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I agree with you that connecting consumers to products is valuable. I've bought several things from instagram ads (has the best targeting of any platform, IMO),

I agree with you that connecting consumers to products is valuable. I've bought several things from instagram ads (has the best targeting of any platform, IMO), but OP specifically mentioned public places. Advertising in public places is privatizing the commons, and, taken to the extreme, is negative-sum. Consider this billboard on a boat that ruins the view at a public beach: https://www.reddit.com/r/ABoringDystopia/comments/i939xz/this_boat_goes_back_and_forth_showing_ads_so_you/ https://www.reddit.com/r/ABoringDystopia/comments/i939xz/thi... Yes, there might be small positive economic benefit to the one person on the beach who actually needed the advertised product, but a huge, diffuse negative externality to everyone else. Most public advertising is not this bad, but if you drive on the highway in a state that has banned billboards, such as Vermont, and then you cross the border into a state that allows them, you notice it, and not in a good way. We'd be collectively better off if they were banned everywhere. Allow advertising in private spaces, but ban in public.

donatj 3y ago
See I don't understand this argument either. Endless water let alone scrub brush on the side of the highway aren't anything worth looking at? I'd rather get signs that aren't targeted to me versus something so painfully boring. I can easily look either side of the sign and see the same thing I would see where the sign is. I genuinely don't see the downside.
- gamegoblin 3y ago
  If you don't have a preference between seeing Vermont's beautiful hilly forests, and seeing the same forests with a tacky billboard drawing your gaze, I don't really know what to tell you other than that most people feel differently. It is ultimately an aesthetic judgment and everyone can have their own taste. We live in a democracy and it's up to a majority to decide what to do with the public commons. It is telling, to me, that no state that has banned billboards (Alaska, Hawaii, Vermont, Maine) has any serious political movement from any part of the spectrum to reverse the bans.
- JKCalhoun 3y ago
  You'll want to avoid Alaska, Hawaii, Vermont, and Maine then. I understand billboards are illegal there.
- empyrrhicist 3y ago
  Wow, I am completely unable to empathize with your attitude.
- mikem170 3y ago
  The parent you responded to mentioned that "Advertising in public places is privatizing the commons", and perhaps this is an objective way to look at it. Why should one profit-seeking entity get to put a billboard in the middle of everyone's scenic view without paying everyone? And if one billboard can be put there, what's to stop there being ten, or a thousand, and then there's no more view? A lot of problems in the world are due to profits being made at the expense of the commons. This happens with everything from resource extraction and pollution of the environment, to telemarketing which aggravates most people, to outrage driven media and social networks polluting peoples minds.

donatj 3y ago

See I don't understand this argument either. Endless water let alone scrub brush on the side of the highway aren't anything worth looking at? I'd rather get signs that aren't targeted to me versus something so painfully boring. I can easily look either side of the sign and see the same thing I would see where the sign is. I genuinely don't see the downside.

gamegoblin 3y ago
If you don't have a preference between seeing Vermont's beautiful hilly forests, and seeing the same forests with a tacky billboard drawing your gaze, I don't really know what to tell you other than that most people feel differently. It is ultimately an aesthetic judgment and everyone can have their own taste. We live in a democracy and it's up to a majority to decide what to do with the public commons. It is telling, to me, that no state that has banned billboards (Alaska, Hawaii, Vermont, Maine) has any serious political movement from any part of the spectrum to reverse the bans.
JKCalhoun 3y ago
You'll want to avoid Alaska, Hawaii, Vermont, and Maine then. I understand billboards are illegal there.
empyrrhicist 3y ago
Wow, I am completely unable to empathize with your attitude.
mikem170 3y ago
The parent you responded to mentioned that "Advertising in public places is privatizing the commons", and perhaps this is an objective way to look at it. Why should one profit-seeking entity get to put a billboard in the middle of everyone's scenic view without paying everyone? And if one billboard can be put there, what's to stop there being ten, or a thousand, and then there's no more view? A lot of problems in the world are due to profits being made at the expense of the commons. This happens with everything from resource extraction and pollution of the environment, to telemarketing which aggravates most people, to outrage driven media and social networks polluting peoples minds.