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> We had great content in newspapers and magazines... and the world decide that cheap ( with instance access ) was better. I do not remember a time that newspa

> We had great content in newspapers and magazines... and the world decide that cheap ( with instance access ) was better. I do not remember a time that newspapers and magazines had no ads, despite being paid. If anything many of them were almost half ads, half content. I was reading magazines since the 90s though, i do not know if things were better before.

AnIdiotOnTheNet 8y ago
My memory agrees. Hell, I work with a gaming magazine preservation project and those things are 90%+ ads when you get down to it.
keepper 8y ago
I think my point is that the "bombardment" of ads is partly in due to the lack of monetization. There's a bit of a difference between print ads, and intrusive online ads. For example, you could turn the page... there was not redirect to "wow iphone user, you've won this prize!!!" I'm actually ok with facebook/ig/google adwords ads. I'm not ok with intrusive, redirecting, in your face, ads. I could be alone in this opinion.
rchaud 8y ago
Those ads are relevant, because they are context-specific and purchased directly from the publisher. If I pick up The Economist, I will expect to see ads for some luxury watch brand, as well as highly specialized job postings for executives somewhere. If I go to the Economists' website, I will see ads for: - a university website I went to that dropped a remarketing cookie into my browser - the shitty dating app full of bots and escorts, that would never have passed a QC review at a publication. Yet they are common on FB and TW (maybe Google Ads is different). - the tshirt website that displays some machine-generated text based on what it thinks my interests are. These are what I consider intrusive ads. When I see one, I don't want to have to think about what trail I left that led to these particular ads being shown to me.
- ariwilson 8y ago
  This is not even true. I just went to the Economist website and I got exactly the same ads you claim for the print version: - Louis Vuitton watch ad - Accenture strategy ad about company purpose (served by Google DoubleClick)
  - rchaud 8y ago
    Hmm, I just checked again and you are right, I was wrong. Perhaps they changed their digital ads strategy, as the last time I visited on a non-adblocked browser, it was showing those low-grade ads that really cheapened the experience of being on the site.
mrep 8y ago
Maybe not all news, but you can pay for ad-free youtube, hulu, spotify, and arstechnica these days.
tzs 8y ago
With magazines with a narrow focus, such as magazines about a particular hobby or activity, readers usually wanted the ads. I used to regularly read "Astronomy" and "Sky & Telescope", for example, and would have been disappointed if the ads went away. Ads in those magazines were the primary way most amateur astronomers back in, say, the '70s would find good equipment. Other magazines I would have been disappointed to lose ads from were "Popular Electronics", "Chess Life" and "Byte". For more general interest magazines, like "Time" or "Newsweek", I don't recall looking forward to the ads like I did for the above mentioned magazines, so wouldn't have minded if they went away. On the other hand, print ads generally weren't intrusive, though, so if they would have had to raise the price of the magazine to get rid of them I would rather keep them. Although newspapers were general interest, their ads were often useful because they were usually for local things. Remember, back in the day we bought almost everything in person at local stores, so these ads often alerted us to sales and deals that we were interested in.

AnIdiotOnTheNet 8y ago

My memory agrees. Hell, I work with a gaming magazine preservation project and those things are 90%+ ads when you get down to it.

keepper 8y ago

I think my point is that the "bombardment" of ads is partly in due to the lack of monetization. There's a bit of a difference between print ads, and intrusive online ads. For example, you could turn the page... there was not redirect to "wow iphone user, you've won this prize!!!" I'm actually ok with facebook/ig/google adwords ads. I'm not ok with intrusive, redirecting, in your face, ads. I could be alone in this opinion.

rchaud 8y ago

Those ads are relevant, because they are context-specific and purchased directly from the publisher. If I pick up The Economist, I will expect to see ads for some luxury watch brand, as well as highly specialized job postings for executives somewhere. If I go to the Economists' website, I will see ads for: - a university website I went to that dropped a remarketing cookie into my browser - the shitty dating app full of bots and escorts, that would never have passed a QC review at a publication. Yet they are common on FB and TW (maybe Google Ads is different). - the tshirt website that displays some machine-generated text based on what it thinks my interests are. These are what I consider intrusive ads. When I see one, I don't want to have to think about what trail I left that led to these particular ads being shown to me.

ariwilson 8y ago
This is not even true. I just went to the Economist website and I got exactly the same ads you claim for the print version: - Louis Vuitton watch ad - Accenture strategy ad about company purpose (served by Google DoubleClick)
- rchaud 8y ago
  Hmm, I just checked again and you are right, I was wrong. Perhaps they changed their digital ads strategy, as the last time I visited on a non-adblocked browser, it was showing those low-grade ads that really cheapened the experience of being on the site.

mrep 8y ago

Maybe not all news, but you can pay for ad-free youtube, hulu, spotify, and arstechnica these days.

tzs 8y ago

With magazines with a narrow focus, such as magazines about a particular hobby or activity, readers usually wanted the ads. I used to regularly read "Astronomy" and "Sky & Telescope", for example, and would have been disappointed if the ads went away. Ads in those magazines were the primary way most amateur astronomers back in, say, the '70s would find good equipment. Other magazines I would have been disappointed to lose ads from were "Popular Electronics", "Chess Life" and "Byte". For more general interest magazines, like "Time" or "Newsweek", I don't recall looking forward to the ads like I did for the above mentioned magazines, so wouldn't have minded if they went away. On the other hand, print ads generally weren't intrusive, though, so if they would have had to raise the price of the magazine to get rid of them I would rather keep them. Although newspapers were general interest, their ads were often useful because they were usually for local things. Remember, back in the day we bought almost everything in person at local stores, so these ads often alerted us to sales and deals that we were interested in.