5 ms·

So its ethical to manually skip the ads but not to automate the process?

rahuldottech 7y ago
Sure, because some percentage of the users will still listen to the ad, especially if it's the first time they're hearing it. Make it automated, that guarantees that no one is listening to it. Which would mean no revenue for the content creators. Which would lead to a really crappy system.
- LeftHandPath 7y ago
  But advertisements in podcasts are commonly pre-recorded by the podcast host(s) - so the host would still be paid for the advertisement, before it goes online. If the advertiser isn’t given any information about playback at ad time, then the revenue would not be affected.
  - rahuldottech 7y ago
    If no users are listening to ads, then no one will purchase ads on the podcasts and the revenue for the creators will dry up.
    - naravara 7y ago
      Or they find alternative revenue streams such as: a.) Patronage/donation model b.) Paywalls c.) Integrated the advertising into the program rather than making it a separate ad read
      - robbrown451 7y ago
        Not sure if you are suggesting that is good or bad. I see all those as bad. I don't like being guilted, paywalls just suck (also for the podcasters, they lose all their word of mouth), and blurring the lines between ads and content is awful
  - nkrisc 7y ago
    Unless it becomes widely known that a large share of the podcast listening audience uses apps that automatically skip the ads. That devalues the podcasts to advertisers.
  - robbrown451 7y ago
    That might work in the very short term. It shouldn't take long for advertisers to realize that a) podcast listeners tend to skip over ads or b) podcast ads don't result in sales.
  - _-david-_ 7y ago
    I think some ads are sponsored links / promo codes. I am not sure in that situation if they get paid for reading the ad or only get commission from the sales.
  - StillBored 7y ago
    Well the question I don't see answered anywhere is how well this actually works. For some podcasts where the ad's are per-recorded and played across a couple different podcasts it seems the problem is pretty easy to solve. OTOH, I've seen a number of youtube and podcasts where the Ads are read by the hosts as part of the show and are unique for each podcast. I heard one once recently where the host must have had 10 different versions of their travel ad, for the same place worded in slightly different ways. Maybe they were just ad'libing them. Either way, I have a hard time believing this can be easily detected. The flow and voice intonation was such that I didn't even realize it was an ad until 3/4 way through.
    - hombre_fatal 7y ago
      The app has a list of the dozen podcast it works with. It doesn't work with any other. That alone should tell you the app simply identifies some sort of jingle or pattern. Or these are the podcasts that OP is willing to manually tag as each episode is released.
DataGata 7y ago
Podcasts and podcast advertisers know we can skip them, they accept this. If they see a lot of users skip ALL of them, it isn't okay.
- nickthegreek 7y ago
  How are they seeing that ads have been skipped? That seems like it would only happen if your player is spying on you.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
  - ceejayoz 7y ago
    The coupon codes or referral links being advertised will see a drop in traffic.
  - reaperducer 7y ago
    That seems like it would only happen if your player is spying on you. No. It works the same way any newspaper, radio, and TV advertising work. If advertisers sponsor a podcast and get zero return, then the advertisers stops sponsoring the podcast and the podcast dies.
    - jmhnilbog 7y ago
      A world where all podcasts have lo-fi production values and only weirdos with too much time and a LOT of interest in the topic at hand make them would be wonderful. The audio version of the early web. They can have podcast web rings instead of ads!
- corodra 7y ago
  Exactly. Because the podcaster is saying the script (normally), we may actually listen (pay attention) to it. That's what they hope for. If there isn't even a chance in hell that we would even START to hear it, then there's no more ad spending. Which means there's less content because not everyone can do the stuff for free at high quality.
deadmetheny 7y ago
Yes. The current system can't predict one way or the other if users are skipping the ads; if this app were to become widespread, it becomes known factually and advertising revenue dries up.
- egdod 7y ago
  Advertising revenue should dry up.
pan69 7y ago
Is it ethical not to look at a billboard when you're walking down the street? Is it ethical to mute the TV when commercials come up? I think it's just your choice, right?
- brailsafe 7y ago
  I believe this is false equivalency. I probably agree with the overall argument that it's not unethical, but in both examples you give you're not requesting someone's service in exchange for nothing. For TV, you're already paying for a service, so do what you will. For billboard's, you're literally getting nothing in return or asking to be bombarded by ads. A better example would probably adblocking on either YouTube or any website. The service is otherwise free, and you're demanding it in some sense.
  - criddell 7y ago
    > For TV, you're already paying for a service, so do what you will. There are still lots of people who watch ad supported TV broadcast over the air. So I think muting commercials or recording with a DVR and skipping over later is a decent analogy.
- alehul 7y ago
  This wasn't meant to be a question of ethics, but one of incentives— let's view it from a standpoint of "will this ultimately be bad for society." > Is it ethical not to look at a billboard when you're walking down the street? This is fine, you're in a public space where somebody paid for an ad on nearby private property, and society wouldn't be worse off if everybody ignored billboards, advertisers were no longer willing to pay for billboards, and we got rid of the lot of them. > Is it ethical to mute the TV when commercials come up? This is fine, you paid for the TV and you pay for cable, and there will be no consequences to many people muting the TV during commercials. If, however, you're given something for free that could be taken away, and it is able to be offered for free due to the business model of ads, taking this concept to its conclusion where everybody automatically skips over ads will make the free and open podcast system no longer viable. Advertisers will no longer be willing to pay for ad space on podcasts, and the podcasters will have to move to charging per episode, or more likely, getting tiny royalties from a company like Spotify.
Akababa 7y ago
I don't believe GP was making a point about ethics, but rather one of economics. In general it's not smart to advertise this to people if you want to keep your podcasts free for as long as possible.
mersenne 7y ago
The twist here is that he's make a profit from automating that process. It's not necessarily unethical, but it's morally dubious, at least.

