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I dislike nearly all ads and want the ability to block any ads I dislike. But the fundamental question is: without advertising, how do you learn about products

by p4wnc6 11y ago

I dislike nearly all ads and want the ability to block any ads I dislike. But the fundamental question is: without advertising, how do you learn about products you might want to buy? Ad-funded search is not a good answer, and in the limit, proprietary search result ordering would be just another type of advertising. Word of mouth is slow and unreliable, especially if you are looking for unusual things or if your preferences are often unusual compared with the people you ask for reviews. The only thing I dislike more than ads is social media, so that's not an option. When I personally bear a higher cost conducting a product search to fit my needs than the costs of viewing ads, then ads are better and they do add value. This is not a heroic defense of the abject shit ads that litter the internet, the rampant malware or tracking, the creepy attempts at unnecessarily specific personalization, or content creators selling out. But it's also not reasonable to say the Platonic idea of an ad is intrinsically unethical or intrinsically cost-ineffective.

AndrewKemendo 11y ago
Advertising is a spectrum. A landing page for a product is advertising, but so are popups. The difference is that one is pull the other is push. Same with offline. Junk mail is push, billboards are push etc... those are the things that people complain about. I'm almost certain that nobody has ever complained about pull advertising - so the hyperbole of the article isn't that. What you describe with searching would come down to pull advertising, because you are asking for it, not being shown it out of context. The answer to your question though actually leads to a much less desirable future: A search engine would know you and your behaviors so well, that when you ask for something it knows exactly your preference and gives you the most relevant return. In effect you end up with the same system we have now, only much more in depth.
- p4wnc6 11y ago
  > What you describe with searching would come down to pull advertising, because you are asking for it, not being shown it out of context. What determines the "context" for what you are "asking" to be advertised from? I'd argue that your choices about what to click, what content to read, etc., all also place as much context as what you explicitly type. More importantly though, as I mentioned in my other comment above about Leesa Mattresses, the specific benefit of ads is for push ads, not pull ads. The whole point is that there is something you want, but you've arrived at the conclusion that either it doesn't exist, or that you've already paid a search cost for trying to find it and you didn't find it and so you're less likely to engage in a pull search on your own. You may still want to know about the new product. Imagine it like an RSS feed. There are the "pull" subscriptions to the blogs you already know that you want. But what if you also want a certain kind of blog that you don't know about yet? If you only look at your RSS feed, it cannot ever possibly come. There has to be another feed, of sorts, that pushes content at you that you did not previously explicitly agree to. A lot of it will be noise, but sometimes it will show you something you wanted that's outside your sphere of pulls, and then you can add it to the pulls. I think this might even be the majority of things that I want. I don't usually respond to a direct need in my life and then say, "Hmm ... what are my options for solving this need?" Normally, I have vague awareness of a whole bunch of things I might want, and they are at various states of being "filed away for later" in my brain, which determines how likely or unlikely it is that I would exogenously come up with the thought to search for it. Many times I benefit from something I never asked to have hit my eyes nonetheless hitting them and making me aware of something I didn't know about, or that I had filed away and would not have actively generated the thought to find it. Whether the value-to-noise ratio is in favor of this arrangement is the big problem. The standard ads online have such a poor noise volume that it's almost never worth it. But, in principle, it could be worth it. Which is why the idea of a push ad is, potentially, a very good thing.
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
a_imho 11y ago
I don't think most people learn about products through online advertising, rather just shaping their preferences. But if that is the case for you, just let ads through. I think the more appropriate phrasing is that dodging specific content is not intrinsically unethical and providers are not entitled to profit from it. Customers are not the one complaining, they are taking action.
- p4wnc6 11y ago
  It is the case for me in a really small number of situations. I want to block most ads just like everyone else. I only bring this up to point out that the Platonic idea of an ad can be a good thing. The OP takes the untenable and extreme position that the concept of an ad is inherently bad, by definition. I don't think that's a reasonable point of view, even though I also support the proliferation of great ad blocking tools and want 99.999999% of current online ad practices to go away.
dota_fanatic 11y ago
I find it very hard to believe that ads out-perform your personal search of whatever you're looking for, even currently. I have never, not once, found a product because of an ad that I wouldn't have found otherwise in looking for the solution to a problem I was having. I have, countless times over my life, especially when I was younger, bought something based on judgement directly based on ads, that turned out to be the wrong choice. When you go to a mall, there's a directory. It'd be even nicer if there was an automated directory so you could peruse at arbitrary granularity before entering stores. Why isn't there a global directory of products, with a reputation system? Why is there no directory online for all the stores within 15min of my home, including people selling out of home, that I can search through? Isn't this driving everyone crazy? I don't care that there exists some Platonic good side to ads, because that good side is not how they're used in the big picture, at all, anymore, and it's just looking the other way from a serious flaw in modern markets. People buying stuff for no good reason other than that they wanted it, not needed it, has gotten an entire planet into a heap of trouble. Let's do less of that, maybe? And let's start making a system to enables people in need of a product in touch with those who can provide a solution, NOT the other way around.
- p4wnc6 11y ago
  Here's one example. I like listening to comedy podcasts from Ear Wolf. I heard an ad for Leesa Mattresses, and happen to need a mattress. After buying mattresses in the past, one of the major pain points for me is actually physically hauling the mattress and carrying it up steps to an apartment. Leesa sells mattresses that are compressed in a special way into a box the size of a mini-fridge, and can be relatively easily carried up steps by a single person. This shipping detail alone makes me much more interested in their product, and I could potentially compromise some on price or quality to get that unique shipping service. I didn't even know any brand did this, and basically had completely put it out of my mind. Some time ago I wrote it off as something I couldn't find, and the activation energy to get my brain to generate a desire to actively search for this feature became really high. Then, sometime later, Leesa came into existence as a seller. My activation energy makes it unlikely that I will choose to search for this feature (I searched before, came to the belief it didn't exist, and don't want to deal with the search cost again under this belief). Thankfully, an ad was pushed into my ears as I listened to a podcast I like, which alerted me to a new company with a new service that I did want, but for which it is extremely unlikely I would have thought to search on my own. Even in the case when I did remember that I want that feature, overcome my belief that no one provides it, sluggishly open a new tab in Chrome, and type out that search, and I find Leesa via a Google search, that's really no different than an ad. It's a function of how many others heard about Leesa (originally through means other than themselves just searching directly) and successfully interacted with them, and the effect of increased reputation as a seller. However, it does rely on me sort of exogenously coming up with the cognitive wherewithal to do the search, rather to be passively advertised at. There's a ton of stuff where this trade-off between relying on manually searching vs. being passively advertised at is in favor of experiencing passive ads. I was very happy to be passively advertised at in that case. Whatever research Leesa did to determine that audio ads through that podcast had a good chance of successfully reaching people who might want that service, it was good work on their part, and made a certain tiny corner of the economy slightly more efficient in a certain way. There is every potential that online ads could be used the same way, and it seems efficient to me to place the research cost burden of how to best place ads onto the advertisers, not onto consumers who then have to overcome activation barriers to engage in searches.

