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>But online ads and the technology that makes them work have played a considerable part in the development of almost every aspect of what we’ve come to enjoy as

>But online ads and the technology that makes them work have played a considerable part in the development of almost every aspect of what we’ve come to enjoy as the free and open internet of today. Online ads and free and open internet are not synonymous and I really wish that people would stop trying to equate them as such. The pervasive advertising systems that are running today (e.g.: Facebook, Google, LinkedIn, etc.) aren't running to make the internet free and open but to squeeze out more profit margins for their respective shareholders and nothing more. Were online ads the cause of the move from dial-up to "high-speed" internet? I'd argue it was actually pictures, graphics, movies, etc. and the desire to be able to consume those at a reasonable rate that caused the move from dial-up to "high-speed" internet. How did advertising play a role in the development of that portion of the free and open internet? (Genuinely asking, in case I'm missing something here.)

richardwhiuk 7y ago
In what world was either dial-up, or high-speed internet free? You have to pay for a connection. If you don't want to pay for the content, it needs to be funded in some manner - donations or ads - we haven't found any other business models.
- Valmar 7y ago
  Online ads are a very invasive business model that only penalizes the end-user, and rarely benefits them. Especially when ads are often nasty vectors for malware.
  - manigandham 7y ago
    Rarely benefits them? What about 95% of the content on the internet that ads pay for? Malware isn't advertising and security is an issue in any industry and sector.
    - renholder 7y ago
      >What about 95% of the content on the internet that ads pay for? This is such a pedestrian argument, as if advertising pays for the content to be made and then hosted - when the truth of the matter is that someone else pays for the content to be created (and hosted) and that cost is recouped (with additional profit added on top), after the fact by advertising. For example, advertising companies are not paying for YouTube content creators to create their content and then for it to be hosted on YouTube. Advertising companies seek those with the largest audience (typically, that requires having made content a priori, yeah?) and then make partnerships with those people and, then, those people may make videos pushing those products. WSJ, since this is predominantly an American board, doesn't have advertisers paying their reporters', photographers', editors', etc. salaries. Advertisers are not paying for the content to be created or to be hosted. All of that is done by WSJ, who then recoups the costs via advertising, yeah? So, the only point at which "95% of the content on the internet that ads pay for" is true, is (predominantly) after the content has been made and hosted and is only true over time (e.g.: not with immediate effect). >Malware isn't advertising You have that backwards from the OC's comment: Advertising networks have been used to push malware. >...and security is an issue in any industry and sector. This comes across as a whataboutism, "So? Other industries have security problems, too!" and, whilst true, largely ignores the fact that those other industries (mostly at large) weren't leveraged as attack vectors to spread malware. (I'm assuming your meaning of "industry" infers the meaning of "commercial industry", that generates revenue in exchange for a product or service, which would ignore the obvious things like P2P and the like.)
      - vegasdew 7y ago
        Is this even an argument? We don't pay for Apple's engineers/designers, Foxconn's workers when buying an iPhone. But they won't be paid if iPhone stops selling.
      - manigandham 7y ago
        Ok? The point still stands that advertising ultimately pays for the content. Manufacturers buy raw parts first and then recoup the costs by selling the final product, does that mean consumers aren't actually paying for the business? Security is an eternal problem and a completely separate topic from advertising as a business model. Do you suggest we stop using email because some people got scams and viruses? Or can we talk about communications while acknowledging that it's separate from implementation and UX issues?
- moreira 7y ago
  > If you don't want to pay for the content, it needs to be funded in some manner - donations or ads - we haven't found any other business models. I'd argue that it doesn't actually need to be funded at all. The internet and plenty of content on it existed prior to any advertising. People still talked on the internet, and they still put up their own content, even when there was no money to be made. Bloggers would still blog without ads. And we're right now using HN - a free service with free content provided by users, without ads or tracking. Funding only matters in a worldview where everything you do has to somehow turn a profit and grow to a gigantic scale to bring in even more profit. There was a time when people on the internet weren't looking at it like "how can I get rich from this".
  - icebraining 7y ago
    HN has ads, they're just low-profile. There's one for Demodesk (YC W19) on the front page right now.
  - BjoernKW 7y ago
    You still have to invest time and money, even if you don't want your service to scale or to get rich from the information you're providing. At the very least someone has to pay for the server and network infrastructure, maintenance and of course content creation. Some of that might be provided for by public funding while other aspects are covered by enthusiasts putting in their time. Just because somebody else pays for it or somebody else does the work required it doesn't magically become free.
