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Fred Rogers wouldn't have wanted to appear in a Google ad
- mxstbr 8y ago“Unfortunately, our website is currently unavailable in most European countries. We are engaged on the issue and committed to looking at options that support our full range of digital offerings to the EU market. We continue to identify technical compliance solutions that will provide all readers with our award-winning journalism.” Yeah I can really see how that impacts Fred Rogers /s How hard can it be to build a publishing website in a privacy-respecting manner? It's been a while since GDPR was introduced.
- ucaetano 8y ago> How hard can it be to build a publishing website in a privacy-respecting manner? It's been a while since GDPR was introduced. Why should they even bother?
- paulddraper 8y agoEspecially for a regional newspaper.
- oneeyedpigeon 8y agoTo make money? I mean, they can choose to do that in whatever way they like, their decision to lock out such a huge market just seems odd.
- chrisseaton 8y agoThey’re a local paper. They cover 100% of their market already.
- ucaetano 8y ago> To make money? The fact that they aren't doing it is a god signal that those users aren't worth the cost. You can't pass regulation and then complain that companies don't want to do business with you. So why should they?
- twblalock 8y ago> How hard can it be to build a publishing website in a privacy-respecting manner? It's been a while since GDPR was introduced. I can understand why a newspaper whose subscriber base is in southern California would not want to spend the time and money necessary to comply with European privacy regulations. It's unlikely that the benefits for the business would outweigh the costs.
- ErrantX 8y agoI suppose the implicit question is more; what are they doing that is likely to be in violation of some (relatively mundane, tbf) privacy regulations. The only thing gdpr really changed was the size of the fine...
- drb91 8y agoUsing a cookie for non-essential functionality would be enough.
- ucaetano 8y ago> what are they doing that is likely to be in violation of some (relatively mundane, tbf) privacy regulations. Why should they even bother spending resources understanding those regulations? The decision is pretty straightforward for them. Don't like it? Go complain with the regulators.
- vladd 8y ago
- CydeWeys 8y agoAnd this from the fourth largest newspaper in the entire US and the largest newspaper of the second largest city, no less. I just in Europe last week and it was infuriating how many US-based newspapers couldn't even be loaded. Americans travel abroad, and foreigners read domestic news sources. The LA Times isn't just local news; it's cited widely in, say, Wikipedia articles, and those are read globally. So to refuse to display any content in Europe is a huge middle finger.
- paulddraper 8y agoDo you believe LA Times misjudged their cost-benefit analysis of EU publication? Or do you think a cost-benefit is the wrong approach?
- CydeWeys 8y agoBoth.
- gpm 8y agoBoth. The cost to providing a minimal EU only view (using the inverse of the current "should I block" function) that complies with the GDPR should be near 0. The benefit, both in terms of advertising revenue, and network affects driving more non-EU viewers, should be high. It's not plausible to me that an accurate cost-benefit analysis says "don't publish to the EU". Separately, as journalists I expect them to be willing to spend some amount of effort (and it shouldn't take much) to report as widely as possible, even if a strict cost-benefit analysis suggests they shouldn't. The fact that they aren't willing to do this brings their motivation, and thus their integrity, into question.
- Spooky23 8y agoWhat do they do when some EU citizen decides to sue to be forgotten for some misdeed? A big newspaper has a target on its back for GDPR trouble, and they have enough trouble already. Blocking access is the pragmatic answer — most other organizations are just ignoring it.
- 8y ago
- bnchrch 8y agoI'm going to present an unpopular opinion: Why should they? I'm all for a free & open internet but I'm not for the internet complying to regulations set by governing bodies that do not represent the entire globe. I believe that if a government should choose to attempt to regulate and enforce what we can build online and how then they (and their constituents) should be dealt with in a hostile manner.
- EvilTerran 8y agoI use outline.com to get past these attempts to block the EU: https://outline.com/BF9AaC https://outline.com/BF9AaC It almost always works. As does archive.is, if you want to see more of the page's original layout.
- cabaalis 8y agoI'm curious: So what you're saying is that you don't value the ideas put forth in the GDPR, because you want the content so badly that you'll bypass a block based upon it? Because if so, it totally validates their decision to not spend resources on it.
- alangpierce 8y agoCopyright issues aside, my impression is that this solution is mostly in the spirit of GDPR. LA Times doesn't want to take the legal risk of being accidentally non-compliant (or doesn't want to go through the effort just yet), and outline.com is willing to act as a "wrapper website" that serves LA Times content while also following all EU rules around cookies. That means people in the EU are able to access the content without losing any privacy rights around cookies. But you're right that it does validate the LA Times's decision to not spend resources on it, if there's an easy way to offload the legal worry to another company.
- solarkraft 8y agoI don't see what "legal worry" there could be if they're not abusing personal data. They could provide a plain-text website (even with ads, since the providers are probably all doing business in the EU) or link to outline.com, which would at least gain them the reputation of somebody having read a good article from them.
