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> That is pretty high for no real value for society in my opinion... There is a widespread belief that Advertising serves no purpose to humanity. Advertising

> That is pretty high for no real value for society in my opinion... There is a widespread belief that Advertising serves no purpose to humanity. Advertising is like anything in life: In high doses it is harmful. In lower doses it is useful. If there are regulators in your country that prevent advertisers from making false claims, even better. Advertising has helped me hone onto products and services in my whole life that I've found useful. Many times I would have not been able to find the product or service if it were not for that advertisement. [You could claim that I was "brainwashed" into buying that product but that could be applied to any interaction in life. For example, if my spouse convinced me to do something, it usually means the logic was sound and it is highly unlikely that I was brainwashed to do her bidding]. No one likes being aggressively marketed to. No one likes being duped. But there is a space for advertising that is gentler, honest and educational. Think of advertising as a way of companies to say "Hey! here's something we're proud of -- please have a look. By selling to you, the customer, we can make a profit and you can get the benefit from our product". Advertising can be a win-win. Advertising can allow manufacturing at scale. It has helped bring about many the marvels of technology that would have cost millions of dollars a few decades ago to be just a few hundred (e.g. our laptops that are more powerful than supercomputers of of the 1990s). Without advertising many companies may not have reached the sales volume to keep bringing down costs year after year. I could go on. Adverting is useful. Bad actors must be weeded out. However, Advertising in itself is useful.

