6 ms·

I have personally gotten very aggressive at removing as many ads from my life as I can. I pay for the "premium" version of everything I can to remove ads (Spot

I have personally gotten very aggressive at removing as many ads from my life as I can. I pay for the "premium" version of everything I can to remove ads (Spotify, YouTube, podcast subscriptions) and use adblocker aggressively. It's so much nicer than the alternative. There are two places where ads remain: 1) Social media where the ads are integrated and not blocked (Facebook, YouTube in-video promos) 2) Billboards in cities and airports #1 has gotten more aggressive lately. I'm not a fan, but I understand why it has happened. However, at least I can choose to avoid these sites if I wish. #2, which is what the article is about, is unavoidable for me. I find billboards ugly, distracting, and annoying clutter. It's just visual "noise." What's worse is that the products targeted in #1 above are frequently relevant to me, and I have purchased them. But I cannot think of a single time I have ever made any purchase based on any billboard. I would love if more municipalities clamped down on these.

ocdtrekkie 3y ago
You can get rid of #1 by moving to Mastodon. Many servers appreciate donations but basically none of them have ads.
- nicbou 3y ago
  #1 is about ads in the content itself, not ads that are designed to look like the posts around it
sphars 3y ago
For integrated ads on YouTube (sponsor messages), you can use the SponsorBlock extension (https://sponsor.ajay.app/ https://sponsor.ajay.app/). If you're using Android, you can also get NewPipe with SponsorBlock integration.
- alwayslikethis 3y ago
  If you can't use NewPipe, you can also.get Youtube ReVanced which also has sponsorblock
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
joelthelion 3y ago
You can get rid of most of your remaining ads by using the Firefox version of ublock and sponsorblock. I almost never see any ads. Twitch is a notable exception.
digging 3y ago
In my city there's a major road with no billboards, and I drive on it whenever it's a reasonable option. It's not exactly lovely, but it's only as bad as driving on a busy road has to be, no worse. It's also a lot safer. Whenever I tell people I prefer this road, they balk. When I tell them there's no billboards, they stop and think and realize that it's actually one of the nicest roads in the city. Parts of it are actually quite beautiful and forested. I've seen a handful of billboards that were mildly entertaining. I've never seen a billboard that made me [edit to add: consciously] want to buy something, in my entire life, as far as I can recall. I've seen countless billboards that manipulated my emotions, showing me food or sex while I'm just trying to drive, purposefully distracting me. And countless more that just suck and are pointless. Among my many grievances with car-dependency, billboards aren't at the top of the list, but they're a very easy target because most people actually hate them as soon as they stop to think about it in my experience.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
NittLion78 3y ago
Alaska, Hawaii, Vermont, and Maine all do not allow for billboard advertisement, so at least there are a few places you can go for respite.
- AnimalMuppet 3y ago
  Some states (Iowa, at least, maybe Nebraska?) seem to have a rule that billboards have to be a certain distance away from the road - a fairly large distance. You have to work to read them. It makes them much easier to ignore. I don't know if that's the rule for all roads, or just for interstates. I don't know if it's for driver safety if they veer off the road, or for avoiding distraction, or just to limit advertising. But I like it.
- ydant 3y ago
  Virginia has a very small number of billboards, and it's definitely one of the nice things about this area. I haven't worked out exactly why some exist, but almost none do. The law is here: https://law.lis.virginia.gov/vacode/title33.2/chapter12/ https://law.lis.virginia.gov/vacode/title33.2/chapter12/ Regardless, the general feel of driving here is very different from many other states because of this rule. It's one of the first things I notice when I drive somewhere else in the US.
browningstreet 3y ago
I think social media feed ads should have a requirement for a different background color of a certain % stronger/lighter than default. Everyone's hiding the "Promotion" text in light text or moving them around so the eye can't find it.
technotarek 3y ago
I don’t know where you live, but what about all the mail spam — physical mail like catalogs and email advertising/marketing? And that half of what’s published by most journalistic outlets is now veiled ads? Dear Products, I know me better than you. I’ll come find you WHEN I need you. In the meantime, please just sit tight and stay out of my way. -Mr Consumption is Overrated
- dudul 3y ago
  I do like these. I need them as kindling to start a fire.
  - digging 3y ago
    Careful, many are coated in glossy toxic plastics that also make them impossible to recycle. Just an extra "fuck you" to the world by the advertiser in permanently ruining the materials they used.
- graeme 3y ago
  >what about all the mail spam — physical mail like catalogs and email advertising/marketing? You can opt out of junk mail. Varies by area. Likely can be done by a "no junk" sticker, or by opting out via your postal service, or both. (A lot of fliers aren't distributed by postal service, but legally must obey no junk signs) Email is trickier, but recently I've had success simply unsubscribing from absolutely everything with an unsubscribe link. I used to leave stuff in if it might be useful. To my surprise I now receive very few junk emails per day. >I know me better than you. I’ll come find you WHEN I need you. In the meantime, please just sit tight and stay out of my way. All of the above said, ads actually work. It is possible of course they don't work on you, the reader of this comment. (Meaning anyone reading, not just the parent comment) But ads really do work in boosting sales.
  - technotarek 3y ago
    They work on me and that’s exactly the problem — that is they work at manipulating me. And that’s why I want them gone. I’d rather free up the energy I spend on trying to ignore them and put that energy into something that actually makes my life better.
