7 ms·

I have been thinking about what would happen if all browsers had perfect ad blockers enabled by default, starting tomorrow. I think years later we would look ba

I have been thinking about what would happen if all browsers had perfect ad blockers enabled by default, starting tomorrow. I think years later we would look back and decide that it was the right thing to do, despite the immediate short-term economic damage.

return1 9y ago
advertising would just shift to product placement in the news you get and affiliate links everywhere. not better. people tend to forget that advertising covers a real need.
- dbasedweeb 9y ago
  People have shown an impressive ability to figure that kind of advertising out. A lot of native advertising on sites like Reddit is outed almost immediately, and then the discussion turns on the advertiser. We could also add protections as they are in the UK requiring “sponsored content” to display clearly that it’s an advertisement. In short, there’s nothing inevitable about advertising models as they exist today, and people who try to convince of you that they are inevitable are peobsbly trying to sow apathy.
  - pixl97 9y ago
    >People have shown an impressive ability to figure that kind of advertising out This is of course selection buas.
- voodootrucker 9y ago
  I'll take the other side of that argument. Search engines should put the most relevant products at the top of the page because they are the best fit, not because someone paid for them to be there. If all advertising disappeared tomorrow, the world would function better. Consumers would not have advertisers trying to manipulate them, and they would more rationally allocate their resources. Advertising is a tax placed on people who have already bought a product, which made it more expensive, to manipulate other people into also buying that same product. Without it, good products would succeed on merit / independent reviews / word of mouth. * The one exception I can think of is possibly during the scale period of startups, helping them scale faster (artificially) than if they just followed the "be the best and it will catch on" approach.
  - chillacy 9y ago
    Companies are already starting to game "independent reviews" through incentivized reviews or downright fake reviews, and word of mouth has been gamed with referral programs. Fact is, when there's money on the line, it's gonna get dirty, PPC and banner ads just happen to be the cheapest option. I'd love to not play the advertising game, but marketing seems to be one of the most important parts of running a business, if not the most important part, and it'll get its grimy hands on anything to acquire users. I'd prefer to avoid the world where they pay people to post rave reviews in HN comments to hype products.
  - thomyorkie 9y ago
    Advertising doesn't necessarily make a product more expensive except where something like cost plus pricing is used.
- dylan-m 9y ago
  On the bright side, I think product placement manipulates people in less problematic ways than companies like Cambridge Analytica have been able to do with precision-targeted advertisements. At least product placement needs to involve actual products, and if you try to go beyond that it'll be pretty obvious. Although I guess there's a cross-section here: one of the really sinister details of Facebook's advertising is it gets presented in the same context as pictures of your friend's puppy, so our filters don't engage like they would looking at something that resembles an ad container.
  - TACIXAT 9y ago
    I strongly disagree that Cambridge Analytica has done more damage than advertising. The leading causes of death in the US are preventable. Companies are pumping out disinformation to get people to consume things that are killing them, as well, to spend money on non essential items they can't afford.
- megaman22 9y ago
  I really don't have any objection to affiliate links. If you're talking about something and link to it on Amazon with your affiliate link, rather than a bare link, what difference does that make to me, as the user? You get paid a smidgeon, on something that I would have either bought or not bought anyway, for the same price to me either way.
  - chillacy 9y ago
    I think general affiliate links are pretty safe, maybe they might incentivize content creators to hype up products that are more expensive (so they get a bigger cut) though.
    - bittercynic 9y ago
      Unless handled very carefully, using affiliate links damages my perception of the writer's integrity. When money's on the line, maybe their motivation for writing wasn't to share their experience of finding the best product for the lowest price. In rare cases, like the AppliedScience youtube channel, the quality of content is so high that the affiliate links in descriptions don't tarnish my esteem for the guy.
- athenot 9y ago
  > people tend to forget that advertising covers a real need I don't buy it. Advertising is not going to provide me with the service that is the most suited to my need, or with the best value. In fact, quite the opposite: the advertisement that's the most likely to reach me comes from the company with the largest budget for advertisement. That budget eats into either the profit of the company or into the quality of service delivered.
