5 ms·

That's true, but this web bloat pays the bills. It is what brings you and billions of other people great services like maps, email, translate etc for free. Web

by negus 9y ago

That's true, but this web bloat pays the bills. It is what brings you and billions of other people great services like maps, email, translate etc for free. Web without ads would not be the same as it is now and I'm not sure whether it would seem better to you

jedrek 9y ago
It only pays for the bills because publishers have said, "sure, put whatever tracking script you want on there, we don't care". And yet they have the power, because they have the eyeballs. Look, nobody runs 30 second commercials in a loop for an hour at prime time, because the TV stations know it would chase viewers away forever. Publishers have to draw a line in the sand and hold it. Not likely, though. It took browser makers to kill pop up ads.
- mentos 9y ago
  Ha wow I completely forgot about the days of pop-up ads that was such an intrusive nightmare.
alkonaut 9y ago
Honestly just charge for the services or take them offline I say. I want to pay for Facebook with money. I can’t. I’d really like to see a complete attack - technical and legal - that goes even further than Apple’s on the current ad business model even if it means 90% of ad revenue disappears over night, and a similar fraction of “free” services do too.
- victorhooi 9y ago
  People say this - but they rarely put their money where their mouth is. History has shown time and time again that people are cheapskate. I know I'm guilty of this as well. We like to signal that oh yes, we have money, and we'll pay. But then they seize up when they see the bill. I subscribe to things like 1Password, Netflix, Hulu, Pocketsmith etc. If I sat down and added it all up, I assume it'd be several hundred a year. Even working in tech, I still sometimes think twice about paying for all these things. How much would you pay for Facebook? $20 a month? $30 a month? $100? I suspect you and I both have very little insight into how much it actually costs to run Facebook - but working for another internet giant, I can say it probably costs a lot more than the average layperson assumes.
  - IntronExon 9y ago
    People say this - but they rarely put their money where their mouth is. Actually they do, but a majority of content is downright fecal. Netflix seems to manage to run subscription services, the NYT digital is doing very well, as are plenty of others. Some “services” though? You’re right, if asked to pay for them, most people would laugh and walk away. The Buzzfeeds of the world only exist because of advertising. So to your point, I pay a few hundred a year for email, streaming services, news, journals, and so on. I wouldn’t use FB if they paid me though. Most social media is worse than free, and a move away from predatory practices and ads would kill them. Good fucking riddance.
  - awalton 9y ago
    > How much would you pay for Facebook? $20 a month? $30 a month? $100? Not even Facebook thinks Facebook is worth that much a month from all of its users. ~2 billion times $20/month times 12m/y = $480B/year? You really think that's fair? The problem is most web content is worth about $0.0002 a page or so. You can't pay that amount of money to anyone - microtransactions simply don't work in our economic system. Because most web content is so exceptionally worthless, the next best thing to do is make it all free and charge ad companies instead, and that's how we are where we are. That's why newspapers and magazines have died - the content they sell is worth less than the paper (and especially the ink) they print on now, so they have to fill their pages with more and more ads, furthering the content death spiral. The market has proven time and again people will pay for quality over quantity - that's why Netflix hasn't died. The web is currently approaching Peak Content Quantity, and the ad companies (re Google) have never been richer because of it. And now that the technology exists to resist those ads, they're becoming crankier as they've gotten used to the status quo. Hopefully sooner before later someone figures out an online content model that's paid and works. And I hope it's sooner, because the ad companies are becoming malicious now that they're packing in cryptominers and other malware to handler "ad blockers"...
  - Guest9812398 9y ago
    I run a community site, with a lot of loyal long term users (most users check the site about 10 times a day and have been registered for years). My AWS bill is 15k per year, and the site earns 70k a year from a couple of advertisements. Now, I also give users the option to pay per month to remove advertising and receive a number of additional perks for fun. However, only 100 of the 100k active users decide to do so, and that only brings in 5k a year in earnings. In short, 15k in expenses, 70k from advertising, and 5k from users willing to pay money. So, if advertising fails I go from a 60k profit to a 10k loss per year, and the site would quickly close.
CaptSpify 9y ago
I think it would be better. People are willing to pay for good services, and hobbyists are willing to build systems and give them away for free. The Internet was around for a long time before advertising. It was also better in many ways. People built things because they wanted them to work well, not because they were tied to a profit center. The more advertising has gotten into the web, the lower the signal-to-noise ratio has gotten.
irrational 9y ago
Well, I remember the web before it was bloated with advertising. I think it was better. Geocities is life.

