8 ms·

With ads you're not just paying with your "attention" (waste of time and focus), you're also paying with changes in your behaviour, perceptions, and attitudes.

With ads you're not just paying with your "attention" (waste of time and focus), you're also paying with changes in your behaviour, perceptions, and attitudes. As much as we like to imagine our minds to be impenetrable bastions of rationality, they are not. We can easily be enticed and manipulated to do things we wouldn't otherwise do, to see things differently than we otherwise would, to consider things we wouldn't consider, and all of that is exactly what the advertisers are paying for.

cutemonster 5y ago
> not just paying with your "attention" And maybe abolishing democracy Political manipulation ads, helping an authoritarian rise to power. But ads for buying what I just searched for: "buy new running shoes", aren't like that -- they can be helpful instead :-). It's mainly social network ads like on Facebook that are dangerous for society? From the article: > I think advertising is positive It's both? Ads are different from ads, just like different things one can eat are different, like potatoes (running shoe ads) versus poisonous mushrooms (nation states abolishing democracy in the US via political manipulation on Facebook)
- e_proxus 5y ago
  If I search for “buy new running shoes” I’d rather get the best search results, not the highest paid for. I’m pretty sure there are better criteria for those results than the amount of money paid to end up in that list. But alas, that’s not what modern search engines use, because they are advertisers first and foremost. Not reputable search providers anymore.
- pydry 5y ago
  I tried starting a website a while back that would give reliable, unbiased information on a certain class of goods and services. I looked at my competitors and saw that most of them were obviously shilling for the company that was paying them the most, which was never the best. I figured by being the most honest I could be the most trusted and win out. The trouble is, the best companies would rely upon word of mouth. Promoting them wouldn't get me paid a dime. Honesty would benefit them, but not me. Getting traffic, meanwhile, I realized would cost me money. That's when I realized that the only way to get a non negative margin in that industry was to sacrifice your objectivity (which is what everyone did). Theoretically you could charge users for this I guess, like Which? magazine does but I couldn't see a straightforward route to that point that wouldn't involve burning a lot of capital I didn't have. The chicken/egg problem rose its ugly head again. I gave up soon after.
  - cutemonster 5y ago
    What if there was something like GPG's network of trust, but for buying stuff
  - Grustaf 5y ago
    Figure out which brand you prefer, contact them and negotiate a commission. If you're open to your readers about it, it should be fine.
    - cutemonster 5y ago
      Nice idea :-) hmm at the same time, from the perspective of the readers, how can they know that Pydry (GP) didn't behind the scenes contact 20 brands, and are now promoting those who paid the most?
      - Grustaf 5y ago
        Sure, they won't know that, but I don't actually think honesty is an important selling point in most sectors. If the review seems coherent and plausible, that's enough for most people. So in a way, honesty is mostly for his own benefit. Besides, how could he prove his honesty either way? I guess he could arrange commission with all companies, hope that his favourite brand isn't also the one paying the most, and then disclose all the commissions.
        cutemonster 5y ago
