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I don't believe in a conscious conspiracy within Facebook to defraud advertisers. I absolutely believe in a pervasive, semi-conscious but unspoken feeling that

by gdulli 10y ago

I don't believe in a conscious conspiracy within Facebook to defraud advertisers. I absolutely believe in a pervasive, semi-conscious but unspoken feeling that asking deep questions about the effectiveness of Facebook advertising or the validity of ad metrics would raise conclusions that would be definitively bad for Facebook, so it doesn't happen.

notyourwork 10y ago
Any internal team at least slightly aware of the problem would not have a good performance review for the year if their biggest project was to reduce revenue by x% due to efforts to address this.
dworin 10y ago
I think this is a fairly common pervasive, semi-conscious but unspoken feeling throughout many marketing and communications measurement organizations.
ethanbond 10y ago
I interned on Atlas (FB's enterprise advertising platform purchased from MS a while back) and this was the impression I got. Everything has a dollop of feel-good verbiage piled on top. We're not selling ads, we're "building more meaningful connections between businesses and their customers." The initial value proposition of online ads was click = confirmed intent. When not enough people click, they construct increasingly convoluted notions of purchasing seconds of mindshare at a time. Of course, at a certain point these purchases become as untestable as a billboard on a highway, a big difference being that highway billboards don't prop up industries, ecosystems, and even geographical regions like online advertising does. If someone calls shenanigans on online ads, it will be far more catastrophic than if they did the same on billboards/radio/TV ads.
- MorePowerToYou 10y ago
  +1 "construct increasingly convoluted notions..." to rationalize or support anything is a huge red flag in this case and, imo, life in general. Understanding the tax system requires trudging through increasingly obscure rules? It's probably a broken, inefficient system. Health care billing system rules are convoluted, vague, and complex? Yeah, it's probably pretty broken. Need a convoluted, complex explanation to rationalize your support for Peter Thiel despite his endorsement of certain political figures? Again, a huge red flag.
  - VLM 10y ago
    Best analogized with computational astrology... Oh you used numbers? Then astrology must be great source of advice.
Terr_ 10y ago
Sort of like that YouTube auto-play-by-default bullshit. I know that as a user I've accidentally had it plow through dozens of videos -- and ads -- while I was AFK, but it probably looks good on somebody's metrics...
- rhizome 10y ago
  Many sites also have auto-replay looping enabled. Add to that, Facebook's "you thought you were clicking to pause/stop, but it's actually full-screen now." Dark patterns are a growth industry.
  - bostik 10y ago
    > Dark patterns are a growth industry. Like cancer.

by gdulli 10y ago

notyourwork 10y ago

Any internal team at least slightly aware of the problem would not have a good performance review for the year if their biggest project was to reduce revenue by x% due to efforts to address this.

dworin 10y ago

I think this is a fairly common pervasive, semi-conscious but unspoken feeling throughout many marketing and communications measurement organizations.

ethanbond 10y ago

I interned on Atlas (FB's enterprise advertising platform purchased from MS a while back) and this was the impression I got. Everything has a dollop of feel-good verbiage piled on top. We're not selling ads, we're "building more meaningful connections between businesses and their customers." The initial value proposition of online ads was click = confirmed intent. When not enough people click, they construct increasingly convoluted notions of purchasing seconds of mindshare at a time. Of course, at a certain point these purchases become as untestable as a billboard on a highway, a big difference being that highway billboards don't prop up industries, ecosystems, and even geographical regions like online advertising does. If someone calls shenanigans on online ads, it will be far more catastrophic than if they did the same on billboards/radio/TV ads.

MorePowerToYou 10y ago
+1 "construct increasingly convoluted notions..." to rationalize or support anything is a huge red flag in this case and, imo, life in general. Understanding the tax system requires trudging through increasingly obscure rules? It's probably a broken, inefficient system. Health care billing system rules are convoluted, vague, and complex? Yeah, it's probably pretty broken. Need a convoluted, complex explanation to rationalize your support for Peter Thiel despite his endorsement of certain political figures? Again, a huge red flag.
- VLM 10y ago
  Best analogized with computational astrology... Oh you used numbers? Then astrology must be great source of advice.

Terr_ 10y ago

Sort of like that YouTube auto-play-by-default bullshit. I know that as a user I've accidentally had it plow through dozens of videos -- and ads -- while I was AFK, but it probably looks good on somebody's metrics...

rhizome 10y ago
Many sites also have auto-replay looping enabled. Add to that, Facebook's "you thought you were clicking to pause/stop, but it's actually full-screen now." Dark patterns are a growth industry.
- bostik 10y ago
  > Dark patterns are a growth industry. Like cancer.