by p4wnc6 11y ago

AndrewKemendo 11y ago

Advertising is a spectrum. A landing page for a product is advertising, but so are popups. The difference is that one is pull the other is push. Same with offline. Junk mail is push, billboards are push etc... those are the things that people complain about. I'm almost certain that nobody has ever complained about pull advertising - so the hyperbole of the article isn't that. What you describe with searching would come down to pull advertising, because you are asking for it, not being shown it out of context. The answer to your question though actually leads to a much less desirable future: A search engine would know you and your behaviors so well, that when you ask for something it knows exactly your preference and gives you the most relevant return. In effect you end up with the same system we have now, only much more in depth.

p4wnc6 11y ago
> What you describe with searching would come down to pull advertising, because you are asking for it, not being shown it out of context. What determines the "context" for what you are "asking" to be advertised from? I'd argue that your choices about what to click, what content to read, etc., all also place as much context as what you explicitly type. More importantly though, as I mentioned in my other comment above about Leesa Mattresses, the specific benefit of ads is for push ads, not pull ads. The whole point is that there is something you want, but you've arrived at the conclusion that either it doesn't exist, or that you've already paid a search cost for trying to find it and you didn't find it and so you're less likely to engage in a pull search on your own. You may still want to know about the new product. Imagine it like an RSS feed. There are the "pull" subscriptions to the blogs you already know that you want. But what if you also want a certain kind of blog that you don't know about yet? If you only look at your RSS feed, it cannot ever possibly come. There has to be another feed, of sorts, that pushes content at you that you did not previously explicitly agree to. A lot of it will be noise, but sometimes it will show you something you wanted that's outside your sphere of pulls, and then you can add it to the pulls. I think this might even be the majority of things that I want. I don't usually respond to a direct need in my life and then say, "Hmm ... what are my options for solving this need?" Normally, I have vague awareness of a whole bunch of things I might want, and they are at various states of being "filed away for later" in my brain, which determines how likely or unlikely it is that I would exogenously come up with the thought to search for it. Many times I benefit from something I never asked to have hit my eyes nonetheless hitting them and making me aware of something I didn't know about, or that I had filed away and would not have actively generated the thought to find it. Whether the value-to-noise ratio is in favor of this arrangement is the big problem. The standard ads online have such a poor noise volume that it's almost never worth it. But, in principle, it could be worth it. Which is why the idea of a push ad is, potentially, a very good thing.