mytailorisrich 4y ago
> There is a widespread belief that advertising serves no purpose to humanity. This is highly political and that 'belief' is indeed often ideological. Free flow of information and awareness of products and services on offer is an important aspect of an open society and free market economics.
- r_hoods_ghost 4y ago
  And beliefs that an open society, free flow of information and free market economics are good things are of course highly political and strongly ideological. They are just largely uncontested (at least amongst the types of people who read hn)
  - mytailorisrich 4y ago
    > They are just largely uncontested I think this has a lot to do with the fact that the alternatives that have been tried have historically been either failures or catastrophes.
    - andrepd 4y ago
      So much to be said about that trope... Are there seriously people who still believe in TINA? What a bleak way to see the world.
      - mytailorisrich 4y ago
        I'm curious about what alternative you have in mind if you think that living in an open and free society is bleak.
        andrepd 4y ago
        But I don't think that the current society is open and free. It is open-er and freer than what it replaced. It is also open-er and freer than some proposed alternatives. It is not the best, most open, and most free society that could ever be conceived. I don't like political arguments on hn but if you're truly interested I can try to summarise them when I get home later.
- andrepd 4y ago
  Free flow of information is when big companies can wage psychological warfare on you without your consent.
- throw827474737 4y ago
  You cannot just put free flow of information on a par with awareness of products and services, lol? And the latter is fully achievable still without everything that is "advertising" today.
fyvhbhn 4y ago
Well, how about opening an online plattform for advertising then? Stopp invading my space (public spaces, software, websites), and put ads there for people that are interested in being suggested products they might like. And, instead of tracking all my activity, put a form that I can fill out with the details I am comfortable with. Not gonna happen, because they're paying people and companies to annoy you with the ads almost nobody wants to see
nicoco 4y ago
But lying, manipulating your emotions, etc. are efficient ways of doing ads. If something is OK when done poorly and harmful when optimised, maybe it was a bad thing in the first place?
peoplefromibiza 4y ago
> But there is a space for advertising that is gentler, honest and educational. I don't disagree, but there are a few points that I see differently. First of all, I think that what you're looking for is promotion, that is based on someone or some entity promoting your products and services, putting their face on it and leveraging their reputation of connoisseur of the matter at hand. It's based on trust and works best especially for tech products Nobody buy smartphones based on adv, well except iPhone users that buy the brand iPhone - that could be seen as a confirmation of the trust based promotion, they trust Apple -, people watch reviews on YouTube channels that they trust. Advertising is low effort. it's usually someone writing a script for you, pretending to be you, that it is the company that is talking directly to you, but it's in fact an agency that wrote a claim and a story to tell, to actually sell, not promote, the service or product in question by exploiting your feelings. Secondly, I don't believe that advertising made laptops affordable, research did. Super computers still cost millions and are an order or two of magnitude more powerful than you regular laptop of today.
- yunohn 4y ago
  > Nobody buy smartphones based on adv What?? If there ever was proof that HN is completely clueless about reality not empathetic of their fellow humans. Ads are not brainwashing.
  - peoplefromibiza 4y ago
    > What?? If there ever was proof that HN is completely clueless about reality not empathetic of their fellow humans The simple answer is that the real disconnect is thinking that since someone comments on HN, he is some kind of a mythical creature. I am a middle aged man from Italy that saw mobile phones birth when was 20 already. Don't assume that your experience is my experience. Nobody I know closely knows what HN is, they ask me what phone to buy or which laptop, because I've always been the "techie" of the family/group of friends and because they care about not wasting their money but can't navigate the bullshit they see in the ads. I guess that "blast past fast" or "do what you can" don't really say anything about the device true capabilities and why one should spend their money to buy it. unless the reason is "I will buy whatever rich people buy" or "I like the colour of this one" Of course the iPhone ads work, because they don't promote the phone, they sell a way of life, a lifestyle, their target is the "cool kids" that want to be "content creators" and that appeals to their desire to be part of what is fashionable among their peers, but that's exactly what brainwashing is. Ads is brainwashing and it's scientifically weaponized against the reference target. repetita iuvant: they don't promote the product, they exploit your sentiments, desires, fears, whatever works, to make you buy the product. But are actually a bunch of lies.
megous 4y ago
Consumers can be served better by independent review of products in magazines, etc. Or if you really want to by catalogues put together by sellers. (I used those when I was younger quite a lot to discover and buy new things.) The random road signs for biggest bank in the land, or one of the three telecom companies in the land, or for things like well known beverages is quite ridiculous. Almost everyone knows these companies exist already.
andrepd 4y ago
> But there is a space for advertising that is gentler, honest and educational. Think of advertising as a way of companies to say "Hey! here's something we're proud of -- please have a look. By selling to you, the customer, we can make a profit and you can get the benefit from our product". I cannot recall one single advertisement I ever saw in my life, other than some institutional/non-profit ads, which remotely fits that idyllic description. So it's really a moot point. "What if advertising were just calm factual information", well but it's not! It's definitely not! It's psychological warfare of moderate-to-high intensity. So what use is pretending it's something it's not? It's very disingenuous to pretend it can ever be "gentle, honest, and educational" (lol) I also don't see how advertising is responsible for chip mass-production and Moore's law.
- registeredcorn 4y ago
  Are you thinking strictly in terms of massive, multi-national companies? For myself, it would be far more handy if I had seen ads for local plumbers, chimney repair, barbershops, etc. I try to support my local economy whenever I can, and I don't mind paying a premium for smaller shops since they usually do a better job, or are at least incentivized to do so. When it comes to something like buying a car, I don't want to be advertised to since the manufacturer of that product 1) isn't a part of my community and 2) isn't supported by the people in my area. I can absolutely think of cases where I would have liked to know what services are available for specific products, like chair making, or a project I have in mind, rather than having to ask around to figure out who even does it in my area. Obviously, I would still have to do some research to figure out if the person advertising is any good, but the fact that a small business has a budget for advertising is a very positive indicator that they are at least professional enough to have some revenue. Advertising, when it relates to something a small business can exist within, reduces the amount of time and effort I have to put in to seeing how many competitors are in that space. It's not something that I'm thrilled about, but it does have benefit within certain circumstance.
  - alexb_ 4y ago
    >I can absolutely think of cases where I would have liked to know what services are available for specific products, like chair making, or a project I have in mind, rather than having to ask around to figure out who even does it in my area. We had this, it was called phone books. And I guess a phone book is technically advertising, but there's clearly a difference between info and manipulation.
puchatek 4y ago
Yeah I'm happy to throw out that baby with the advertising bathwater. Fuck it, I'll even break the news to the few friends in advertising that society has decided to evolve and that their services won't be needed any longer. But unfortunately, ads are how people prefer to pay online so we're stuck with it.
phartenfeller 4y ago
Good point, ads can be really useful. For me, the question is how much we are exposed to it, in which context, and the transparency about things being ads. Examples: - Obvious ads vs. sneaky product placements - There should be spaces/times without ads allowed Another thing that makes me wonder is big know companies (soda for example) constantly making ads. This is not the case of "Hey we made something new" as literally everybody knows the product for years. This constant cognitive exposure has some similarities to propaganda. We are not allowed to forget them. > But there is a space for advertising that is gentler, honest and educational. This pretty much sums it up really good.
tomjen3 4y ago
This assumes that there are new useful products out there. There might be, but I don’t see ads for any. I see ads for overpriced shit all the time.
throw827474737 4y ago
> However, Advertising in itself is useful. Total disagree. New trends, improvements communicate itself one or the other way. If I want a new X, I'd rather research on my own, best are objective tests, or worse then selective advertisements I choose to view. Even non-aggressive mild advertisements that just try to snatch my attention involuntarily are just not needed and a pain. The world could be much better without that crap. I don't buy the argument that advertisements were necessary for manufacutring at scale, any source? > Think of advertising as a way of companies to say "Hey! here's something we're proud of -- please have a look. Erm wtf what, no, just no, leave me alone please. I want to find you in a dedicated magazine / tests / reviews if your something is something I currently want, otherwise this attention grab is hostile.
- 1123581321 4y ago
  You’re just negotiating who pays for searching and communication. You want to pay someone (a magazine or review site) to gather the data for you from the companies. Other people want the companies to pay so they get the information for free. There’s a qualitative argument there as well, and whether to value not having to pay for ad-supported publications and services, but that’s essentially the question in the preference for or against advertising: who pays and who gets paid to make the right buyers and sellers aware of each other.
atwood22 4y ago
> Think of advertising as a way of companies to say "Hey! here's something we're proud of -- please have a look. Do you like being approach on the street by solicitors? Personally, I hate it. When I’m walking, I appreciate undisturbed personal space. I feel the same way about advertising. I don’t care that the company is proud. I want my personal space undisturbed. You can show me something if I ask, but to assume I care to see anything you have to offer is rude.
igorkraw 4y ago
There is one thing that extremely easy way to retain the "benefit" you claim: make advertising opt-in. Truly, continuously opt-in. Every time there is an ad, you have to tap "yes, I'd like to see it" (or "yes, show all ads for this movie", but not across movies). If there is truly advantages to ads, people will choose to see them. I'd go even further: have different platforms compete as "and serving" places, basically opt-in targeted advertising sites. They aren't allowed to use any external data, just a questionnaire and your behaviour on the platform, and the user must choose to go to the site by entering it into their browser or looking it up on Google. No ads anywhere else. If ads are truly as beneficial as you describe, people will go for it. Let the market decide whether ads are good for the consumer
matheusmoreira 4y ago
> But there is a space for advertising that is gentler, honest and educational. There is no such thing as honest advertising. The conflict of interest is inherent. The best information comes from third parties but even that gets corrupted by advertisers eventually. > Think of advertising as a way of companies to say "Hey! here's something we're proud of -- please have a look. When I want companies talking to me about products, I'll visit their website or I'll open their store app. In those cases it's not even advertising but information. I asked to see the products. Advertising is by definition an intrusion, uninvited. Most of the time I don't want companies talking to me about offers. Their insistence is abuse. That ideal of advertising you described is virtually non-existent. It's generally manipulation of the lowest sort concocted by sociopathic people.
- samatman 4y ago
  > There is no such thing as honest advertising. The conflict of interest is inherent. This is obviously untrue. Not only can a merchant engage in only honest advertising, there are those who do. There's a conflict of interest every time a married man has a drink with an interested woman. That doesn't mean he cheats.
amelius 4y ago
> There is a widespread belief that Advertising serves no purpose to humanity. It's worse than that. Advertising persuades people to buy ever more stuff they don't need, thereby causing enormous damage to the planet. Advertising is among the top of things we should ban to reduce climate change.