  - fecsantos 7y ago
    > And we're right now using HN - a free service with free content provided by users, without ads or tracking. It's obvious that ycombinator's business model is not based on Hacker News advertising - but hacker news is still used as platform for their portfolio companies and services. Hacker news is just a curated list, so calling it "free content" is a bit of a stretch, unless you're saying that the content provided are the comments of the user, but I'd argue that the website wouldn't be the same without the link to the content being commented on (which are in a big part, funded by ads). Y-Combinator is for profit by the way, and it invests in companies supported by advertising (e.g. Reddit). > Funding only matters in a worldview where everything you do has to somehow turn a profit and grow to a gigantic scale to bring in even more profit. Funding is not required only for growing into a gigantic scale. If you want to open a restaurant in your small town, you'll require some sort of funding. Even if you don't want to profit and just want to cover costs, you'll need a stream of money coming in from somewhere. I personally don't see anything wrong in people getting paid for their work - if you really want to create your own content and give it out for free, you can do so (a lot of people currently do just that). > There was a time when people on the internet weren't looking at it like "how can I get rich from this". I'm not sure exactly when that was. There's been people trying to get rich from the Internet for a long long time.
keerthiko 7y ago
Yes this. Most people who work outside software development and several within, are convinced that they have access to free internet services only because they are willing to tolerate ads. Ads ≠ "free" services, and "free" services ≠ ads. ["free" in scare quotes to refer to not paying money per usage or to gain access to usage, but you may be paying in other ways] Counter examples are public libraries (no ads but "free") and cable television (not "free" yet ads).
- simonh 7y ago
  He didn't say that in principle the only way to make money on the internet was through ads. He's saying that in practice most (not all) of the services people actually use on the internet for free (at no direct cost to themselves) are in fact paid for by advertising. As an observation, I think that's hard to argue with.
  - mlthoughts2018 7y ago
    The quote in question specifically says “free and open internet” which has a massively different connotation than merely “no direct cost.” Free and open software, and by extension the internet services wishing to provide a free and open internet, often has no direct cost to end users and also does not generate income from ads, and seeks non-exploitative funding or donation models very different from advertising. Regardless of how many ad-based services people use at no direct cost, it’s highly debatable whether these services contribute in any way to the “free and open” internet... their widespread usage and superficial lack of direct financial cost certainly don’t factor in at all and are not relevant details for what the quote is discussing.
- isostatic 7y ago
  Obviously you pay in other ways. When Tesco have an advert, they have to charge more to pay for that advert. The money still comes from me, the person shopping at Tesco.
  - 0_gravitas 7y ago
simonh 7y ago
>(e.g.: Facebook, Google, LinkedIn, etc.) aren't running to make the internet free and open but to squeeze out more profit margins for their respective shareholders and nothing more. "It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest" - Adam Smith, 1776.
- TheOtherHobbes 7y ago
  "It is not very unreasonable that the rich should contribute to the public expense, not only in proportion to their revenue, but something more than in that proportion." Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations, Book V, Chapter II.
  - simonh 7y ago
    Another excellent Smith quote with which I fully agree, and one often overlooked by avowed Smith fans, though I don't see it's immediate applicability to the issue at hand.
    - rusk 7y ago
      If you made such a statement unquoted you’d be branded populist
      - C1sc0cat 7y ago
        Hard left socialist in the USA
  - isostatic 7y ago
    What does rich mean? High revenue? High profits? High wealth?
    - onion2k 7y ago
      Yes, all of those things.
manigandham 7y ago
He never said they were synonymous. He also mentions ads - and the technology that makes them work - have played a part. Perhaps you should read the sentence you quoted again. Advertising pays for most content on the internet, that's the "free" part as most consumers experience it. The rest is about the technical advances that have been made in building out modern adtech companies and infrastructure, and what those companies have then gone on to contribute afterwards.
- sametmax 7y ago
  We had plenty of content on the web, if you make user count / content amount ratio, before it was overloaded with ads. I spent hours a day on the net in 2000, and we had very few ads. Even when google started showing ads, it was very discreet. No pop ups, modals, auto playing videos, invasive trackers and fake comments.
jonathanstrange 7y ago
I can only speak for myself but I'd be happy to get my 90s Internet back. The Internet was much better before companies grabbed their share of it and eroded standards.
- isostatic 7y ago
  Before or after Eternal September?
  - Crinus 7y ago
    After, of course. Before that most people didn't have access to Internet.
    - isostatic 7y ago
      most people didn't have access to Internet in the 90s at all.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]