- EvilTerran 8y agoWell said. You've elucidated my thinking better than I could. Another aspect: I've set up my browser to be pretty aggressive about blocking ads & trackers, to the extent that in practice any website is limited to tracking only what they can collect server-side, with first-party isolation; as such, GDPR doesn't give me that much extra protection when I'm interacting with sites that I'm not actively giving my personal details to. I'd still appreciate the additional protections GDPR provides, in terms of control over that server-side tracking, and when interacting with sites that do know who I am; and I see the value in even the protections I don't personally benefit from, for the sake of people who aren't tech-savvy enough to lock down their browsers to the same extent (and to deal with it breaking sites, when that happens). So I'm still a fan of GDPR in general - it's just that, when it comes to me personally, just passively browsing a site, my own browser set-up is adequate for my liking.
- justin66 8y agoAt least they're blocking out of a fear of litigation. They'll figure it out eventually. In contrast, the BBC blocks a lot content from international viewing just because they're cheap.
- lovemenot 8y agoThe BBC has a charter that mandates they serve the people of Britain. Its implementation is complex, but overall it is necessary to allow for more than just market forces.
- sincerely 8y agoGDPR discussion aside, this seems like an example of something I've been thinking about: why are we (societally etc) okay with ads that have basically nothing to do with the product?
- chrisseaton 8y agoSeems a funny thing to moralise over. Is it a problem?
- mrob 8y agoThe usual excuse for advertising being morally acceptable is that it informs potential customers about the product. If it has nothing to do with the product then its only possible purpose is deception.
- chrisseaton 8y agoIf an advert doesn’t mention the product it seems very hard to say that it’s deveiving you about what the product will do, doesn’t it?
- chongli 8y agoIt's deceiving you in a far less obvious and ham-fisted way: it's associating a brand with your lifestyle and your identity. It's using insights gained from psychology research to try to hack your brain into thinking that this brand is part of your tribe. And it works. To an obscene degree, really.
- gingerbread-man 8y agoThe iconic "1984" Apple ad was about as abstract as anything on today's screens. It did tell users about the product, indirectly, by telling them about the values of the Apple brand and company. And I'd much prefer to watch that than the harrowing "Head-On: Apply directly to the forehead" commercial.
- en4bz 8y agoIt's disconcerting to say the least that someone can own your likeness after you die.
- casefields 8y agoThen he should've specified that in his will. If people have such a problem with his estate making money off his likeness, then name and shame them.
- Pulcinella 8y agoI don’t think anyone should have to specify that they don’t want their memory to be exploited financially.
- flycaliguy 8y agoWorking in entertainment has plenty of unusual side effects. You could argue that he commodified himself before anybody else did.
- bredren 8y agoIt is quite a thing to blame a dead man for failing to protect himself from something he obviously would have objected to if he could review and understand the result.
- rukuu001 8y agoOr even before you die: https://www.newsweek.com/carrie-fisher-george-lucas-star-wars-archive-interview-67321 https://www.newsweek.com/carrie-fisher-george-lucas-star-war...
- steve-benjamins 8y agoWhy do commercials try to pluck our deepest heartstrings? What is this genre of aspirational commercials that's become such a cliche?
- acangiano 8y agoBecause we don't make rational decisions. We make emotional decisions. If you have 30 seconds to make an emotional connection with millions of strangers, you shoot for the heart.
- lodi 8y agoBecause it's effective. If you're advertising specs like "grams of sugar in your cola", someone else can swoop in and make a competing product that surpasses you in whatever concrete metrics you advertised. If you can associate your cola with "warm fuzzy childhood memories of Christmas", it's game over for other competitors. They not only have to match specs, but now also displace feelings. People identify as Coke people, or Pepsi people. Also for some products, you literally can't advertise the features; the most precise mechanical watch in the world is completely dominated by a 30 cent happy meal Casio digital watch. That's why advertising for luxury watches is all centered around a "you made it [to graduation, to financial stability, to the upper class, to retirement]" theme.
- steve-benjamins 8y agoThanks. Very clearly explained.
- jwiley 8y agoHow is this different than the "Think Different" Jobs era ads with Einstein and Martin Luther King? Or the giant American flags waving over every car lot? Or pictures of veterans learning to walk again on an add for Prudential insurance? This is a very old marketing game, and I'm sure whatever qualms the team creating it had, if any, were overruled by the need to make it rain and get bonuses and keep all of us engineers employed. "Dignity and an empty sack is worth the sack."
- bredren 8y agoI too thought of this campaign. Fwiw, I do think Apple and Google are different today in how they handle consumer privacy. That includes how information collected on minors or new adults is used. I also do not think Apple would use historical figures in this way anymore.
- village-idiot 8y agoThey don’t need to anymore.
- bitmapbrother 8y ago>Fwiw, I do think Apple and Google are different today in how they handle consumer privacy. So we're conveniently going to ignore how Apple violates user privacy by handing over their cloud data to the Chinese government? It goes both ways. If you're going to be a proponent of user privacy then don't be a hypocrite and bend over to the Chinese government. Apple clearly values their Chinese profits over the privacy of their Chinese users.