mytailorisrich 4y ago

> There is a widespread belief that advertising serves no purpose to humanity. This is highly political and that 'belief' is indeed often ideological. Free flow of information and awareness of products and services on offer is an important aspect of an open society and free market economics.

r_hoods_ghost 4y ago
And beliefs that an open society, free flow of information and free market economics are good things are of course highly political and strongly ideological. They are just largely uncontested (at least amongst the types of people who read hn)
- mytailorisrich 4y ago
  > They are just largely uncontested I think this has a lot to do with the fact that the alternatives that have been tried have historically been either failures or catastrophes.
  - andrepd 4y ago
    So much to be said about that trope... Are there seriously people who still believe in TINA? What a bleak way to see the world.
    - mytailorisrich 4y ago
      I'm curious about what alternative you have in mind if you think that living in an open and free society is bleak.
      - andrepd 4y ago
        But I don't think that the current society is open and free. It is open-er and freer than what it replaced. It is also open-er and freer than some proposed alternatives. It is not the best, most open, and most free society that could ever be conceived. I don't like political arguments on hn but if you're truly interested I can try to summarise them when I get home later.
andrepd 4y ago
Free flow of information is when big companies can wage psychological warfare on you without your consent.
throw827474737 4y ago
You cannot just put free flow of information on a par with awareness of products and services, lol? And the latter is fully achievable still without everything that is "advertising" today.

