12 ms·

What is it, exactly?

by beaner 5y ago

thrwn_frthr_awy 5y ago
Personalized advertising.
- handmodel 5y ago
  What would be the definition of this? I listen to a podcast on football. Are they allowed to run ads that are about sports betting and NFL tickets? That is personalized to the group. Is Facebook allowed to run ads for sports betting to all people who are fans of a professional team on their site? Is Facebook not allowed to run me ads for local restaurants any more?
  - MetaWhirledPeas 5y ago
    This could be done. The ads on a football podcast could be based on who their broader audience is, not based on a specific user. > Is Facebook not allowed to run me ads for local restaurants any more? Nope.
    - yellow_postit 5y ago
      the difference between a cohort that listens to a football podcast and lives in a metro doesn’t seem obvious to me.
  - runarberg 5y ago
    I’m guessing that people use targeted advertising and personalized advertising interchangeably. The advertising industry knows full well what it means, and I’m sure the legislator should have no problem finding experts in that area to make a legally rigorous definition.
- malandrew 5y ago
  I personally find the personalized advertising great. A lot of the time I am shown things that are actually useful/valuable to me. I think a lot of the value really depends on the individual. If you're engaging in productive activities like hobbies, you get valuable targeted ads. If you're engaging in activities that are low value like signaling to others in myriad ways, you probably get adds for things like disposable fashion. Personalized ads are basically a mirror. They feed what the person already wants to engage in. If you want less of the bad types of advertising, then you need to start at the root which is getting people to stop being interested in activities and behaviors that are lower value.
  - MetaWhirledPeas 5y ago
    > I personally find the personalized advertising great. A lot of the time I am shown things that are actually useful/valuable to me. There are plenty of ways to deliver this value without secretly fingerprinting every user and delivering targeted ads at every corner. A search where you profile yourself, for instance; similar to how you provide search filters on Amazon.
  - Tamrind7 5y ago
    All ads are fundamentally ugly in the sense that their effect is the opposite of a great work of art or entertainment. Ads are fundamentally just some pathetic person's selfish attempt to control what other people to think and feel in order to increase their own power through financial profit. In a sane world they would all be banned. Ads exist in their current deranged and disgusting form because contemporary humans have been selectively bred through social engineering to be submissive, cowardly, selfish, and stupid. Personalized/targeted advertising is not something that needs to be discussed.
    - RandomLensman 5y ago
      Ads have been around for more than 2000 years now - would need a massive shift in mores to get rid of them (they survive in a lot of very different societies).
- MetaWhirledPeas 5y ago
  Yes! Excellent suggestion. This is at the root of so many data-related problems.
asdff 5y ago
There should be some laws about using addictive patterns imo. I'm sure that's fine and profitable and coca cola would continue to like putting cocaine into their drinks to make their customers want it all the more, but we have laws preventing that behavior in the meatspace and therefore we can have laws preventing this sort of evil behavior with technology companies too. Tie it into website accessibility laws that are already codified in law and can be used to sue certain companies today.
- MetaWhirledPeas 5y ago
  While this is extremely murky and maybe impossible to pin down from a legal standpoint, I do like the thought. It's not just Facebook and it's not just social media. It's any software (online games?) that clearly goes out of its way to induce addictive behavior as their business model.
- nradov 5y ago
  How could legislators draft such a law in a way that wouldn't be voided for vagueness? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vagueness_doctrine?wprov=sfla1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vagueness_doctrine?wprov=sfla1
  - asdff 5y ago
    Probably with the help of psychologists who can offer more concrete definitions of addictive behavior and dark patterns than you or I.
    - fidesomnes 5y ago
      You sound like an absolute tool.
    - nradov 5y ago
      Since psychology is mostly unscientific bunk, hopefully the courts would put a stop to that type of legislative overreach.
zo1 5y ago
Ads. I knew something was seriously wrong the moment I saw a legitimate business (EBay) selling eye-ball space (ads) on their property that was supposedly profitable through legitimate business (hosting a marketplace, taking a cut, etc). Ads create a negative and detrimental feedback loop by incentivizing dark patterns and other negative gamification in order to squeeze out previously non-existant eyeball time from your product. E.g. the optimal path for say EBay is to have a user come on, find what they want, browse a bit through interesting things and recommendations, buy what they want/need, then log off. Instead, ads have incentivized spam listings which do two things: More eyeball time and thus ad-impressions/clicks. And they've cause the creation of non-optimal experiences by allowing non-optimal players to exist through pure randomness. I.e. In an ideal market, it should be "winner takes all" for any unique genre or field or product space, one which should be exploring. Instead, the spam listings make it so a non-negligible amount of useless and bottom of the barrel products/sellers/companies to exist and thrive. For FB, ads have commoditized eyeball time even more directly than the indirect example I gave above with EBay. A potential product path with FB should be people using it as a platform to interact with people they know, organize events, and to have a shared space to communicate and discuss ideas.

