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I keep wondering whether such tools should be even legal. Where is the line between making sure you show your advert to people most likely interested in your pr

I keep wondering whether such tools should be even legal. Where is the line between making sure you show your advert to people most likely interested in your product and straight up manipulating people into buying something they don't need? In the past, if you sold let's say car parts, you would then naturally buy advert on a car forum, hoping that people interested in cars would click your ad and see what you have to offer. Now you that such forums are mostly gone, you have the whole science of nudging people into buying something using your personal data harvested in questionable ways, various funnel strategies and so on. Why is this socially acceptable?

fakedang 6y ago
While I'm a vocal critic of both Facebook and Google, do they really make people buy things they don't need by manipulating? Anecdotally, most of the marketing material and discounts that people around me get and then use to make a purchasing decision came from email. Not Google or Facebook shoving shit in their face, plain old email. Are you going to call for a ban on email? The times I've been convinced to check out a product were only because either a.) their product was really good in the ad and b.) the ad was really good. For example, I still show that Honda R button ad to people who haven't seen it. And even though that ad was still brilliant, as I type this, my Google query (to reconfirm) was "Hyundai R button ad". That's right - that unique and famous YouTube ad that I still remember from 2015 was still not enough for me to even remember the name of the company, much less the name of the product! Most ads are obnoxious and/or boring, and simply exasperating when they interrupt you in between, but nowhere near manipulative. Facebook and Google's major flaw is not in the advertising model but in the way they amplify voices of like minded people who are otherwise irrelevant personae.
- varispeed 6y ago
  This is a completely different beast. I am subscribed to a couple of companies that from time to time send me email about promotions they have and sometimes I buy those products.
- walshemj 6y ago
  Or the impossible dream advert advert Honda basically won car adverts with that one.
- johncessna 6y ago
  I always took it as name recognition/playing the long game. I'm not currently looking to buy a car. When I do there will be 10ish years of product placement in movies, banners, radio and TV commercials, magazine ads, youtube ads, good press, and bad press that I've been 'ignoring' that will undoubtedly play somehow into the purchasing decision.
  - fakedang 6y ago
    Exactly, it has always been about brand building. Which is why I find Amazon and Deliveroo tiresome. These guys just replaced TV and newspapers in the ad business.
justapassenger 6y ago
> manipulating people into buying something they don't need? This shows you have very little idea how advertising business works. There’s a lot of bad and shady stuff, sure, but that’s extremely naive oversimplification. It’s like saying that software engineering exists to steal jobs from people and give them to machines instead.
- cwkoss 6y ago
  People who work in telemarketing or bulk mail or spam all make similar arguments, but I don't buy it. There are narrow cases where advertising can be societally beneficial, but this is not the case the vast majority of the time.
  - justapassenger 6y ago
    It’s not about arguments, it’s about educating yourself on the topic before making definitive conclusions. Bringing up telemarketing and spam when we talk about advertising is as relevant as bringing ransomware as an argument against encryption.
    - deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]
    - jacobolus 6y ago
      What do you think the difference is between telemarketing and other forms of advertising that makes comparing them an expression of total ignorance, worthy of gratuitous insults? The premise of both is forcing people’s attention to focus on an unsolicited message as a way of manipulating them into doing something they would not otherwise do or buy something they would not otherwise buy. Spreading those manipulative messages through phone calls or paper mail does not seem to be fundamentally different than spreading them through interstitial television clips, magazine pages, billboards, spam emails, or website popups. All of these delivery mechanisms are ugly, unpleasant, and typically exploitative. Personally I find e.g. Facebook and Google’s panopticon-driven advertising empires to be more ethically problematic than many kinds of telemarketing and junk mail. Facebook in particular has caused more concrete harm in the world than any telemarketing firm.
wubbert 6y ago
>Why is this socially acceptable? Because most people don't know that it's happening, and of the people that do, most don't care.
HatchedLake721 6y ago
How is this different to how advertising has been done for hundreds of years, e.g. newspapers or a billboard on a public street? Aren't they "manipulating people into buying something they don't need"?
- varispeed 6y ago
  Today advertising looks something like this: - You go to a shop and ask for information about what kind of tires they have - A spotter sees you and phones the ad company that you were seen at such and such store asking for tires - The ad company already knows where you do usually walk and what time - They send agents with tires on billboards who follow you on the way to work and back and whenever you look they try to shove a banner in front of your eyes, sometimes even slowing you down as you try to walk past them I am pretty sure if they did exactly the same as they do online, but offline, that would be illegal (stalking for starters)
- cwkoss 6y ago
  The vast majority of advertising is not a socially productive activity. There is a narrow use case that can be productive when informing a buyer of the existence of something they actually need, but this is not the case 90+% of the time.

