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I don't think ads are bad per se, people don't like them because they don't like paying. No-one is forcing you to see ads and often you have the option to buy

I don't think ads are bad per se, people don't like them because they don't like paying. No-one is forcing you to see ads and often you have the option to buy your way out of ads. More in general if people preferred to pay we see a paid alternative emerge, thanks to the nature of the market. The reality is that the majority of people are not privacy conscious and don't care as much as people in tech do. Overall, I'd be prouder to work on Google Ads, which provides services on a voluntary basis, than to work for the IRS or HMRC which impose their government's decisions on people under threat of fines and eventually incarceration.

rcMgD2BwE72F 6y ago
>No-one is forcing you to see ads Uh? Where do you live? Where do you browse? I'm a paid subscriber to newspapers and they keep tracking me and emailing/notifying/displaying ads. They even share my data to their "partners". I can't get out of my apartment without seeing ad everywhere (subway, buildings, billboards...). You cannot escape advertising unless you completely isolate yourself from society.
- yosito 6y ago
  I'm not OP, but I've stopped using Google products as much as possible, and browse the internet with Firefox and uMatrix. There are very few physical world ads where I live, due to local restrictions. The only ads I see these days are sponsored posts when I open Instagram, and I'm doing that less and less because in my experience 80% of the content on Instagram is either a sponsored post or cheap low-quality recommended posts, and only 20% are the friends that I follow. My point is, it's not impossible to avoid ads these days.
- jokethrowaway 5y ago
  My point is that if people were that bothered by ads, they would be willing to pay ad-free alternatives and we wouldn't have ads. For some things you can actually choose between free ad-supported or paid without ads. Besides, I really don't see ads in my life - but that's because I use adblock and similar software. I don't live in a big city anymore so I don't see physical ads as well.

rcMgD2BwE72F 6y ago

>No-one is forcing you to see ads Uh? Where do you live? Where do you browse? I'm a paid subscriber to newspapers and they keep tracking me and emailing/notifying/displaying ads. They even share my data to their "partners". I can't get out of my apartment without seeing ad everywhere (subway, buildings, billboards...). You cannot escape advertising unless you completely isolate yourself from society.

yosito 6y ago
I'm not OP, but I've stopped using Google products as much as possible, and browse the internet with Firefox and uMatrix. There are very few physical world ads where I live, due to local restrictions. The only ads I see these days are sponsored posts when I open Instagram, and I'm doing that less and less because in my experience 80% of the content on Instagram is either a sponsored post or cheap low-quality recommended posts, and only 20% are the friends that I follow. My point is, it's not impossible to avoid ads these days.
jokethrowaway 5y ago
My point is that if people were that bothered by ads, they would be willing to pay ad-free alternatives and we wouldn't have ads. For some things you can actually choose between free ad-supported or paid without ads. Besides, I really don't see ads in my life - but that's because I use adblock and similar software. I don't live in a big city anymore so I don't see physical ads as well.