  - chillacy 9y ago
    Advertising covers a real need for businesses, (you and I aren't the customer, we are the product). The math works out pretty simply: what is the total profit with 0 advertising vs the total profit with advertising? If you had a magical machine where you could insert a dollar and get $1.05 out, you should be putting your money in there as fast as possible.
    - deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]
  - thomyorkie 9y ago
    It is short-sited to say advertising eats into the profit of the company. When done successfully, it allows for more goods to be sold which increases profits and in turn allows for more research and development and thus better products.
paxys 9y ago
Browser-based ad blocking is pretty easy to bypass for companies like Facebook if they really want to. They already have their own ad network, so they will start serving all content (messages, ads, videos) from the same server with no way to distinguish between them programmatically.
- 220V_USKettle 9y ago
  At least, peformance-wise, that would be nice.
- hansen 9y ago
  In Germany ads must be distinguishable from other content. If a human can spot the difference it shouldn’t be too hard to automate that process.
iAMAGuest 9y ago
I like pretty much everyone else dislikes advertising, but it is a genuine source for a company to generate revenue. I really don't know any other real alternatives other than making the user pay, which would in turn make the internet just basically one big subscription model. The majority of the "free" services which many people enjoy now, like YouTube, Facebook, etc probably could not exist as they do. What is needed is some clear boundaries (legislation), and education. I believe without advertising that the internet would not have been what it is today, and I don't think it would have exponentially better.
- cies 9y ago
  > but it is a genuine source for a company to generate revenue. That's a common cultural belief that I do not subscribe to, seems to come with our currently trendy variants of capitalism/liberalism. I personally belief it is more akin to a crime that is currently not punished. > probably could not exist as they do. More industries have been outlawed in history. > I believe without advertising that the internet would not have been what it is today, I can take that as fact. But I do not think that "without ads" (on the internet or not) is "economically worse". I think without ads we would produce better quality; it's complete guessing, but that's just my expectation.
- michaelchisari 9y ago
  Do we know how much Youtube, Facebook, etc. make in ad revenue per user? It can't be much. If micro-payments are an option, the ability to pay $0.75 a month for an ad-free social network would be fantastic.
  - iAMAGuest 9y ago
    I think the problem behind this is that ad revenue is not the same as a subscription revenue. You cannot assume that if a user was worth $3 a month in ad revenue that that would translate to a $3 a month subscription. For example, I would have no doubt the the customer acquisition cost for an "free" application with advertising is a lot lower than trying to sell that same user a membership. When it comes to social networks I would suggest that the stickiness is because your friends/family etc are on the same network. It's not if you are willing to pay, it is only really worth it, if your friends are willing to pay. If you are talking more about a paid and free version, then there are already services out there like YouTube Red (available in some areas for $9.99+ USD). There are always options out there.
zaidf 9y ago
Who is “we”? You and I might decide it was the right thing to do but you and I are probably also in the top X% of the world in terms of wage. Here’s my hunch on what would happen: we would realize that it’s really messed up that the only options for people to get basic services we once took for granted is to pay for it; and those that can’t afford it must give up their privacy or start rationing a budget to access news, email etc. for a fee. On Maslows hierarchy, privacy in the sense of ad targeting is a pretty privileged need. The business model works for the overwhelming majority of the world; it’s only broken for people who think it’s no big deal to have to shell a few bucks extra a month for either more privacy or access to services (that would no longer exist for free to the extent they do today.)
kerng 9y ago
Well Google certainly would not do that with Chrome. Firefox, Safari and Edge however could explore such ideas putting pressure on Google. It could be an option during setup, like disable tracking and known advertisers. That certainly would make a difference, bunch of things would break but alternatives would pop up quickly I'd assume
- majewsky 9y ago
  > Firefox, Safari and Edge Given how much Microsoft has been pushing ads in W10, we're not going to see this push coming from Microsoft anytime soon.
  - gaius 9y ago
    MS play this game because they have to. If they had the option to cut Google off cold they would take it in a heartbeat.