Feathercrown 3y ago
The Sponsorblock chrome extension does wonders
Tempest1981 3y ago
Do you watch any sports on TV? The amount of ads packed into an NBA basketball game on TV is startling and exhausting: - each player's jersey - arena walls - courtside walls (tv screens) - projected onto the court floor (updated each minute) - on the side and top of the backboard - most TV graphics ("Taco Bell play of the game") - split-screen ads during free-throws - traditional commercials during time-outs
- walthamstow 3y ago
  Advertising isn't quite as pervasive on UK TV sports coverage but the one and only I ever see or hear and advert in my life is when I'm watching football on Sky Sports. It's unavoidable.
- mikepurvis 3y ago
  My mind immediately went to the feasibility of using an AI artist to remove most or all of this in real time. Could be an interesting shift in terms of the "live" experience being significantly worse/degraded relative to the broadcast version with all that stuff painted out.
- jareklupinski 3y ago
  - each player's jersey i noticed some pretty no-name companies on jerseys recently makes me wonder how much it actually costs to get them to wear like a pin with my face on it for a few games "did you see me at the knicks game last night? i was everywhere!"
- ToucanLoucan 3y ago
  That is fucking egregious even by the absolute trip-hazard-in-hell standards of television, holy shit. I have no idea why anyone consumes anything on TV anymore.
throwup238 3y ago
> But I cannot think of a single time I have ever made any purchase based on any billboard. I would love if more municipalities clamped down on these. In California the billboards are now predominantly cannabis and casinos.
- floren 3y ago
  Depends where you are. Crossing the Bay Bridge, the difference is stark.
- OkayPhysicist 3y ago
  Which is baffling to me, because when I'm in the mood for vice I will make an active effort to find it. I'm not going to go "Oh boy, I'll find that one store advertised on that billboard I was subjected to", I'm going to Google the nearest dispensary (or go to the next closest if I've already determined that one to be crap), or plan a Vegas trip. And the magic of vices is that you don't need to even put people in the mood, vice is it's own attraction. Coke dealers don't need to advertise, their customers come to them.
- 0xEF 3y ago
  In Michigan, it's cannabis or personal injury lawyers, which is pretty on brand for us. I wonder if you can tell what a whole state is about just by looking at the billboards.
dudul 3y ago
Billboards are kind of funny to me because I wonder if they really work. I would assume that people living in the city are so used to them that they don't even notice them.
amelius 3y ago
> #2, which is what the article is about, is unavoidable for me Maybe one day you could wear AR goggles, and replace these ads by artworks?
chankstein38 3y ago
Pro tip about Youtube in-video promos, SponsorBlock is a really nice extension that will auto-skip those in many more popular videos!
bvirb 3y ago
Years ago I was driving home and saw a Corona beer billboard and distinctly remember thinking that I would love a Pacifico. So it kinda worked on me.
jabroni_salad 3y ago
If you ever visit washington DC it is absolutely wild the kind of things that are advertised via billboard. Raytheon making sure everyone knows where to get their missiles etc.
- easton 3y ago
  I still think it's super wild, but after thinking about it it's a lot like IT in big companies. Someone cold emails your boss and all of the sudden you're demoing some random doodad. In DC, your boss sees a fighter jet engine upgrade ad when walking into the Pentagon from the metro, and... (I literally saw that exact ad at the pentagon metro station. who buys a 30 million dollar engine upgrade off of a metro ad?)
  - jabl 3y ago
    When my country was tendering for new fighter jets a few years ago there were a lot of ads on various social media. Since random civilians like yours truly seldom impulse buy $100M latest generation fighter jets, I presume the goal was to influence public opinion and politicians to lean on the actual procurement organization that was responsible for arriving at a recommendation for the next generation jet. Still, it all seemed pretty far fetched, or maybe the vendors just had a poor understanding of how such procurement programs are run in my country.
- ydant 3y ago
  I noticed the same when I drove around the San Francisco Bay Area, except targeted at IT professionals. Just like with DC, it makes sense - target the eyes of the people who can influence decisions that actually financially matter. Get outside of these bubbles, though, and it's all lawyers, casinos, car dealerships, and sex shops.
Y_Y 3y ago
There used to be a widget you could get from the likes of ThinkGeek that would spam the "off" IR signal for lots of tvs and commercial displays. I remember seeing it as a neat trick twenty years ago, but more and more.I wish I really had one. Lots of storefronts have absurdly bright screens on all night now, project moving shit onto the sidewalk and just generally bombard your vision with distraction. I imagine you can use something like a Flipper to get a similar "put-outer" device nowadays but I haven't come across anyone using it in that way.
- marssaxman 3y ago
  You are likely thinking of the Tv-B-Gone: https://www.tvbgone.com/ https://www.tvbgone.com/
  - Y_Y 3y ago
    That's it! Good remember, thanks! > Disclaimer: This product is sold for the exclusive private use of the buyer on their own equipment . Use under adult supervision. For external use only. Side effect may include decreased anxiety, increased social skills, increased cognitive ability, increased sense of well being. The above statements have not been evaluated by the FDA. Effective personal choices are the sole responsibility of each individual user of this device.
- ydant 3y ago
  Looks like it's built in on Flipper: https://blog.flipper.net/infrared/ https://blog.flipper.net/infrared/ > To use the Universal Remote mode, navigate Infrared -> Universal library and select the type of device you want to control.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