richardwhiuk 7y ago

In what world was either dial-up, or high-speed internet free? You have to pay for a connection. If you don't want to pay for the content, it needs to be funded in some manner - donations or ads - we haven't found any other business models.

Valmar 7y ago
Online ads are a very invasive business model that only penalizes the end-user, and rarely benefits them. Especially when ads are often nasty vectors for malware.
- manigandham 7y ago
  Rarely benefits them? What about 95% of the content on the internet that ads pay for? Malware isn't advertising and security is an issue in any industry and sector.
  - renholder 7y ago
    >What about 95% of the content on the internet that ads pay for? This is such a pedestrian argument, as if advertising pays for the content to be made and then hosted - when the truth of the matter is that someone else pays for the content to be created (and hosted) and that cost is recouped (with additional profit added on top), after the fact by advertising. For example, advertising companies are not paying for YouTube content creators to create their content and then for it to be hosted on YouTube. Advertising companies seek those with the largest audience (typically, that requires having made content a priori, yeah?) and then make partnerships with those people and, then, those people may make videos pushing those products. WSJ, since this is predominantly an American board, doesn't have advertisers paying their reporters', photographers', editors', etc. salaries. Advertisers are not paying for the content to be created or to be hosted. All of that is done by WSJ, who then recoups the costs via advertising, yeah? So, the only point at which "95% of the content on the internet that ads pay for" is true, is (predominantly) after the content has been made and hosted and is only true over time (e.g.: not with immediate effect). >Malware isn't advertising You have that backwards from the OC's comment: Advertising networks have been used to push malware. >...and security is an issue in any industry and sector. This comes across as a whataboutism, "So? Other industries have security problems, too!" and, whilst true, largely ignores the fact that those other industries (mostly at large) weren't leveraged as attack vectors to spread malware. (I'm assuming your meaning of "industry" infers the meaning of "commercial industry", that generates revenue in exchange for a product or service, which would ignore the obvious things like P2P and the like.)
    - vegasdew 7y ago
      Is this even an argument? We don't pay for Apple's engineers/designers, Foxconn's workers when buying an iPhone. But they won't be paid if iPhone stops selling.
    - manigandham 7y ago
      Ok? The point still stands that advertising ultimately pays for the content. Manufacturers buy raw parts first and then recoup the costs by selling the final product, does that mean consumers aren't actually paying for the business? Security is an eternal problem and a completely separate topic from advertising as a business model. Do you suggest we stop using email because some people got scams and viruses? Or can we talk about communications while acknowledging that it's separate from implementation and UX issues?
moreira 7y ago
> If you don't want to pay for the content, it needs to be funded in some manner - donations or ads - we haven't found any other business models. I'd argue that it doesn't actually need to be funded at all. The internet and plenty of content on it existed prior to any advertising. People still talked on the internet, and they still put up their own content, even when there was no money to be made. Bloggers would still blog without ads. And we're right now using HN - a free service with free content provided by users, without ads or tracking. Funding only matters in a worldview where everything you do has to somehow turn a profit and grow to a gigantic scale to bring in even more profit. There was a time when people on the internet weren't looking at it like "how can I get rich from this".
- icebraining 7y ago
  HN has ads, they're just low-profile. There's one for Demodesk (YC W19) on the front page right now.
- BjoernKW 7y ago
  You still have to invest time and money, even if you don't want your service to scale or to get rich from the information you're providing. At the very least someone has to pay for the server and network infrastructure, maintenance and of course content creation. Some of that might be provided for by public funding while other aspects are covered by enthusiasts putting in their time. Just because somebody else pays for it or somebody else does the work required it doesn't magically become free.
- fecsantos 7y ago
  > And we're right now using HN - a free service with free content provided by users, without ads or tracking. It's obvious that ycombinator's business model is not based on Hacker News advertising - but hacker news is still used as platform for their portfolio companies and services. Hacker news is just a curated list, so calling it "free content" is a bit of a stretch, unless you're saying that the content provided are the comments of the user, but I'd argue that the website wouldn't be the same without the link to the content being commented on (which are in a big part, funded by ads). Y-Combinator is for profit by the way, and it invests in companies supported by advertising (e.g. Reddit). > Funding only matters in a worldview where everything you do has to somehow turn a profit and grow to a gigantic scale to bring in even more profit. Funding is not required only for growing into a gigantic scale. If you want to open a restaurant in your small town, you'll require some sort of funding. Even if you don't want to profit and just want to cover costs, you'll need a stream of money coming in from somewhere. I personally don't see anything wrong in people getting paid for their work - if you really want to create your own content and give it out for free, you can do so (a lot of people currently do just that). > There was a time when people on the internet weren't looking at it like "how can I get rich from this". I'm not sure exactly when that was. There's been people trying to get rich from the Internet for a long long time.