- bassman9000 8y agoA study released this week in the Journal of Behavioral and Developmental Pediatrics found that 95% of the most downloaded apps designated as “designed for families” in the Google Play Store contain some form of embedded advertising. Because of this. Because some line has to be drawn.
- angel_j 8y agoAdvertising at children should be banned. Parents should consider it no less than predatory, and act accordingly. Children can't consent to all the psycho-behavioral research and artfully composed subliminal content a modern advertisement delivers. It's creepy that we accept there are adults in offices with whiteboards and Adobe products thinking hard about how to influence and manipulate children.
- astazangasta 8y agoThis is the society that produced Fruit Loops and Lucky Charms; the notion that it cares at all about children, or anyone else, is rubbished by the child obesity statistics. What's creepy is that we've built a society that rewards this mentality with greater power: those who are able to successfully market disgusting crap to children are "winners". If you have a problem with this, you have a problem with capitalism. Advertising is nothing. There are people out there, right now, designing, manufacturing, shipping and deploying all sorts of lethal devices that are maiming and killing children all over the world.
- angel_j 8y agoOf course I have a problem with capitalism! But I don't believe that society chose all those things (branded cereal madness, etc), I think it was more or less thrust on them. That people seem more interested in getting ahead and pleasing their egos, instead of trying to repair or escape, is a kind of syndrome—the syndrome of being trapped in an idealogy. DGMW, I would love to berate parenting, childcare, and education in the US; I mean, I would just beat it about the brow for being so retarding, if I could Like, how do you trade middling entertainment and financial reward for terrible, indoctrinating, media and education for your offspring? You must be some kind of real selfish idiotic shitbrain to send your children to grade C- public school, while you go off and sit at a desk for peanut pay so you can afford, what?, convenient foodstuffs and the trappings of dignified success in a system that yr suspicions suggest doesn't care about you? FOH! But no, I can only suppose a syndrome, and blame no one. The majority are being used by capitalists, and if they grow in that mold, knowingly or not, successful or not, it's not their fault; there's no obvious, non-serious, way out of capitalist subjugation, except for the American Dream, which is ofc to become one of them. So, I think it tactical to treat this kind of spectre—invasive media campaigns aimed at children—as an outside, enemy, force; (today, all parents of young people, were themselves targeted by these forces, so they have the right to be pissed about it); If nothing else, people can get behind anti-child-predation, even if they aren't ready to stop the military industrial complex, or capitalism.
- pasbesoin 8y agoI'm sorry, but this is just wrong. Some things should remain inviolate. In this case, not just for the memory, but for the new children who continue to engage with Rogers' program (it will run in repeats and streaming for years and years) and experience its commercial free attention and insight. Further, Fred Rogers was genuine. This commercial is disingenuous. You should take a hard look at yourself, Google. (Speaking to individual Googlers, where the corporate structure refuses to.)
- plink 8y agoHis heirs should take a hard look at themselves. Then again, maybe they did and all they found was need.
- pasbesoin 8y agoThat, I don't have an answer for. However, I don't find it absolving what I observe in today's Google and all the "business" and "marketing" types who appear to have come to dominate it.
- 99_00 8y ago>Rogers, who died in 2003, spoke out against commercialization aimed at children. “The question is not,” he once said, “what can we sell the children and families who use ‘Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood?’ or even ‘What can we give them?’ but rather ‘Who are they?’ and ‘What do they bring to the television set?’” what does this mean?
- Noos 8y agoI doubt fred rogers would have liked being deified as some form of secular saint by nostalgic adult info workers either, nor his face plastered on t-shirts, motivational books, etc.This is just shameless enough to get you thinking about that.
- makecheck 8y agoWhen this first came on, I thought: oh, did someone make a new documentary? It was full of nostalgic nice things that Mr. Rogers was known for. It brought back memories. And then, it ended in the cheapest, most offensive, most un-Mister-Rogers way possible: just a Google ad. I refuse to even let myself recall what crappy product apparently demanded the outright abuse of a man’s lifetime of genuine contributions to society out of some sense of clever advertising. This feels like a bunch of Google executives just took a can of spray paint to deface everything that Mr. Rogers ever did. And Google, you don’t understand anything about why Mr. Rogers was so great.
- slowmovintarget 8y agoAlphabet removed "Don't be evil" from their code of conduct and then... Kill-bots, military AI, Chinese search engine with built in censoring and key-logging... Why not this, too? They've cancelled many of these after backlash, but not all of them.
- Aeolun 8y ago“Cancelled” I don’t believe for a minute that they won’t be renamed and developed by some people they’ve now identified as not giving a shit.
- feri339 8y agoI doubt it somehow. At least near to mid-term, if it would get out, the reputation damage with the public and much worse the employees would probably be a lot higher than the gains. Alphabet needs to be the most attractive place to work for. Or at least close to it. They live and die by that.
- 8bitsrule 8y agoGoogle paid an undisclosed, presumably large amount for Rogers’ voice, words and music. But it’s hard to understand why the heirs to his production company would compromise his integrity in this way. Not hard to understand, but disappointing. Fred's high standards for how children should be treated were ... advanced.