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Take a look at your microwave oven and ask yourself why it has so many buttons. 99% of the time you are using it for one thing only. To heat an item for 15, 30,

by 12xo 7y ago

Take a look at your microwave oven and ask yourself why it has so many buttons. 99% of the time you are using it for one thing only. To heat an item for 15, 30, 60 or N seconds. On high. Yet every single microwave is full of dozens of other buttons. Multiple other functions. Lots of features, bells and dings. Why? Because somewhere along the way, people thought they needed these extra features to sell their product. They thought they added value. But in the end, they do not add value to 99% of their users or their actual use. They are superfluous and yet, they remain on every microwave oven sold. This is what digital ads have become. A kluge of processes and jargon chasing a rainbow of perfect, efficient ad delivery. Something that is impossible to achieve. With the FB and Google and Amazon, owning the sell side market, you do not have a balanced marketplace. They are not adjusting the cost of the imp, conversion, or click or engagement or the N based on efficiency, or competition, or depreciation over time. They are in fact doing the opposite. They are adjusting the price based on none of those things. Only their ability to sell all those buttons, those features and those extras... And in the end, the advertiser just wants to sell more of X or achieve more of Y for as little as possible.

jefftk 7y ago
Microwaves offer additional features because it's really cheap, some of us like them (defrost is great!), and the features don't get in the way for users who don't need them. I don't think this is a useful analogy.
- 12xo 7y ago
  That's why these features are on every single one. They are cheap. Their costs went down over time... And just like digital, there are only a few manufactures. Have digital ad costs decreased over time as supply as increased?
- pen2l 7y ago
  Correct me if I'm wrong, but defrost is just a microwave for a very long time, right? Why _not_ just microwave by typing 5 minutes? Or instead, why shouldn't the microwave have less abstruse buttons like "1 min", "2 min", "5 min" which grant you the opportunity to seamlessly jump to trying to use your intuition to figure out the timing you want instead of this vague "defrost" button which... I'm still not sure what it does.
  - jefftk 7y ago
    Defrost is a long time, but at a lower power. For example, if I want to defrost a small bowl of berries I could put it in for 30s on high, but they'd get a bit cooked and squishy. If I put it in as defrosting 2oz it runs for ~1:40 at a much lower power and they're nearly as nice as if I'd let them slowly come up to temp in the fridge.
    - 12xo 7y ago
      I could be wrong but I believe that most microwaves operate with a single power. The various settings are just cycling the power on and off at different variables... 5 is half the number of cycles, Defrost is a timer setting, pre-programmed based on weight of food... water content.
      - jefftk 7y ago
        Yes, I think you're right, turning down the power level is usually implemented as cycling the magnetron. But you need to be smart in how you do it if you're not going to wear out the microwave unnecessarily by using cycles that are too short. If you are cooking something big you can do 50% with 30s on / 30s off, while if it's small you might need 2s on / 2s off. Hence the relatively complex controls.
olegious 7y ago
You're assuming that Google, FB and Amazon are the entire supply side of the market. They're a huge part of it yes, but there's about 30% of the internet supply that they don't control and once you get into the TV space it becomes even more open.
- 12xo 7y ago
  TV open? Um. No. I guess if you count the myriad of brokers as supply, otherwise, the linear market is even tighter. Not too mention most of the ads are never seen...and not audited. Leave the scatter out, that's for and local ads and DR. Those are measured in pennys, not dollars.
  - olegious 7y ago
    Traditional TV isn't. But more and more TV is consumed via various types of CTV platforms- these are transacted programmatically, mostly through private deals but a growing share via open programmatic.

by 12xo 7y ago

jefftk 7y ago

Microwaves offer additional features because it's really cheap, some of us like them (defrost is great!), and the features don't get in the way for users who don't need them. I don't think this is a useful analogy.

12xo 7y ago
That's why these features are on every single one. They are cheap. Their costs went down over time... And just like digital, there are only a few manufactures. Have digital ad costs decreased over time as supply as increased?
pen2l 7y ago
Correct me if I'm wrong, but defrost is just a microwave for a very long time, right? Why _not_ just microwave by typing 5 minutes? Or instead, why shouldn't the microwave have less abstruse buttons like "1 min", "2 min", "5 min" which grant you the opportunity to seamlessly jump to trying to use your intuition to figure out the timing you want instead of this vague "defrost" button which... I'm still not sure what it does.
- jefftk 7y ago
  Defrost is a long time, but at a lower power. For example, if I want to defrost a small bowl of berries I could put it in for 30s on high, but they'd get a bit cooked and squishy. If I put it in as defrosting 2oz it runs for ~1:40 at a much lower power and they're nearly as nice as if I'd let them slowly come up to temp in the fridge.
  - 12xo 7y ago
    I could be wrong but I believe that most microwaves operate with a single power. The various settings are just cycling the power on and off at different variables... 5 is half the number of cycles, Defrost is a timer setting, pre-programmed based on weight of food... water content.
    - jefftk 7y ago
      Yes, I think you're right, turning down the power level is usually implemented as cycling the magnetron. But you need to be smart in how you do it if you're not going to wear out the microwave unnecessarily by using cycles that are too short. If you are cooking something big you can do 50% with 30s on / 30s off, while if it's small you might need 2s on / 2s off. Hence the relatively complex controls.

olegious 7y ago

You're assuming that Google, FB and Amazon are the entire supply side of the market. They're a huge part of it yes, but there's about 30% of the internet supply that they don't control and once you get into the TV space it becomes even more open.

12xo 7y ago
TV open? Um. No. I guess if you count the myriad of brokers as supply, otherwise, the linear market is even tighter. Not too mention most of the ads are never seen...and not audited. Leave the scatter out, that's for and local ads and DR. Those are measured in pennys, not dollars.
- olegious 7y ago
  Traditional TV isn't. But more and more TV is consumed via various types of CTV platforms- these are transacted programmatically, mostly through private deals but a growing share via open programmatic.