Sure, because some percentage of the users will still listen to the ad, especially if it's the first time they're hearing it. Make it automated, that guarantees that no one is listening to it. Which would mean no revenue for the content creators. Which would lead to a really crappy system.

LeftHandPath 7y ago
But advertisements in podcasts are commonly pre-recorded by the podcast host(s) - so the host would still be paid for the advertisement, before it goes online. If the advertiser isn’t given any information about playback at ad time, then the revenue would not be affected.
- rahuldottech 7y ago
  If no users are listening to ads, then no one will purchase ads on the podcasts and the revenue for the creators will dry up.
  - naravara 7y ago
    Or they find alternative revenue streams such as: a.) Patronage/donation model b.) Paywalls c.) Integrated the advertising into the program rather than making it a separate ad read
    - robbrown451 7y ago
      Not sure if you are suggesting that is good or bad. I see all those as bad. I don't like being guilted, paywalls just suck (also for the podcasters, they lose all their word of mouth), and blurring the lines between ads and content is awful
- nkrisc 7y ago
  Unless it becomes widely known that a large share of the podcast listening audience uses apps that automatically skip the ads. That devalues the podcasts to advertisers.
- robbrown451 7y ago
  That might work in the very short term. It shouldn't take long for advertisers to realize that a) podcast listeners tend to skip over ads or b) podcast ads don't result in sales.
- _-david-_ 7y ago
  I think some ads are sponsored links / promo codes. I am not sure in that situation if they get paid for reading the ad or only get commission from the sales.
- StillBored 7y ago
  Well the question I don't see answered anywhere is how well this actually works. For some podcasts where the ad's are per-recorded and played across a couple different podcasts it seems the problem is pretty easy to solve. OTOH, I've seen a number of youtube and podcasts where the Ads are read by the hosts as part of the show and are unique for each podcast. I heard one once recently where the host must have had 10 different versions of their travel ad, for the same place worded in slightly different ways. Maybe they were just ad'libing them. Either way, I have a hard time believing this can be easily detected. The flow and voice intonation was such that I didn't even realize it was an ad until 3/4 way through.
  - hombre_fatal 7y ago
    The app has a list of the dozen podcast it works with. It doesn't work with any other. That alone should tell you the app simply identifies some sort of jingle or pattern. Or these are the podcasts that OP is willing to manually tag as each episode is released.

DataGata 7y ago

Podcasts and podcast advertisers know we can skip them, they accept this. If they see a lot of users skip ALL of them, it isn't okay.

nickthegreek 7y ago
How are they seeing that ads have been skipped? That seems like it would only happen if your player is spying on you.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- ceejayoz 7y ago
  The coupon codes or referral links being advertised will see a drop in traffic.
- reaperducer 7y ago
  That seems like it would only happen if your player is spying on you. No. It works the same way any newspaper, radio, and TV advertising work. If advertisers sponsor a podcast and get zero return, then the advertisers stops sponsoring the podcast and the podcast dies.
  - jmhnilbog 7y ago
    A world where all podcasts have lo-fi production values and only weirdos with too much time and a LOT of interest in the topic at hand make them would be wonderful. The audio version of the early web. They can have podcast web rings instead of ads!
corodra 7y ago
Exactly. Because the podcaster is saying the script (normally), we may actually listen (pay attention) to it. That's what they hope for. If there isn't even a chance in hell that we would even START to hear it, then there's no more ad spending. Which means there's less content because not everyone can do the stuff for free at high quality.

deadmetheny 7y ago

Yes. The current system can't predict one way or the other if users are skipping the ads; if this app were to become widespread, it becomes known factually and advertising revenue dries up.

egdod 7y ago
Advertising revenue should dry up.

pan69 7y ago

Is it ethical not to look at a billboard when you're walking down the street? Is it ethical to mute the TV when commercials come up? I think it's just your choice, right?

brailsafe 7y ago
I believe this is false equivalency. I probably agree with the overall argument that it's not unethical, but in both examples you give you're not requesting someone's service in exchange for nothing. For TV, you're already paying for a service, so do what you will. For billboard's, you're literally getting nothing in return or asking to be bombarded by ads. A better example would probably adblocking on either YouTube or any website. The service is otherwise free, and you're demanding it in some sense.
- criddell 7y ago
  > For TV, you're already paying for a service, so do what you will. There are still lots of people who watch ad supported TV broadcast over the air. So I think muting commercials or recording with a DVR and skipping over later is a decent analogy.
alehul 7y ago
This wasn't meant to be a question of ethics, but one of incentives— let's view it from a standpoint of "will this ultimately be bad for society." > Is it ethical not to look at a billboard when you're walking down the street? This is fine, you're in a public space where somebody paid for an ad on nearby private property, and society wouldn't be worse off if everybody ignored billboards, advertisers were no longer willing to pay for billboards, and we got rid of the lot of them. > Is it ethical to mute the TV when commercials come up? This is fine, you paid for the TV and you pay for cable, and there will be no consequences to many people muting the TV during commercials. If, however, you're given something for free that could be taken away, and it is able to be offered for free due to the business model of ads, taking this concept to its conclusion where everybody automatically skips over ads will make the free and open podcast system no longer viable. Advertisers will no longer be willing to pay for ad space on podcasts, and the podcasters will have to move to charging per episode, or more likely, getting tiny royalties from a company like Spotify.

Akababa 7y ago

I don't believe GP was making a point about ethics, but rather one of economics. In general it's not smart to advertise this to people if you want to keep your podcasts free for as long as possible.

mersenne 7y ago

The twist here is that he's make a profit from automating that process. It's not necessarily unethical, but it's morally dubious, at least.