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

a_imho 11y ago

I don't think most people learn about products through online advertising, rather just shaping their preferences. But if that is the case for you, just let ads through. I think the more appropriate phrasing is that dodging specific content is not intrinsically unethical and providers are not entitled to profit from it. Customers are not the one complaining, they are taking action.

p4wnc6 11y ago
It is the case for me in a really small number of situations. I want to block most ads just like everyone else. I only bring this up to point out that the Platonic idea of an ad can be a good thing. The OP takes the untenable and extreme position that the concept of an ad is inherently bad, by definition. I don't think that's a reasonable point of view, even though I also support the proliferation of great ad blocking tools and want 99.999999% of current online ad practices to go away.

dota_fanatic 11y ago

I find it very hard to believe that ads out-perform your personal search of whatever you're looking for, even currently. I have never, not once, found a product because of an ad that I wouldn't have found otherwise in looking for the solution to a problem I was having. I have, countless times over my life, especially when I was younger, bought something based on judgement directly based on ads, that turned out to be the wrong choice. When you go to a mall, there's a directory. It'd be even nicer if there was an automated directory so you could peruse at arbitrary granularity before entering stores. Why isn't there a global directory of products, with a reputation system? Why is there no directory online for all the stores within 15min of my home, including people selling out of home, that I can search through? Isn't this driving everyone crazy? I don't care that there exists some Platonic good side to ads, because that good side is not how they're used in the big picture, at all, anymore, and it's just looking the other way from a serious flaw in modern markets. People buying stuff for no good reason other than that they wanted it, not needed it, has gotten an entire planet into a heap of trouble. Let's do less of that, maybe? And let's start making a system to enables people in need of a product in touch with those who can provide a solution, NOT the other way around.

p4wnc6 11y ago
Here's one example. I like listening to comedy podcasts from Ear Wolf. I heard an ad for Leesa Mattresses, and happen to need a mattress. After buying mattresses in the past, one of the major pain points for me is actually physically hauling the mattress and carrying it up steps to an apartment. Leesa sells mattresses that are compressed in a special way into a box the size of a mini-fridge, and can be relatively easily carried up steps by a single person. This shipping detail alone makes me much more interested in their product, and I could potentially compromise some on price or quality to get that unique shipping service. I didn't even know any brand did this, and basically had completely put it out of my mind. Some time ago I wrote it off as something I couldn't find, and the activation energy to get my brain to generate a desire to actively search for this feature became really high. Then, sometime later, Leesa came into existence as a seller. My activation energy makes it unlikely that I will choose to search for this feature (I searched before, came to the belief it didn't exist, and don't want to deal with the search cost again under this belief). Thankfully, an ad was pushed into my ears as I listened to a podcast I like, which alerted me to a new company with a new service that I did want, but for which it is extremely unlikely I would have thought to search on my own. Even in the case when I did remember that I want that feature, overcome my belief that no one provides it, sluggishly open a new tab in Chrome, and type out that search, and I find Leesa via a Google search, that's really no different than an ad. It's a function of how many others heard about Leesa (originally through means other than themselves just searching directly) and successfully interacted with them, and the effect of increased reputation as a seller. However, it does rely on me sort of exogenously coming up with the cognitive wherewithal to do the search, rather to be passively advertised at. There's a ton of stuff where this trade-off between relying on manually searching vs. being passively advertised at is in favor of experiencing passive ads. I was very happy to be passively advertised at in that case. Whatever research Leesa did to determine that audio ads through that podcast had a good chance of successfully reaching people who might want that service, it was good work on their part, and made a certain tiny corner of the economy slightly more efficient in a certain way. There is every potential that online ads could be used the same way, and it seems efficient to me to place the research cost burden of how to best place ads onto the advertisers, not onto consumers who then have to overcome activation barriers to engage in searches.