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I've already addressed your claims in this thread, but as for these new arguments: > most won't This is an unsubstantiated claim. > subscription models have

• ry_ry 11y ago
  Wikipedia does have a large, irritating begging banner though, so kinda. I guess.
  • bovermyer 11y ago
    That banner is directly from the service itself, which means the product is still Wikipedia, not its users. Very important distinction.
  • tommorris 11y ago
    It isn't there for 11 months of the year.
• gjm11 11y ago
  I mostly agree with you, but ... > Not only is this a cheap emotional gambit, it pre-supposes that they are currently getting content for free. I don't think it does. The poorer you are, the more money is worth to you relative to other things. (Because as you get more money, what you spend it on is in rough order of priority, which means the things you buy when richer are less valuable to you per dollar than the things you buy when poorer.) In particular, other things being equal, money is worth more to you relative to attention when you are poorer. Therefore, "cheaper internet but more ads" is a better tradeoff for richer people than for poorer people. So it's at least credible that relatively-well-off people agitating for more expensive internet but fewer ads might, if successful, make life worse overall for poorer people. (This is far from watertight. For instance, if being poor makes ads more harmful to you or reduces the total amount of attention you can bestow on things -- for both of which I can at least imagine possible mechanisms -- then more-ads-more-money might not after all be a better tradeoff for poorer people than richer people even though X more-X-more-money is for most bad things X.)
• mahranch 11y ago
  > Not only is this a cheap emotional gambit Are you really suggesting or implying that the poor won't be affected by this? This is a huge issue and trying to claim the concern isn't valid by calling it "a cheap emotional gambit" is shockingly dishonest and disingenuous. Quite the contrary, it's a massive concern. It's reminds me of the whole idiotic & naive "flat tax" ideology. Millionaires love the idea because it hurts the poor the most. They're the ones most directly impacted. > it pre-supposes that they are currently getting content for free. They are. Practically the entire internet is free. Do you have to pay to use youtube, facebook or reddit? Do you pay when you go to carforums.com and chat with other people about cars? Or video game forums to chat about the latest Call of duty game? If you instead had to pay a $5 per month subscription to youtube, or reddit or facebook, the entire internet changes overnight. The fact you don't see this pretty much solidifies my idea that you really haven't thought this through. > Do academic websites have ads in your world? Does wikipedia? Are you suggesting people only educate themselves on wikipedia and academic websites? Because I've learned considerably more from non-academic sites. Sites like Reddit's /r/Askscience, /r/TodayIlearned or /r/Askhistory. Or sites that popularize learning & education, like Mentafloss, Zidbits or even Cracked.com > You seem to have a very inaccurate view of what is available on the internet. No, quite the opposite. You haven't really began to comprehend just how much of an impact the changes you suggest would be. And how it would eventually directly & indirectly effect everything else. You haven't fully connected all the dots yet. Do you know how I know you haven't connected all the dots yet? Because nobody has. Nobody can predict the outcome of something like that, though we can make some educated guesses about some things. I think that's the difference between our opinions; I freely admit that I have no idea, while you claim to know everything and have an answer for everything. Only, that's impossible. Nobody is omniscient.
  • pdkl95 11y ago
    > Are you really suggesting or implying that the poor won't be affected by this? Due to some unfortunate medical issues, I currently live just barely above the poverty line (SSDI). I have about $100/year that I can spend on "fun" things like my fastmail account. I will be able to afford very few paywalls, if any. The people I know personally that currently live below the poverty line are sick of being taken advantage of by supposedly "free" services. Don't you dare try to tell me how you think the poor will be affected by any of this. > Practically the entire internet is free Some of it, like wikipedia, is free because it is funded by the community (a funding model that you seem very reluctant to acknowledge). As for the youtube/etc, I already covered that in a previous reply[1]. The rest... is not free. Services like google or facebook may not cost money, but only a naive fool would describe their services as free. If, by some chance, you are actually ignorant of how their business model actually works, you should watch Aral Balkan's very good overview of how you are the product[2]. > Because I've learned considerably more from non-academic sites. I can tell. You might want to consider studying better sources. I have nothing against those places, but there are significantly better educational sources available on the internet. > You haven't fully connected all the dots yet. I never claimed I had. I only know what I've seen, and I've seen the internet slowly crumble. NAT ruined the power to publish freely[3], and advertising became a perverse incentive working against actual journalism and creativity. On the other hand, you seem unable to acknowledge that advertising is only one type of funding model, and you seem very naive regarding the actual costs that model exacts on society. Explore more of the internet, and think of creative ways to approach the question of funding. If you are observant, you may notice that there are quite a few successful creative endeavors that exist outside of the world of advertising. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10730416 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10730416 [2] https://projectbullrun.org/surveillance/2015/video-2015.html#balkan https://projectbullrun.org/surveillance/2015/video-2015.html... [3] https://www.fourmilab.ch/documents/digital-imprimatur/ https://www.fourmilab.ch/documents/digital-imprimatur/