn.com/ http://web.archive.org/web/20010402054709/http://www.msn.com... [7] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claria_Corporation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claria_Corporation
- jacquesm 11y ago
  - full screen pop-ups obscuring the entire article - popups that obscure the article after you start reading and scroll down - campaigns that follow you everywhere - advertising in the middle of the text you're reading, in the same font as the article - entire articles written simply to be able to place a product or an ad (advertorials) - pages on which 50% or more is taken over by ads and on and on. Really the web of 2000 was so much more innocent in this respect. Those 640x480 ads were relatively easy to ignore, usually above the fold and maybe a skyscraper along the side but that was about it. Irritating, sure. But nothing compared to being hounded by ads for a specific product because you once googled a particular term or that feeling halfway through reading something that it is simply an un-declared ad. Btw, I host a copy of geocities today and it is entirely ad free :)

lotsoflumens 11y ago

I think it's a lot worse. Once you take yourself out of the cesspool (I cut the TV cable 4 years ago), and start really being careful about your exposure to worst of it, the impact of the few that manage to get past your defenses is magnified.