        > If the review seems coherent and plausible, that's enough for most people I think so too > hope that his favourite brand isn't also the one paying the most, and then disclose all the commissions. I'm thinking that if the site visitors have a way to see that usually the site promotes other brands than the highest paying, then that'd be good enough. At the same time, why would they trust the disclosure info :-) Another thought: if his/her favorite brand didn't pay enough, s/he could just disclose the commissions, but not write any review. (To encourage that brand to pay more)
    - 5y ago
- nikitaga 5y ago
  Just googled that to see if the ads are helpful. They weren't. Not surprising, because Google ads are ranked by profitability, not helpfulness, and those metrics don't correlate as much as Google would like you to think. The ads just took my attention away from organic results, which are the ones that are supposed to be ranked by helpfulness. Those sneaker ads probably aren't destroying our democracy[1], they're just costing the society things that are hard to quantify. They induce me to buy what's most profitable to the sellers, not what's best for me. They take away business from actually helpful resources, and from those who don't advertise on Google. [1] They are enabling the existence of a search monopoly (along with other factors), so you know, "probably" is the strongest word I'd go with here.
  - underlines 5y ago
    No, Google Ads are not ranked for highest bidder. There's Quality Score that affects the decision a lot. If I have a website about running shoes and want to bid on the keyword "second hand cars" two things happen: first my bid gets astronomically high, because it's not matching the user's intent. secondly from all those people who click and leave google search but come back after a few seconds, google figures out that the quality score of the website is so bad (wrong intent) that the bid for that advertiser even gets more astronomically high and at one point even gets stopped. The whole system incentivises ads that match the intent of the user, any deviation from this is extremely difficult and not profitable for the advertiser in most cases.
    - nikitaga 5y ago
      I know. I didn't say the ads were ranked for highest bidder. I said they were ranked to maximize profitability. If the user does not click an ad, it's not profitable to Google. If the user comes back to the search page after visiting the ad, the ad is not profitable to the advertiser. But if the user buys from the ad, that doesn't say anything about whether the ad was useful (or counter-productive) to the user, it only means that this transaction was profitable to Google and the advertiser. Ads not matching the search query are not the issue. They are neither profitable nor helpful, so you can't use that criterion to distinguish the two goals.
pydry 5y ago
>As much as we like to imagine our minds to be impenetrable bastions of rationality, they are not. We can easily be enticed and manipulated to do things we wouldn't otherwise do I don't think advertising does work well on everybody nor does it have to. Maybe not even half of us need to be susceptible for it to be as profitable as it is. I have noticed some people are much more susceptible to suggestion than others. These people are probably responsible for a disproportionate amount of commercial profits and probably more likely to be taken in by paid political campaigning. Furthermore, I reckon if we could hold a mirror up to many of these people they might reconsider their behavior (it probably would work better than shouting at them at thanksgiving or over Facebook).
- Grustaf 5y ago
  IF advertising didn't work, on average, it would probably have gone away by now, don't you think?
  - pydry 5y ago
    I didn't say it didn't work.
matheusmoreira 5y ago
Yes, completely agree. Advertising is essentially mind hacking. Companies pay advertisers to introduce their brands into the minds of consumers. It's inherently hostile.