by negus 9y ago

jedrek 9y ago

It only pays for the bills because publishers have said, "sure, put whatever tracking script you want on there, we don't care". And yet they have the power, because they have the eyeballs. Look, nobody runs 30 second commercials in a loop for an hour at prime time, because the TV stations know it would chase viewers away forever. Publishers have to draw a line in the sand and hold it. Not likely, though. It took browser makers to kill pop up ads.

mentos 9y ago
Ha wow I completely forgot about the days of pop-up ads that was such an intrusive nightmare.

alkonaut 9y ago

Honestly just charge for the services or take them offline I say. I want to pay for Facebook with money. I can’t. I’d really like to see a complete attack - technical and legal - that goes even further than Apple’s on the current ad business model even if it means 90% of ad revenue disappears over night, and a similar fraction of “free” services do too.

victorhooi 9y ago
People say this - but they rarely put their money where their mouth is. History has shown time and time again that people are cheapskate. I know I'm guilty of this as well. We like to signal that oh yes, we have money, and we'll pay. But then they seize up when they see the bill. I subscribe to things like 1Password, Netflix, Hulu, Pocketsmith etc. If I sat down and added it all up, I assume it'd be several hundred a year. Even working in tech, I still sometimes think twice about paying for all these things. How much would you pay for Facebook? $20 a month? $30 a month? $100? I suspect you and I both have very little insight into how much it actually costs to run Facebook - but working for another internet giant, I can say it probably costs a lot more than the average layperson assumes.
- IntronExon 9y ago
  People say this - but they rarely put their money where their mouth is. Actually they do, but a majority of content is downright fecal. Netflix seems to manage to run subscription services, the NYT digital is doing very well, as are plenty of others. Some “services” though? You’re right, if asked to pay for them, most people would laugh and walk away. The Buzzfeeds of the world only exist because of advertising. So to your point, I pay a few hundred a year for email, streaming services, news, journals, and so on. I wouldn’t use FB if they paid me though. Most social media is worse than free, and a move away from predatory practices and ads would kill them. Good fucking riddance.
- awalton 9y ago
  > How much would you pay for Facebook? $20 a month? $30 a month? $100? Not even Facebook thinks Facebook is worth that much a month from all of its users. ~2 billion times $20/month times 12m/y = $480B/year? You really think that's fair? The problem is most web content is worth about $0.0002 a page or so. You can't pay that amount of money to anyone - microtransactions simply don't work in our economic system. Because most web content is so exceptionally worthless, the next best thing to do is make it all free and charge ad companies instead, and that's how we are where we are. That's why newspapers and magazines have died - the content they sell is worth less than the paper (and especially the ink) they print on now, so they have to fill their pages with more and more ads, furthering the content death spiral. The market has proven time and again people will pay for quality over quantity - that's why Netflix hasn't died. The web is currently approaching Peak Content Quantity, and the ad companies (re Google) have never been richer because of it. And now that the technology exists to resist those ads, they're becoming crankier as they've gotten used to the status quo. Hopefully sooner before later someone figures out an online content model that's paid and works. And I hope it's sooner, because the ad companies are becoming malicious now that they're packing in cryptominers and other malware to handler "ad blockers"...
- Guest9812398 9y ago
  I run a community site, with a lot of loyal long term users (most users check the site about 10 times a day and have been registered for years). My AWS bill is 15k per year, and the site earns 70k a year from a couple of advertisements. Now, I also give users the option to pay per month to remove advertising and receive a number of additional perks for fun. However, only 100 of the 100k active users decide to do so, and that only brings in 5k a year in earnings. In short, 15k in expenses, 70k from advertising, and 5k from users willing to pay money. So, if advertising fails I go from a 60k profit to a 10k loss per year, and the site would quickly close.

CaptSpify 9y ago

I think it would be better. People are willing to pay for good services, and hobbyists are willing to build systems and give them away for free. The Internet was around for a long time before advertising. It was also better in many ways. People built things because they wanted them to work well, not because they were tied to a profit center. The more advertising has gotten into the web, the lower the signal-to-noise ratio has gotten.

irrational 9y ago

Well, I remember the web before it was bloated with advertising. I think it was better. Geocities is life.