ocdtrekkie 3y ago

You can get rid of #1 by moving to Mastodon. Many servers appreciate donations but basically none of them have ads.

nicbou 3y ago
#1 is about ads in the content itself, not ads that are designed to look like the posts around it

sphars 3y ago

For integrated ads on YouTube (sponsor messages), you can use the SponsorBlock extension (https://sponsor.ajay.app/ https://sponsor.ajay.app/). If you're using Android, you can also get NewPipe with SponsorBlock integration.

alwayslikethis 3y ago
If you can't use NewPipe, you can also.get Youtube ReVanced which also has sponsorblock

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

joelthelion 3y ago

You can get rid of most of your remaining ads by using the Firefox version of ublock and sponsorblock. I almost never see any ads. Twitch is a notable exception.

digging 3y ago

In my city there's a major road with no billboards, and I drive on it whenever it's a reasonable option. It's not exactly lovely, but it's only as bad as driving on a busy road has to be, no worse. It's also a lot safer. Whenever I tell people I prefer this road, they balk. When I tell them there's no billboards, they stop and think and realize that it's actually one of the nicest roads in the city. Parts of it are actually quite beautiful and forested. I've seen a handful of billboards that were mildly entertaining. I've never seen a billboard that made me [edit to add: consciously] want to buy something, in my entire life, as far as I can recall. I've seen countless billboards that manipulated my emotions, showing me food or sex while I'm just trying to drive, purposefully distracting me. And countless more that just suck and are pointless. Among my many grievances with car-dependency, billboards aren't at the top of the list, but they're a very easy target because most people actually hate them as soon as they stop to think about it in my experience.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

NittLion78 3y ago

Alaska, Hawaii, Vermont, and Maine all do not allow for billboard advertisement, so at least there are a few places you can go for respite.

