3 ms·

People talk about the ad blocking arms race, but they forget that advertising itself is an arms race. Often it doesn't even benefit the advertisers! For exampl

People talk about the ad blocking arms race, but they forget that advertising itself is an arms race. Often it doesn't even benefit the advertisers! For example, everyone would buy food even if it wasn't advertised, so the food industry as a whole might well be losing money on ads. (If you're feeling nitpicky, substitute "cheap food industry" for "food industry".) It's a kind of prisoner's dilemma situation where each firm keeps spending money on ads to avoid losing market share to competitors, but all firms together would be happier with a blanket ban on advertising. I suspect that many online ads are also fighting for a share of a fixed-size market, and would benefit from a ban as well. Ad blocking is a gradual way to institute such a ban without requiring everyone's consent. It's probably already making many companies richer without them realizing it, by suppressing the ads of their competitors. In fact, these are the companies you want to get richer, because their products are spreading by word of mouth instead of ads.

arjie 10y ago
Blanket bans on advertising favour market incumbents. It's true that some companies will prosper through word of mouth but in the early adopter stage you need to reach those early adopters. If you're small and your early adopters are distributed, you'll die before you catch on through people talking about you. I'd wager the net effect would be to entrench big brands.
- Cyclone_ 10y ago
  I could see that being the case where the little guys aren't able to get the word out about their product, but keep in mind that big advertisers like coke use the "brand awareness" aspect of advertising to get their brand in your mind.
- Jordrok 10y ago
  I still don't see how this works out as an advantage for the little guy. At best, for every ad the new startup buys, the big incumbent buys two and you're back to more or less where you started. Worst case, the big incumbents and shady scammers buy up the majority of the advertising time, training consumers to ignore ads and making it even harder for a legitimate newcomer to get their foot in the door.
  - arjie 10y ago
    > At best, for every ad the new startup buys, the big incumbent buys two and you're back to more or less where you started. Are you? Previously no one knew about the startup. Now one in three people in the targeted segment see it.

arjie 10y ago

Blanket bans on advertising favour market incumbents. It's true that some companies will prosper through word of mouth but in the early adopter stage you need to reach those early adopters. If you're small and your early adopters are distributed, you'll die before you catch on through people talking about you. I'd wager the net effect would be to entrench big brands.

Cyclone_ 10y ago
I could see that being the case where the little guys aren't able to get the word out about their product, but keep in mind that big advertisers like coke use the "brand awareness" aspect of advertising to get their brand in your mind.
Jordrok 10y ago
I still don't see how this works out as an advantage for the little guy. At best, for every ad the new startup buys, the big incumbent buys two and you're back to more or less where you started. Worst case, the big incumbents and shady scammers buy up the majority of the advertising time, training consumers to ignore ads and making it even harder for a legitimate newcomer to get their foot in the door.
- arjie 10y ago
  > At best, for every ad the new startup buys, the big incumbent buys two and you're back to more or less where you started. Are you? Previously no one knew about the startup. Now one in three people in the targeted segment see it.