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For one, that Ad logo spent about two years being yellow-on-white, so people without well-tuned contrast monitors couldn't see it at all. Last year they made a

For one, that Ad logo spent about two years being yellow-on-white, so people without well-tuned contrast monitors couldn't see it at all. Last year they made a change that made them so indistinguishable to the untrained eye that even Google rolled them back: https://techcrunch.com/2020/01/23/squint-and-youll-click-it/ https://techcrunch.com/2020/01/23/squint-and-youll-click-it/ https://www.cnbc.com/2020/01/24/google-will-iterate-the-design-that-made-it-harder-to-tell-ads-from-search-results.html https://www.cnbc.com/2020/01/24/google-will-iterate-the-desi... But no, generally, they don't notice that. Studies have been done demonstrating how few users can tell the difference between an ad and a search result. In one study, half of respondents "didn't spot" ads in Google search results at all: https://www.123-reg.co.uk/blog/seo-2/how-google-is-profiting-from-search-confusion/ https://www.123-reg.co.uk/blog/seo-2/how-google-is-profiting... That study was in 2013, when Ads were much more obvious in search results than they are today. By 2018, the statistic of people who couldn't identify search ads on Google was up closer to two-thirds: https://marketingtechnews.net/news/2018/sep/06/two-thirds-people-dont-know-difference-between-google-paid-and-organic-search-results/ https://marketingtechnews.net/news/2018/sep/06/two-thirds-pe...

FridayoLeary 6y ago
it normally takes me 1 sentence max to realise i've clicked on an ad by mistake. I think even if there was no ad shin i would still manage to work out what is promoted content. If ads ever stops being generic, irrelevant clickbait, we might have a problem on our hands. But that particular danger doesn't seem to be very likely at all.
- Gregaros 6y ago
  > it normally takes me 1 sentence max to realise i've clicked on an ad by mistake. Good thing that has no cost, then. Especially with how poorly optimized all the javascript on these pages is, slowing loading to a perceptible crawl (unless, perhaps again, if you’re in the bubble where every machine you use is latest flagship android or a workstation, blind to the experience of the less ‘sophisticated’ users).

FridayoLeary 6y ago

it normally takes me 1 sentence max to realise i've clicked on an ad by mistake. I think even if there was no ad shin i would still manage to work out what is promoted content. If ads ever stops being generic, irrelevant clickbait, we might have a problem on our hands. But that particular danger doesn't seem to be very likely at all.

Gregaros 6y ago
> it normally takes me 1 sentence max to realise i've clicked on an ad by mistake. Good thing that has no cost, then. Especially with how poorly optimized all the javascript on these pages is, slowing loading to a perceptible crawl (unless, perhaps again, if you’re in the bubble where every machine you use is latest flagship android or a workstation, blind to the experience of the less ‘sophisticated’ users).