return1 9y ago

advertising would just shift to product placement in the news you get and affiliate links everywhere. not better. people tend to forget that advertising covers a real need.

dbasedweeb 9y ago
People have shown an impressive ability to figure that kind of advertising out. A lot of native advertising on sites like Reddit is outed almost immediately, and then the discussion turns on the advertiser. We could also add protections as they are in the UK requiring “sponsored content” to display clearly that it’s an advertisement. In short, there’s nothing inevitable about advertising models as they exist today, and people who try to convince of you that they are inevitable are peobsbly trying to sow apathy.
- pixl97 9y ago
  >People have shown an impressive ability to figure that kind of advertising out This is of course selection buas.
voodootrucker 9y ago
I'll take the other side of that argument. Search engines should put the most relevant products at the top of the page because they are the best fit, not because someone paid for them to be there. If all advertising disappeared tomorrow, the world would function better. Consumers would not have advertisers trying to manipulate them, and they would more rationally allocate their resources. Advertising is a tax placed on people who have already bought a product, which made it more expensive, to manipulate other people into also buying that same product. Without it, good products would succeed on merit / independent reviews / word of mouth. * The one exception I can think of is possibly during the scale period of startups, helping them scale faster (artificially) than if they just followed the "be the best and it will catch on" approach.
- chillacy 9y ago
  Companies are already starting to game "independent reviews" through incentivized reviews or downright fake reviews, and word of mouth has been gamed with referral programs. Fact is, when there's money on the line, it's gonna get dirty, PPC and banner ads just happen to be the cheapest option. I'd love to not play the advertising game, but marketing seems to be one of the most important parts of running a business, if not the most important part, and it'll get its grimy hands on anything to acquire users. I'd prefer to avoid the world where they pay people to post rave reviews in HN comments to hype products.
- thomyorkie 9y ago
  Advertising doesn't necessarily make a product more expensive except where something like cost plus pricing is used.
dylan-m 9y ago
On the bright side, I think product placement manipulates people in less problematic ways than companies like Cambridge Analytica have been able to do with precision-targeted advertisements. At least product placement needs to involve actual products, and if you try to go beyond that it'll be pretty obvious. Although I guess there's a cross-section here: one of the really sinister details of Facebook's advertising is it gets presented in the same context as pictures of your friend's puppy, so our filters don't engage like they would looking at something that resembles an ad container.
- TACIXAT 9y ago
  I strongly disagree that Cambridge Analytica has done more damage than advertising. The leading causes of death in the US are preventable. Companies are pumping out disinformation to get people to consume things that are killing them, as well, to spend money on non essential items they can't afford.
megaman22 9y ago
I really don't have any objection to affiliate links. If you're talking about something and link to it on Amazon with your affiliate link, rather than a bare link, what difference does that make to me, as the user? You get paid a smidgeon, on something that I would have either bought or not bought anyway, for the same price to me either way.
- chillacy 9y ago
  I think general affiliate links are pretty safe, maybe they might incentivize content creators to hype up products that are more expensive (so they get a bigger cut) though.
  - bittercynic 9y ago
    Unless handled very carefully, using affiliate links damages my perception of the writer's integrity. When money's on the line, maybe their motivation for writing wasn't to share their experience of finding the best product for the lowest price. In rare cases, like the AppliedScience youtube channel, the quality of content is so high that the affiliate links in descriptions don't tarnish my esteem for the guy.
athenot 9y ago
> people tend to forget that advertising covers a real need I don't buy it. Advertising is not going to provide me with the service that is the most suited to my need, or with the best value. In fact, quite the opposite: the advertisement that's the most likely to reach me comes from the company with the largest budget for advertisement. That budget eats into either the profit of the company or into the quality of service delivered.
- chillacy 9y ago
  Advertising covers a real need for businesses, (you and I aren't the customer, we are the product). The math works out pretty simply: what is the total profit with 0 advertising vs the total profit with advertising? If you had a magical machine where you could insert a dollar and get $1.05 out, you should be putting your money in there as fast as possible.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
- thomyorkie 9y ago
  It is short-sited to say advertising eats into the profit of the company. When done successfully, it allows for more goods to be sold which increases profits and in turn allows for more research and development and thus better products.