fakedang 6y ago

While I'm a vocal critic of both Facebook and Google, do they really make people buy things they don't need by manipulating? Anecdotally, most of the marketing material and discounts that people around me get and then use to make a purchasing decision came from email. Not Google or Facebook shoving shit in their face, plain old email. Are you going to call for a ban on email? The times I've been convinced to check out a product were only because either a.) their product was really good in the ad and b.) the ad was really good. For example, I still show that Honda R button ad to people who haven't seen it. And even though that ad was still brilliant, as I type this, my Google query (to reconfirm) was "Hyundai R button ad". That's right - that unique and famous YouTube ad that I still remember from 2015 was still not enough for me to even remember the name of the company, much less the name of the product! Most ads are obnoxious and/or boring, and simply exasperating when they interrupt you in between, but nowhere near manipulative. Facebook and Google's major flaw is not in the advertising model but in the way they amplify voices of like minded people who are otherwise irrelevant personae.

varispeed 6y ago
This is a completely different beast. I am subscribed to a couple of companies that from time to time send me email about promotions they have and sometimes I buy those products.
walshemj 6y ago
Or the impossible dream advert advert Honda basically won car adverts with that one.
johncessna 6y ago
I always took it as name recognition/playing the long game. I'm not currently looking to buy a car. When I do there will be 10ish years of product placement in movies, banners, radio and TV commercials, magazine ads, youtube ads, good press, and bad press that I've been 'ignoring' that will undoubtedly play somehow into the purchasing decision.
- fakedang 6y ago
  Exactly, it has always been about brand building. Which is why I find Amazon and Deliveroo tiresome. These guys just replaced TV and newspapers in the ad business.

justapassenger 6y ago

> manipulating people into buying something they don't need? This shows you have very little idea how advertising business works. There’s a lot of bad and shady stuff, sure, but that’s extremely naive oversimplification. It’s like saying that software engineering exists to steal jobs from people and give them to machines instead.

cwkoss 6y ago
People who work in telemarketing or bulk mail or spam all make similar arguments, but I don't buy it. There are narrow cases where advertising can be societally beneficial, but this is not the case the vast majority of the time.
- justapassenger 6y ago
  It’s not about arguments, it’s about educating yourself on the topic before making definitive conclusions. Bringing up telemarketing and spam when we talk about advertising is as relevant as bringing ransomware as an argument against encryption.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - jacobolus 6y ago
    What do you think the difference is between telemarketing and other forms of advertising that makes comparing them an expression of total ignorance, worthy of gratuitous insults? The premise of both is forcing people’s attention to focus on an unsolicited message as a way of manipulating them into doing something they would not otherwise do or buy something they would not otherwise buy. Spreading those manipulative messages through phone calls or paper mail does not seem to be fundamentally different than spreading them through interstitial television clips, magazine pages, billboards, spam emails, or website popups. All of these delivery mechanisms are ugly, unpleasant, and typically exploitative. Personally I find e.g. Facebook and Google’s panopticon-driven advertising empires to be more ethically problematic than many kinds of telemarketing and junk mail. Facebook in particular has caused more concrete harm in the world than any telemarketing firm.

wubbert 6y ago

>Why is this socially acceptable? Because most people don't know that it's happening, and of the people that do, most don't care.

HatchedLake721 6y ago

How is this different to how advertising has been done for hundreds of years, e.g. newspapers or a billboard on a public street? Aren't they "manipulating people into buying something they don't need"?

varispeed 6y ago
Today advertising looks something like this: - You go to a shop and ask for information about what kind of tires they have - A spotter sees you and phones the ad company that you were seen at such and such store asking for tires - The ad company already knows where you do usually walk and what time - They send agents with tires on billboards who follow you on the way to work and back and whenever you look they try to shove a banner in front of your eyes, sometimes even slowing you down as you try to walk past them I am pretty sure if they did exactly the same as they do online, but offline, that would be illegal (stalking for starters)
cwkoss 6y ago
The vast majority of advertising is not a socially productive activity. There is a narrow use case that can be productive when informing a buyer of the existence of something they actually need, but this is not the case 90+% of the time.