keerthiko 7y ago

Yes this. Most people who work outside software development and several within, are convinced that they have access to free internet services only because they are willing to tolerate ads. Ads ≠ "free" services, and "free" services ≠ ads. ["free" in scare quotes to refer to not paying money per usage or to gain access to usage, but you may be paying in other ways] Counter examples are public libraries (no ads but "free") and cable television (not "free" yet ads).

simonh 7y ago
He didn't say that in principle the only way to make money on the internet was through ads. He's saying that in practice most (not all) of the services people actually use on the internet for free (at no direct cost to themselves) are in fact paid for by advertising. As an observation, I think that's hard to argue with.
- mlthoughts2018 7y ago
  The quote in question specifically says “free and open internet” which has a massively different connotation than merely “no direct cost.” Free and open software, and by extension the internet services wishing to provide a free and open internet, often has no direct cost to end users and also does not generate income from ads, and seeks non-exploitative funding or donation models very different from advertising. Regardless of how many ad-based services people use at no direct cost, it’s highly debatable whether these services contribute in any way to the “free and open” internet... their widespread usage and superficial lack of direct financial cost certainly don’t factor in at all and are not relevant details for what the quote is discussing.
isostatic 7y ago
Obviously you pay in other ways. When Tesco have an advert, they have to charge more to pay for that advert. The money still comes from me, the person shopping at Tesco.
- 0_gravitas 7y ago

simonh 7y ago

>(e.g.: Facebook, Google, LinkedIn, etc.) aren't running to make the internet free and open but to squeeze out more profit margins for their respective shareholders and nothing more. "It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest" - Adam Smith, 1776.

TheOtherHobbes 7y ago
"It is not very unreasonable that the rich should contribute to the public expense, not only in proportion to their revenue, but something more than in that proportion." Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations, Book V, Chapter II.
- simonh 7y ago
  Another excellent Smith quote with which I fully agree, and one often overlooked by avowed Smith fans, though I don't see it's immediate applicability to the issue at hand.
  - rusk 7y ago
    If you made such a statement unquoted you’d be branded populist
    - C1sc0cat 7y ago
      Hard left socialist in the USA
- isostatic 7y ago
  What does rich mean? High revenue? High profits? High wealth?
  - onion2k 7y ago
    Yes, all of those things.

manigandham 7y ago

He never said they were synonymous. He also mentions ads - and the technology that makes them work - have played a part. Perhaps you should read the sentence you quoted again. Advertising pays for most content on the internet, that's the "free" part as most consumers experience it. The rest is about the technical advances that have been made in building out modern adtech companies and infrastructure, and what those companies have then gone on to contribute afterwards.

sametmax 7y ago
We had plenty of content on the web, if you make user count / content amount ratio, before it was overloaded with ads. I spent hours a day on the net in 2000, and we had very few ads. Even when google started showing ads, it was very discreet. No pop ups, modals, auto playing videos, invasive trackers and fake comments.

jonathanstrange 7y ago

I can only speak for myself but I'd be happy to get my 90s Internet back. The Internet was much better before companies grabbed their share of it and eroded standards.

isostatic 7y ago
Before or after Eternal September?
- Crinus 7y ago
  After, of course. Before that most people didn't have access to Internet.
  - isostatic 7y ago
    most people didn't have access to Internet in the 90s at all.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]