What is it, exactly?

by beaner 5y ago

What is it, exactly?

thrwn_frthr_awy 5y ago

Personalized advertising.

handmodel 5y ago
What would be the definition of this? I listen to a podcast on football. Are they allowed to run ads that are about sports betting and NFL tickets? That is personalized to the group. Is Facebook allowed to run ads for sports betting to all people who are fans of a professional team on their site? Is Facebook not allowed to run me ads for local restaurants any more?
- MetaWhirledPeas 5y ago
  This could be done. The ads on a football podcast could be based on who their broader audience is, not based on a specific user. > Is Facebook not allowed to run me ads for local restaurants any more? Nope.
  - yellow_postit 5y ago
    the difference between a cohort that listens to a football podcast and lives in a metro doesn’t seem obvious to me.
- runarberg 5y ago
  I’m guessing that people use targeted advertising and personalized advertising interchangeably. The advertising industry knows full well what it means, and I’m sure the legislator should have no problem finding experts in that area to make a legally rigorous definition.
malandrew 5y ago
I personally find the personalized advertising great. A lot of the time I am shown things that are actually useful/valuable to me. I think a lot of the value really depends on the individual. If you're engaging in productive activities like hobbies, you get valuable targeted ads. If you're engaging in activities that are low value like signaling to others in myriad ways, you probably get adds for things like disposable fashion. Personalized ads are basically a mirror. They feed what the person already wants to engage in. If you want less of the bad types of advertising, then you need to start at the root which is getting people to stop being interested in activities and behaviors that are lower value.
- MetaWhirledPeas 5y ago
  > I personally find the personalized advertising great. A lot of the time I am shown things that are actually useful/valuable to me. There are plenty of ways to deliver this value without secretly fingerprinting every user and delivering targeted ads at every corner. A search where you profile yourself, for instance; similar to how you provide search filters on Amazon.
- Tamrind7 5y ago
  All ads are fundamentally ugly in the sense that their effect is the opposite of a great work of art or entertainment. Ads are fundamentally just some pathetic person's selfish attempt to control what other people to think and feel in order to increase their own power through financial profit. In a sane world they would all be banned. Ads exist in their current deranged and disgusting form because contemporary humans have been selectively bred through social engineering to be submissive, cowardly, selfish, and stupid. Personalized/targeted advertising is not something that needs to be discussed.
  - RandomLensman 5y ago
    Ads have been around for more than 2000 years now - would need a massive shift in mores to get rid of them (they survive in a lot of very different societies).
MetaWhirledPeas 5y ago
Yes! Excellent suggestion. This is at the root of so many data-related problems.

asdff 5y ago

There should be some laws about using addictive patterns imo. I'm sure that's fine and profitable and coca cola would continue to like putting cocaine into their drinks to make their customers want it all the more, but we have laws preventing that behavior in the meatspace and therefore we can have laws preventing this sort of evil behavior with technology companies too. Tie it into website accessibility laws that are already codified in law and can be used to sue certain companies today.

MetaWhirledPeas 5y ago
While this is extremely murky and maybe impossible to pin down from a legal standpoint, I do like the thought. It's not just Facebook and it's not just social media. It's any software (online games?) that clearly goes out of its way to induce addictive behavior as their business model.
nradov 5y ago
How could legislators draft such a law in a way that wouldn't be voided for vagueness? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vagueness_doctrine?wprov=sfla1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vagueness_doctrine?wprov=sfla1
- asdff 5y ago
  Probably with the help of psychologists who can offer more concrete definitions of addictive behavior and dark patterns than you or I.
  - fidesomnes 5y ago
    You sound like an absolute tool.
  - nradov 5y ago
    Since psychology is mostly unscientific bunk, hopefully the courts would put a stop to that type of legislative overreach.

zo1 5y ago

Ads. I knew something was seriously wrong the moment I saw a legitimate business (EBay) selling eye-ball space (ads) on their property that was supposedly profitable through legitimate business (hosting a marketplace, taking a cut, etc). Ads create a negative and detrimental feedback loop by incentivizing dark patterns and other negative gamification in order to squeeze out previously non-existant eyeball time from your product. E.g. the optimal path for say EBay is to have a user come on, find what they want, browse a bit through interesting things and recommendations, buy what they want/need, then log off. Instead, ads have incentivized spam listings which do two things: More eyeball time and thus ad-impressions/clicks. And they've cause the creation of non-optimal experiences by allowing non-optimal players to exist through pure randomness. I.e. In an ideal market, it should be "winner takes all" for any unique genre or field or product space, one which should be exploring. Instead, the spam listings make it so a non-negligible amount of useless and bottom of the barrel products/sellers/companies to exist and thrive. For FB, ads have commoditized eyeball time even more directly than the indirect example I gave above with EBay. A potential product path with FB should be people using it as a platform to interact with people they know, organize events, and to have a shared space to communicate and discuss ideas.