AnimalMuppet 3y ago
Some states (Iowa, at least, maybe Nebraska?) seem to have a rule that billboards have to be a certain distance away from the road - a fairly large distance. You have to work to read them. It makes them much easier to ignore. I don't know if that's the rule for all roads, or just for interstates. I don't know if it's for driver safety if they veer off the road, or for avoiding distraction, or just to limit advertising. But I like it.
ydant 3y ago
Virginia has a very small number of billboards, and it's definitely one of the nice things about this area. I haven't worked out exactly why some exist, but almost none do. The law is here: https://law.lis.virginia.gov/vacode/title33.2/chapter12/ https://law.lis.virginia.gov/vacode/title33.2/chapter12/ Regardless, the general feel of driving here is very different from many other states because of this rule. It's one of the first things I notice when I drive somewhere else in the US.

browningstreet 3y ago

I think social media feed ads should have a requirement for a different background color of a certain % stronger/lighter than default. Everyone's hiding the "Promotion" text in light text or moving them around so the eye can't find it.

technotarek 3y ago

I don’t know where you live, but what about all the mail spam — physical mail like catalogs and email advertising/marketing? And that half of what’s published by most journalistic outlets is now veiled ads? Dear Products, I know me better than you. I’ll come find you WHEN I need you. In the meantime, please just sit tight and stay out of my way. -Mr Consumption is Overrated

dudul 3y ago
I do like these. I need them as kindling to start a fire.
- digging 3y ago
  Careful, many are coated in glossy toxic plastics that also make them impossible to recycle. Just an extra "fuck you" to the world by the advertiser in permanently ruining the materials they used.
graeme 3y ago
>what about all the mail spam — physical mail like catalogs and email advertising/marketing? You can opt out of junk mail. Varies by area. Likely can be done by a "no junk" sticker, or by opting out via your postal service, or both. (A lot of fliers aren't distributed by postal service, but legally must obey no junk signs) Email is trickier, but recently I've had success simply unsubscribing from absolutely everything with an unsubscribe link. I used to leave stuff in if it might be useful. To my surprise I now receive very few junk emails per day. >I know me better than you. I’ll come find you WHEN I need you. In the meantime, please just sit tight and stay out of my way. All of the above said, ads actually work. It is possible of course they don't work on you, the reader of this comment. (Meaning anyone reading, not just the parent comment) But ads really do work in boosting sales.
- technotarek 3y ago
  They work on me and that’s exactly the problem — that is they work at manipulating me. And that’s why I want them gone. I’d rather free up the energy I spend on trying to ignore them and put that energy into something that actually makes my life better.

Feathercrown 3y ago

The Sponsorblock chrome extension does wonders

Tempest1981 3y ago

Do you watch any sports on TV? The amount of ads packed into an NBA basketball game on TV is startling and exhausting: - each player's jersey - arena walls - courtside walls (tv screens) - projected onto the court floor (updated each minute) - on the side and top of the backboard - most TV graphics ("Taco Bell play of the game") - split-screen ads during free-throws - traditional commercials during time-outs

walthamstow 3y ago
Advertising isn't quite as pervasive on UK TV sports coverage but the one and only I ever see or hear and advert in my life is when I'm watching football on Sky Sports. It's unavoidable.
mikepurvis 3y ago
My mind immediately went to the feasibility of using an AI artist to remove most or all of this in real time. Could be an interesting shift in terms of the "live" experience being significantly worse/degraded relative to the broadcast version with all that stuff painted out.
jareklupinski 3y ago
- each player's jersey i noticed some pretty no-name companies on jerseys recently makes me wonder how much it actually costs to get them to wear like a pin with my face on it for a few games "did you see me at the knicks game last night? i was everywhere!"
ToucanLoucan 3y ago
That is fucking egregious even by the absolute trip-hazard-in-hell standards of television, holy shit. I have no idea why anyone consumes anything on TV anymore.