fyvhbhn 4y ago

Well, how about opening an online plattform for advertising then? Stopp invading my space (public spaces, software, websites), and put ads there for people that are interested in being suggested products they might like. And, instead of tracking all my activity, put a form that I can fill out with the details I am comfortable with. Not gonna happen, because they're paying people and companies to annoy you with the ads almost nobody wants to see

nicoco 4y ago

But lying, manipulating your emotions, etc. are efficient ways of doing ads. If something is OK when done poorly and harmful when optimised, maybe it was a bad thing in the first place?

peoplefromibiza 4y ago

> But there is a space for advertising that is gentler, honest and educational. I don't disagree, but there are a few points that I see differently. First of all, I think that what you're looking for is promotion, that is based on someone or some entity promoting your products and services, putting their face on it and leveraging their reputation of connoisseur of the matter at hand. It's based on trust and works best especially for tech products Nobody buy smartphones based on adv, well except iPhone users that buy the brand iPhone - that could be seen as a confirmation of the trust based promotion, they trust Apple -, people watch reviews on YouTube channels that they trust. Advertising is low effort. it's usually someone writing a script for you, pretending to be you, that it is the company that is talking directly to you, but it's in fact an agency that wrote a claim and a story to tell, to actually sell, not promote, the service or product in question by exploiting your feelings. Secondly, I don't believe that advertising made laptops affordable, research did. Super computers still cost millions and are an order or two of magnitude more powerful than you regular laptop of today.

yunohn 4y ago
> Nobody buy smartphones based on adv What?? If there ever was proof that HN is completely clueless about reality not empathetic of their fellow humans. Ads are not brainwashing.
- peoplefromibiza 4y ago
  > What?? If there ever was proof that HN is completely clueless about reality not empathetic of their fellow humans The simple answer is that the real disconnect is thinking that since someone comments on HN, he is some kind of a mythical creature. I am a middle aged man from Italy that saw mobile phones birth when was 20 already. Don't assume that your experience is my experience. Nobody I know closely knows what HN is, they ask me what phone to buy or which laptop, because I've always been the "techie" of the family/group of friends and because they care about not wasting their money but can't navigate the bullshit they see in the ads. I guess that "blast past fast" or "do what you can" don't really say anything about the device true capabilities and why one should spend their money to buy it. unless the reason is "I will buy whatever rich people buy" or "I like the colour of this one" Of course the iPhone ads work, because they don't promote the phone, they sell a way of life, a lifestyle, their target is the "cool kids" that want to be "content creators" and that appeals to their desire to be part of what is fashionable among their peers, but that's exactly what brainwashing is. Ads is brainwashing and it's scientifically weaponized against the reference target. repetita iuvant: they don't promote the product, they exploit your sentiments, desires, fears, whatever works, to make you buy the product. But are actually a bunch of lies.

megous 4y ago

Consumers can be served better by independent review of products in magazines, etc. Or if you really want to by catalogues put together by sellers. (I used those when I was younger quite a lot to discover and buy new things.) The random road signs for biggest bank in the land, or one of the three telecom companies in the land, or for things like well known beverages is quite ridiculous. Almost everyone knows these companies exist already.

andrepd 4y ago

> But there is a space for advertising that is gentler, honest and educational. Think of advertising as a way of companies to say "Hey! here's something we're proud of -- please have a look. By selling to you, the customer, we can make a profit and you can get the benefit from our product". I cannot recall one single advertisement I ever saw in my life, other than some institutional/non-profit ads, which remotely fits that idyllic description. So it's really a moot point. "What if advertising were just calm factual information", well but it's not! It's definitely not! It's psychological warfare of moderate-to-high intensity. So what use is pretending it's something it's not? It's very disingenuous to pretend it can ever be "gentle, honest, and educational" (lol) I also don't see how advertising is responsible for chip mass-production and Moore's law.

registeredcorn 4y ago
Are you thinking strictly in terms of massive, multi-national companies? For myself, it would be far more handy if I had seen ads for local plumbers, chimney repair, barbershops, etc. I try to support my local economy whenever I can, and I don't mind paying a premium for smaller shops since they usually do a better job, or are at least incentivized to do so. When it comes to something like buying a car, I don't want to be advertised to since the manufacturer of that product 1) isn't a part of my community and 2) isn't supported by the people in my area. I can absolutely think of cases where I would have liked to know what services are available for specific products, like chair making, or a project I have in mind, rather than having to ask around to figure out who even does it in my area. Obviously, I would still have to do some research to figure out if the person advertising is any good, but the fact that a small business has a budget for advertising is a very positive indicator that they are at least professional enough to have some revenue. Advertising, when it relates to something a small business can exist within, reduces the amount of time and effort I have to put in to seeing how many competitors are in that space. It's not something that I'm thrilled about, but it does have benefit within certain circumstance.
- alexb_ 4y ago
  >I can absolutely think of cases where I would have liked to know what services are available for specific products, like chair making, or a project I have in mind, rather than having to ask around to figure out who even does it in my area. We had this, it was called phone books. And I guess a phone book is technically advertising, but there's clearly a difference between info and manipulation.