cutemonster 5y ago

> not just paying with your "attention" And maybe abolishing democracy Political manipulation ads, helping an authoritarian rise to power. But ads for buying what I just searched for: "buy new running shoes", aren't like that -- they can be helpful instead :-). It's mainly social network ads like on Facebook that are dangerous for society? From the article: > I think advertising is positive It's both? Ads are different from ads, just like different things one can eat are different, like potatoes (running shoe ads) versus poisonous mushrooms (nation states abolishing democracy in the US via political manipulation on Facebook)

e_proxus 5y ago
If I search for “buy new running shoes” I’d rather get the best search results, not the highest paid for. I’m pretty sure there are better criteria for those results than the amount of money paid to end up in that list. But alas, that’s not what modern search engines use, because they are advertisers first and foremost. Not reputable search providers anymore.
pydry 5y ago
I tried starting a website a while back that would give reliable, unbiased information on a certain class of goods and services. I looked at my competitors and saw that most of them were obviously shilling for the company that was paying them the most, which was never the best. I figured by being the most honest I could be the most trusted and win out. The trouble is, the best companies would rely upon word of mouth. Promoting them wouldn't get me paid a dime. Honesty would benefit them, but not me. Getting traffic, meanwhile, I realized would cost me money. That's when I realized that the only way to get a non negative margin in that industry was to sacrifice your objectivity (which is what everyone did). Theoretically you could charge users for this I guess, like Which? magazine does but I couldn't see a straightforward route to that point that wouldn't involve burning a lot of capital I didn't have. The chicken/egg problem rose its ugly head again. I gave up soon after.
- cutemonster 5y ago
  What if there was something like GPG's network of trust, but for buying stuff
- Grustaf 5y ago
  Figure out which brand you prefer, contact them and negotiate a commission. If you're open to your readers about it, it should be fine.
  - cutemonster 5y ago
    Nice idea :-) hmm at the same time, from the perspective of the readers, how can they know that Pydry (GP) didn't behind the scenes contact 20 brands, and are now promoting those who paid the most?
    - Grustaf 5y ago
      Sure, they won't know that, but I don't actually think honesty is an important selling point in most sectors. If the review seems coherent and plausible, that's enough for most people. So in a way, honesty is mostly for his own benefit. Besides, how could he prove his honesty either way? I guess he could arrange commission with all companies, hope that his favourite brand isn't also the one paying the most, and then disclose all the commissions.
      - cutemonster 5y ago
        > If the review seems coherent and plausible, that's enough for most people I think so too > hope that his favourite brand isn't also the one paying the most, and then disclose all the commissions. I'm thinking that if the site visitors have a way to see that usually the site promotes other brands than the highest paying, then that'd be good enough. At the same time, why would they trust the disclosure info :-) Another thought: if his/her favorite brand didn't pay enough, s/he could just disclose the commissions, but not write any review. (To encourage that brand to pay more)
  - 5y ago
nikitaga 5y ago
Just googled that to see if the ads are helpful. They weren't. Not surprising, because Google ads are ranked by profitability, not helpfulness, and those metrics don't correlate as much as Google would like you to think. The ads just took my attention away from organic results, which are the ones that are supposed to be ranked by helpfulness. Those sneaker ads probably aren't destroying our democracy[1], they're just costing the society things that are hard to quantify. They induce me to buy what's most profitable to the sellers, not what's best for me. They take away business from actually helpful resources, and from those who don't advertise on Google. [1] They are enabling the existence of a search monopoly (along with other factors), so you know, "probably" is the strongest word I'd go with here.
- underlines 5y ago
  No, Google Ads are not ranked for highest bidder. There's Quality Score that affects the decision a lot. If I have a website about running shoes and want to bid on the keyword "second hand cars" two things happen: first my bid gets astronomically high, because it's not matching the user's intent. secondly from all those people who click and leave google search but come back after a few seconds, google figures out that the quality score of the website is so bad (wrong intent) that the bid for that advertiser even gets more astronomically high and at one point even gets stopped. The whole system incentivises ads that match the intent of the user, any deviation from this is extremely difficult and not profitable for the advertiser in most cases.
  - nikitaga 5y ago
    I know. I didn't say the ads were ranked for highest bidder. I said they were ranked to maximize profitability. If the user does not click an ad, it's not profitable to Google. If the user comes back to the search page after visiting the ad, the ad is not profitable to the advertiser. But if the user buys from the ad, that doesn't say anything about whether the ad was useful (or counter-productive) to the user, it only means that this transaction was profitable to Google and the advertiser. Ads not matching the search query are not the issue. They are neither profitable nor helpful, so you can't use that criterion to distinguish the two goals.

pydry 5y ago

>As much as we like to imagine our minds to be impenetrable bastions of rationality, they are not. We can easily be enticed and manipulated to do things we wouldn't otherwise do I don't think advertising does work well on everybody nor does it have to. Maybe not even half of us need to be susceptible for it to be as profitable as it is. I have noticed some people are much more susceptible to suggestion than others. These people are probably responsible for a disproportionate amount of commercial profits and probably more likely to be taken in by paid political campaigning. Furthermore, I reckon if we could hold a mirror up to many of these people they might reconsider their behavior (it probably would work better than shouting at them at thanksgiving or over Facebook).

Grustaf 5y ago
IF advertising didn't work, on average, it would probably have gone away by now, don't you think?
- pydry 5y ago
  I didn't say it didn't work.

matheusmoreira 5y ago

Yes, completely agree. Advertising is essentially mind hacking. Companies pay advertisers to introduce their brands into the minds of consumers. It's inherently hostile.