throwup238 3y ago

> But I cannot think of a single time I have ever made any purchase based on any billboard. I would love if more municipalities clamped down on these. In California the billboards are now predominantly cannabis and casinos.

floren 3y ago
Depends where you are. Crossing the Bay Bridge, the difference is stark.
OkayPhysicist 3y ago
Which is baffling to me, because when I'm in the mood for vice I will make an active effort to find it. I'm not going to go "Oh boy, I'll find that one store advertised on that billboard I was subjected to", I'm going to Google the nearest dispensary (or go to the next closest if I've already determined that one to be crap), or plan a Vegas trip. And the magic of vices is that you don't need to even put people in the mood, vice is it's own attraction. Coke dealers don't need to advertise, their customers come to them.
0xEF 3y ago
In Michigan, it's cannabis or personal injury lawyers, which is pretty on brand for us. I wonder if you can tell what a whole state is about just by looking at the billboards.

dudul 3y ago

Billboards are kind of funny to me because I wonder if they really work. I would assume that people living in the city are so used to them that they don't even notice them.

amelius 3y ago

> #2, which is what the article is about, is unavoidable for me Maybe one day you could wear AR goggles, and replace these ads by artworks?

chankstein38 3y ago

Pro tip about Youtube in-video promos, SponsorBlock is a really nice extension that will auto-skip those in many more popular videos!

bvirb 3y ago

Years ago I was driving home and saw a Corona beer billboard and distinctly remember thinking that I would love a Pacifico. So it kinda worked on me.

jabroni_salad 3y ago

If you ever visit washington DC it is absolutely wild the kind of things that are advertised via billboard. Raytheon making sure everyone knows where to get their missiles etc.

easton 3y ago
I still think it's super wild, but after thinking about it it's a lot like IT in big companies. Someone cold emails your boss and all of the sudden you're demoing some random doodad. In DC, your boss sees a fighter jet engine upgrade ad when walking into the Pentagon from the metro, and... (I literally saw that exact ad at the pentagon metro station. who buys a 30 million dollar engine upgrade off of a metro ad?)
- jabl 3y ago
  When my country was tendering for new fighter jets a few years ago there were a lot of ads on various social media. Since random civilians like yours truly seldom impulse buy $100M latest generation fighter jets, I presume the goal was to influence public opinion and politicians to lean on the actual procurement organization that was responsible for arriving at a recommendation for the next generation jet. Still, it all seemed pretty far fetched, or maybe the vendors just had a poor understanding of how such procurement programs are run in my country.
ydant 3y ago
I noticed the same when I drove around the San Francisco Bay Area, except targeted at IT professionals. Just like with DC, it makes sense - target the eyes of the people who can influence decisions that actually financially matter. Get outside of these bubbles, though, and it's all lawyers, casinos, car dealerships, and sex shops.

Y_Y 3y ago

There used to be a widget you could get from the likes of ThinkGeek that would spam the "off" IR signal for lots of tvs and commercial displays. I remember seeing it as a neat trick twenty years ago, but more and more.I wish I really had one. Lots of storefronts have absurdly bright screens on all night now, project moving shit onto the sidewalk and just generally bombard your vision with distraction. I imagine you can use something like a Flipper to get a similar "put-outer" device nowadays but I haven't come across anyone using it in that way.

marssaxman 3y ago
You are likely thinking of the Tv-B-Gone: https://www.tvbgone.com/ https://www.tvbgone.com/
- Y_Y 3y ago
  That's it! Good remember, thanks! > Disclaimer: This product is sold for the exclusive private use of the buyer on their own equipment . Use under adult supervision. For external use only. Side effect may include decreased anxiety, increased social skills, increased cognitive ability, increased sense of well being. The above statements have not been evaluated by the FDA. Effective personal choices are the sole responsibility of each individual user of this device.
ydant 3y ago
Looks like it's built in on Flipper: https://blog.flipper.net/infrared/ https://blog.flipper.net/infrared/ > To use the Universal Remote mode, navigate Infrared -> Universal library and select the type of device you want to control.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]