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The money you would likely pay would be less than what they can make by selling you ads (as a whole). If you were willing to pay > $1000 for software and servic

The money you would likely pay would be less than what they can make by selling you ads (as a whole). If you were willing to pay > $1000 for software and services there was no reason for companies to maintain an Ad business.

yebyen 8y ago
Is that really true? I feel like they would need _everyone_ to be willing to pay that much, and on a recurring basis somehow to make support sustainable. The value of marketing to Windows users is in the network effect. If one Windows user can pay $1000 to avoid advertising and change nothing else, the other users will probably hear about this and take notice. But if every Windows user is subjected to ads, I very much doubt that Microsoft is making $1000 in advertising revenue from just one person. Microsoft would never convert 100% of users to "ad-free" paid subscriptions, at any price. But they can make money directly from advertising to 100% of their users, and there is no "loss" except from attrition (which I would guess is still probably quite a bit smaller than their numbers for overall user-base growth.)
aikah 8y ago
> The money you would likely pay would be less than what they can make by selling you ads (as a whole). If you were willing to pay > $1000 for software and services there was no reason for companies to maintain an Ad business. So people used the same argument with games and loot boxes. But even if videogames cost $500 a copy, there is so much money to be made with loot boxes that they would still exist in these games at that price.
reaperducer 8y ago
If you were willing to pay > $1000 for software and services there was no reason for companies to maintain an Ad business. I don't think this is true, but if it is, please provide a link to prove the assertion. I doubt that companies are selling software at a loss with the intent to make it up in ad revenue. They're selling the software at a profit, and then getting ad revenue for additional profit. All this just to "maximize revenue potential" for a bunch of faceless investment funds.
anoncake 8y ago
There is plenty of reason to advertise to someone willing and able to spend >$1000 on software.
autoexec 8y ago
> . If you were willing to pay > $1000 for software and services there was no reason for companies to maintain an Ad business. Let's be honest though, if a company can make money doing something they most likely will do it. It wouldn't matter if you paid $100,000 a month to use windows, if they could make an extra $1000 selling your personal information and pushing ads at you they will.
- ovao 8y ago
  If that were truly the case, wouldn’t Apple and Canonical be doing exactly that?
  - dsego 8y ago
    Except Canonical was doing exactly that with amazon ads in the launcher.
  - autoexec 8y ago
    Ubuntu did infest their OS with ads (via amazon). Last I checked they still did but backlash caused them to disable it by default. I can't speak to apple's data collection and ad practices but I'm guessing they've been doing some form of both.
tracker1 8y ago
Yeah... like the car dealers that just sold you a $50K car don't also try to get you to use them for your oil changes.
lowercased 8y ago
maybe they could compare my purchase history from various services along with the ads they've served, and at some point realize that I've never bought anything from an ad, nor ever bought anything, ever, that's been promoted through these ads, then finally stop showing them to me. It would be better experience for me, and also make their clickrate ratios go up for their advertisers.

yebyen 8y ago

Is that really true? I feel like they would need _everyone_ to be willing to pay that much, and on a recurring basis somehow to make support sustainable. The value of marketing to Windows users is in the network effect. If one Windows user can pay $1000 to avoid advertising and change nothing else, the other users will probably hear about this and take notice. But if every Windows user is subjected to ads, I very much doubt that Microsoft is making $1000 in advertising revenue from just one person. Microsoft would never convert 100% of users to "ad-free" paid subscriptions, at any price. But they can make money directly from advertising to 100% of their users, and there is no "loss" except from attrition (which I would guess is still probably quite a bit smaller than their numbers for overall user-base growth.)

aikah 8y ago

> The money you would likely pay would be less than what they can make by selling you ads (as a whole). If you were willing to pay > $1000 for software and services there was no reason for companies to maintain an Ad business. So people used the same argument with games and loot boxes. But even if videogames cost $500 a copy, there is so much money to be made with loot boxes that they would still exist in these games at that price.

reaperducer 8y ago

If you were willing to pay > $1000 for software and services there was no reason for companies to maintain an Ad business. I don't think this is true, but if it is, please provide a link to prove the assertion. I doubt that companies are selling software at a loss with the intent to make it up in ad revenue. They're selling the software at a profit, and then getting ad revenue for additional profit. All this just to "maximize revenue potential" for a bunch of faceless investment funds.

anoncake 8y ago

There is plenty of reason to advertise to someone willing and able to spend >$1000 on software.

autoexec 8y ago

> . If you were willing to pay > $1000 for software and services there was no reason for companies to maintain an Ad business. Let's be honest though, if a company can make money doing something they most likely will do it. It wouldn't matter if you paid $100,000 a month to use windows, if they could make an extra $1000 selling your personal information and pushing ads at you they will.

ovao 8y ago
If that were truly the case, wouldn’t Apple and Canonical be doing exactly that?
- dsego 8y ago
  Except Canonical was doing exactly that with amazon ads in the launcher.
- autoexec 8y ago
  Ubuntu did infest their OS with ads (via amazon). Last I checked they still did but backlash caused them to disable it by default. I can't speak to apple's data collection and ad practices but I'm guessing they've been doing some form of both.

tracker1 8y ago

Yeah... like the car dealers that just sold you a $50K car don't also try to get you to use them for your oil changes.

lowercased 8y ago

maybe they could compare my purchase history from various services along with the ads they've served, and at some point realize that I've never bought anything from an ad, nor ever bought anything, ever, that's been promoted through these ads, then finally stop showing them to me. It would be better experience for me, and also make their clickrate ratios go up for their advertisers.