6 ms·

I have exactly this problem of gross online ads, sometimes featuring ways to clear my bowels by eating/not eating bananas. The graphics are, well, graphic. I n

by dash2 2y ago

I have exactly this problem of gross online ads, sometimes featuring ways to clear my bowels by eating/not eating bananas. The graphics are, well, graphic. I never click ads and I turn off personalisation wherever possible. Could it be that the system is punishing me somehow? Is this some dystopian algorithm?

Veuxdo 2y ago
> I turn off personalisation wherever possible Think about it: if the ad auction house knows nothing about you, then you'd expect to only get least-common-denominator ads. Everyone has a butt, after all.
- fallingsquirrel 2y ago
  A saner solution would be to target based on the content (like advertisers did for centuries before the internet). If someone's reading an article about guitars, there's a good bet they'll respond more favorably to a guitar ad than to a picture of someone's ass. Common sense was a casualty in the transition to the internet.
  - mthoms 2y ago
    Sure, that’s obvious. The problem is the tons of content that isn’t easily associated with a product or service. Like news and opinion (many of the article’s examples are from The NY Times)
    - fallingsquirrel 2y ago
      News about crime -> advertise a home security system Opinion piece about politics -> advertise a book of the same political leaning I guarantee, no matter the topic, there's always a more relevant option than someone's ass.
      - mthoms 2y ago
        There's books about everything, sure. It doesn't mean this approach is profitable enough to support the news gathering in the first place. >more relevant option than someone's ass That's a pretty low bar. I'm not arguing for this kind of ad. I'm only saying that keeping all ads exclusively topical would be highly unprofitable for many categories of information you find on the internet. >News about crime -> advertise a home security system That would create some pretty perverse incentives for news organizations to fear monger about local crime (more than usual that is). What could go wrong?
whartung 2y ago
I've always figured that these are the lowest common denominator form of ads. "Since we have no idea of who you are, this is the drek that targeted to you -- i.e. 'everybody'". This is also the reason I don't log in to YouTube, and if I do find I video, I open it in a "private tab". If I don't suddenly my "feed" explodes with even more stuff I was barely interested in when I wanted to watch the video in the first place. Never let it know you might be casually interested in anything borderline controversial, or you'll be overwhelmed with every fringe dingbat clickbait video that's, perchance, even barely related to the video you watched.
- dash2 2y ago
  I dunno though, surely the lowest common denominator would be a car ad? Or an advert for pizza? This seems -worse- than that.
  - obviousdang 2y ago
    [flagged]
unyttigfjelltol 2y ago
Yes, it's worse than that though. These news sites are pushing ads at paying customers. I saw an ad at wsj.com the other day-- a site I pay an exorbitant sum to browse-- that disappeared the entire article as I scrolled through it. I get it, they used to have ads in printed newspaper and everyone shrugged and read on. However, this is different, and I regularly find myself exasperated by-- when I click on a show in PBS's paid subscription app, they immediately launch a 30-second ad, not the show; Peacock launches a 3-minute ad, not the show. The New York Times shows other reporters the backsides of dogs. I read about Ford prioritizing development of technology they acknowledge their customers will hate to show them similar tripe unbidden in their cars. This is clearly a dystopian development and it turns on its head the old adage that when you pay for a product you become the customer. These businesses are abusing their "customers" by treating them as something less.
- SAI_Peregrinus 2y ago
  When cable TV originally launched it was ad free, in exchange for the subscription. Eventually commercials got added back in, and very few people cancelled their subscriptions.
bhaney 2y ago
> Could it be that the system is punishing me somehow? Yes. The system is punishing you with ads for not having an ad blocker.

by dash2 2y ago

Veuxdo 2y ago

> I turn off personalisation wherever possible Think about it: if the ad auction house knows nothing about you, then you'd expect to only get least-common-denominator ads. Everyone has a butt, after all.

fallingsquirrel 2y ago
A saner solution would be to target based on the content (like advertisers did for centuries before the internet). If someone's reading an article about guitars, there's a good bet they'll respond more favorably to a guitar ad than to a picture of someone's ass. Common sense was a casualty in the transition to the internet.
- mthoms 2y ago
  Sure, that’s obvious. The problem is the tons of content that isn’t easily associated with a product or service. Like news and opinion (many of the article’s examples are from The NY Times)
  - fallingsquirrel 2y ago
    News about crime -> advertise a home security system Opinion piece about politics -> advertise a book of the same political leaning I guarantee, no matter the topic, there's always a more relevant option than someone's ass.
    - mthoms 2y ago
      There's books about everything, sure. It doesn't mean this approach is profitable enough to support the news gathering in the first place. >more relevant option than someone's ass That's a pretty low bar. I'm not arguing for this kind of ad. I'm only saying that keeping all ads exclusively topical would be highly unprofitable for many categories of information you find on the internet. >News about crime -> advertise a home security system That would create some pretty perverse incentives for news organizations to fear monger about local crime (more than usual that is). What could go wrong?

whartung 2y ago

I've always figured that these are the lowest common denominator form of ads. "Since we have no idea of who you are, this is the drek that targeted to you -- i.e. 'everybody'". This is also the reason I don't log in to YouTube, and if I do find I video, I open it in a "private tab". If I don't suddenly my "feed" explodes with even more stuff I was barely interested in when I wanted to watch the video in the first place. Never let it know you might be casually interested in anything borderline controversial, or you'll be overwhelmed with every fringe dingbat clickbait video that's, perchance, even barely related to the video you watched.

dash2 2y ago
I dunno though, surely the lowest common denominator would be a car ad? Or an advert for pizza? This seems -worse- than that.
- obviousdang 2y ago
  [flagged]

unyttigfjelltol 2y ago

Yes, it's worse than that though. These news sites are pushing ads at paying customers. I saw an ad at wsj.com the other day-- a site I pay an exorbitant sum to browse-- that disappeared the entire article as I scrolled through it. I get it, they used to have ads in printed newspaper and everyone shrugged and read on. However, this is different, and I regularly find myself exasperated by-- when I click on a show in PBS's paid subscription app, they immediately launch a 30-second ad, not the show; Peacock launches a 3-minute ad, not the show. The New York Times shows other reporters the backsides of dogs. I read about Ford prioritizing development of technology they acknowledge their customers will hate to show them similar tripe unbidden in their cars. This is clearly a dystopian development and it turns on its head the old adage that when you pay for a product you become the customer. These businesses are abusing their "customers" by treating them as something less.

SAI_Peregrinus 2y ago
When cable TV originally launched it was ad free, in exchange for the subscription. Eventually commercials got added back in, and very few people cancelled their subscriptions.

bhaney 2y ago

> Could it be that the system is punishing me somehow? Yes. The system is punishing you with ads for not having an ad blocker.