puchatek 4y ago

Yeah I'm happy to throw out that baby with the advertising bathwater. Fuck it, I'll even break the news to the few friends in advertising that society has decided to evolve and that their services won't be needed any longer. But unfortunately, ads are how people prefer to pay online so we're stuck with it.

phartenfeller 4y ago

Good point, ads can be really useful. For me, the question is how much we are exposed to it, in which context, and the transparency about things being ads. Examples: - Obvious ads vs. sneaky product placements - There should be spaces/times without ads allowed Another thing that makes me wonder is big know companies (soda for example) constantly making ads. This is not the case of "Hey we made something new" as literally everybody knows the product for years. This constant cognitive exposure has some similarities to propaganda. We are not allowed to forget them. > But there is a space for advertising that is gentler, honest and educational. This pretty much sums it up really good.

tomjen3 4y ago

This assumes that there are new useful products out there. There might be, but I don’t see ads for any. I see ads for overpriced shit all the time.

throw827474737 4y ago

> However, Advertising in itself is useful. Total disagree. New trends, improvements communicate itself one or the other way. If I want a new X, I'd rather research on my own, best are objective tests, or worse then selective advertisements I choose to view. Even non-aggressive mild advertisements that just try to snatch my attention involuntarily are just not needed and a pain. The world could be much better without that crap. I don't buy the argument that advertisements were necessary for manufacutring at scale, any source? > Think of advertising as a way of companies to say "Hey! here's something we're proud of -- please have a look. Erm wtf what, no, just no, leave me alone please. I want to find you in a dedicated magazine / tests / reviews if your something is something I currently want, otherwise this attention grab is hostile.

1123581321 4y ago
You’re just negotiating who pays for searching and communication. You want to pay someone (a magazine or review site) to gather the data for you from the companies. Other people want the companies to pay so they get the information for free. There’s a qualitative argument there as well, and whether to value not having to pay for ad-supported publications and services, but that’s essentially the question in the preference for or against advertising: who pays and who gets paid to make the right buyers and sellers aware of each other.

atwood22 4y ago

> Think of advertising as a way of companies to say "Hey! here's something we're proud of -- please have a look. Do you like being approach on the street by solicitors? Personally, I hate it. When I’m walking, I appreciate undisturbed personal space. I feel the same way about advertising. I don’t care that the company is proud. I want my personal space undisturbed. You can show me something if I ask, but to assume I care to see anything you have to offer is rude.

igorkraw 4y ago

There is one thing that extremely easy way to retain the "benefit" you claim: make advertising opt-in. Truly, continuously opt-in. Every time there is an ad, you have to tap "yes, I'd like to see it" (or "yes, show all ads for this movie", but not across movies). If there is truly advantages to ads, people will choose to see them. I'd go even further: have different platforms compete as "and serving" places, basically opt-in targeted advertising sites. They aren't allowed to use any external data, just a questionnaire and your behaviour on the platform, and the user must choose to go to the site by entering it into their browser or looking it up on Google. No ads anywhere else. If ads are truly as beneficial as you describe, people will go for it. Let the market decide whether ads are good for the consumer

matheusmoreira 4y ago

> But there is a space for advertising that is gentler, honest and educational. There is no such thing as honest advertising. The conflict of interest is inherent. The best information comes from third parties but even that gets corrupted by advertisers eventually. > Think of advertising as a way of companies to say "Hey! here's something we're proud of -- please have a look. When I want companies talking to me about products, I'll visit their website or I'll open their store app. In those cases it's not even advertising but information. I asked to see the products. Advertising is by definition an intrusion, uninvited. Most of the time I don't want companies talking to me about offers. Their insistence is abuse. That ideal of advertising you described is virtually non-existent. It's generally manipulation of the lowest sort concocted by sociopathic people.

samatman 4y ago
> There is no such thing as honest advertising. The conflict of interest is inherent. This is obviously untrue. Not only can a merchant engage in only honest advertising, there are those who do. There's a conflict of interest every time a married man has a drink with an interested woman. That doesn't mean he cheats.

amelius 4y ago

> There is a widespread belief that Advertising serves no purpose to humanity. It's worse than that. Advertising persuades people to buy ever more stuff they don't need, thereby causing enormous damage to the planet. Advertising is among the top of things we should ban to reduce climate change.