paxys 9y ago

Browser-based ad blocking is pretty easy to bypass for companies like Facebook if they really want to. They already have their own ad network, so they will start serving all content (messages, ads, videos) from the same server with no way to distinguish between them programmatically.

220V_USKettle 9y ago
At least, peformance-wise, that would be nice.
hansen 9y ago
In Germany ads must be distinguishable from other content. If a human can spot the difference it shouldn’t be too hard to automate that process.

iAMAGuest 9y ago

I like pretty much everyone else dislikes advertising, but it is a genuine source for a company to generate revenue. I really don't know any other real alternatives other than making the user pay, which would in turn make the internet just basically one big subscription model. The majority of the "free" services which many people enjoy now, like YouTube, Facebook, etc probably could not exist as they do. What is needed is some clear boundaries (legislation), and education. I believe without advertising that the internet would not have been what it is today, and I don't think it would have exponentially better.

cies 9y ago
> but it is a genuine source for a company to generate revenue. That's a common cultural belief that I do not subscribe to, seems to come with our currently trendy variants of capitalism/liberalism. I personally belief it is more akin to a crime that is currently not punished. > probably could not exist as they do. More industries have been outlawed in history. > I believe without advertising that the internet would not have been what it is today, I can take that as fact. But I do not think that "without ads" (on the internet or not) is "economically worse". I think without ads we would produce better quality; it's complete guessing, but that's just my expectation.
michaelchisari 9y ago
Do we know how much Youtube, Facebook, etc. make in ad revenue per user? It can't be much. If micro-payments are an option, the ability to pay $0.75 a month for an ad-free social network would be fantastic.
- iAMAGuest 9y ago
  I think the problem behind this is that ad revenue is not the same as a subscription revenue. You cannot assume that if a user was worth $3 a month in ad revenue that that would translate to a $3 a month subscription. For example, I would have no doubt the the customer acquisition cost for an "free" application with advertising is a lot lower than trying to sell that same user a membership. When it comes to social networks I would suggest that the stickiness is because your friends/family etc are on the same network. It's not if you are willing to pay, it is only really worth it, if your friends are willing to pay. If you are talking more about a paid and free version, then there are already services out there like YouTube Red (available in some areas for $9.99+ USD). There are always options out there.

zaidf 9y ago

Who is “we”? You and I might decide it was the right thing to do but you and I are probably also in the top X% of the world in terms of wage. Here’s my hunch on what would happen: we would realize that it’s really messed up that the only options for people to get basic services we once took for granted is to pay for it; and those that can’t afford it must give up their privacy or start rationing a budget to access news, email etc. for a fee. On Maslows hierarchy, privacy in the sense of ad targeting is a pretty privileged need. The business model works for the overwhelming majority of the world; it’s only broken for people who think it’s no big deal to have to shell a few bucks extra a month for either more privacy or access to services (that would no longer exist for free to the extent they do today.)

kerng 9y ago

Well Google certainly would not do that with Chrome. Firefox, Safari and Edge however could explore such ideas putting pressure on Google. It could be an option during setup, like disable tracking and known advertisers. That certainly would make a difference, bunch of things would break but alternatives would pop up quickly I'd assume

majewsky 9y ago
> Firefox, Safari and Edge Given how much Microsoft has been pushing ads in W10, we're not going to see this push coming from Microsoft anytime soon.
- gaius 9y ago
  MS play this game because they have to. If they had the option to cut Google off cold they would take it in a heartbeat.