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There are two major things missing: 1) No one actually likes this stuff, and it still exists everywhere, so it must be worth it. I feel like the article is a b

There are two major things missing: 1) No one actually likes this stuff, and it still exists everywhere, so it must be worth it. I feel like the article is a broad list of the author's least favorite aspects of today's information/social/economic environment. But those are just the cost of consuming all our favorite content for ~free, right? It's like saying "I think this price is oppressive, and although I am willing to pay for it, I think we should all try really hard to lower the cost." The privacy stuff stands out because it isn't transparent to the user, which is maybe the worst part about it. Like if everyone knew what data they were providing and exactly how it was used, it wouldn't feel so abusive. 2) The size of the company has to be a major factor here. If your local shop takes out an ad in the local newspaper, I don't care what weird psychological tactics they use, does it really hit the same way? "That's just the shop down the street, why are they being so weird." Conversely, is there any ad from a massive company that doesn't come across as "this is how we want you, our loyal subjects, to see the world?"

danaris 2y ago
> so it must be worth it. ...To someone. That doesn't mean it's worth it to society. No one actually likes muggings, and they still exist everywhere, but that doesn't mean that our society would be worse off without muggings. No one actually likes the flu, and it still exists everywhere, but that doesn't mean that our society would be worse off without the flu. The idea that "it's still around/common, therefore it must be valuable" requires subscribing pretty hard to a version of free-market ideology that ignores a lot of objective reality.
- ngriffiths 2y ago
  I don't see it as subscribing to free-market ideology - more like "every bad thing has a certain prevalence, and that prevalence is a policy choice." The flu exists because we don't aggressively isolate/contact trace people who get the flu, but it isn't that prevalent and results in few deaths because of how much we invest in vaccination, hygiene, and medical care. The muggings continue because we don't spend the insane amounts on law enforcement and surveillance that would really be required to eradicate them. Also, these examples are different in another way - few people get mugged or get the flu, but literally everyone consumes ads daily. I think a lot of people dislike ads but I'm not sure I agree that there is a strong desire to dramatically reduce or change them - people seem happy to complain but pretty hesitant to pay actual money to reduce them.
  - pavel_lishin 2y ago
    > The muggings continue because we don't spend the insane amounts on law enforcement and surveillance that would really be required to eradicate them. Or a society where people's drug addictions are treated as a medical problem, and poverty is fought with the same fervor that we fight "terrorism" and "drugs". > Also, these examples are different in another way - few people get mugged or get the flu, but literally everyone consumes ads daily. I think a lot of people dislike ads but I'm not sure I agree that there is a strong desire to dramatically reduce or change them - people seem happy to complain but pretty hesitant to pay actual money to reduce them. People consume ads like I consume mosquitos in the summer.
  - danaris 2y ago
    In addition to what pavel_lishin says... > people seem happy to complain but pretty hesitant to pay actual money to reduce them. First, you have to look at this in the context of the actual economic situation of the average American, which has been, more or less, getting steadily worse in a relative sense for roughly 40-50 years. Second, you can't actually say this with any degree of rigor because in the vast majority of cases, there isn't an option to pay money to reduce the ads. Sure, I could subscribe to YouTube Premium to reduce the number of ads on YouTube—but it wouldn't eliminate sponsored segments of videos, most of it (all of it? I don't actually know the economics off the top of my head) goes to Google rather than to the creators of the videos you watch, and it doesn't do anything about ads outside of YouTube. Even if you were to subscribe to every single service that has an option to do so to remove ads, you would still be seeing intrusive online ads constantly (assuming you weren't using an adblocker). You would still have your personal data sold and sold again to try to squeeze every last drop of profit out of you for people already more wealthy than God. And, as can be seen on places like Netflix and Amazon Prime, there's zero guarantee that subscribing will actually keep the ads away permanently. Given all that, why would most people give up another $9.99 a month just to reduce the number of ads on Yet Another Website?
    - ngriffiths 2y ago
      > First, you have to look at this in the context of the actual economic situation of the average American, which has been, more or less, getting steadily worse in a relative sense for roughly 40-50 years. I don't have a good grasp of the broad economic trends, but the accessibility of ~free, high quality, valuable knowledge (as well as entertaining content) online has exploded in this time frame. That may be unrelated to wages but it certainly has to do with demand. > Second, you can't actually say this with any degree of rigor because in the vast majority of cases, there isn't an option to pay money to reduce the ads. Maybe, but this seems like a problem that could have been solved if it were actually profitable to do so, no? I mean, I guess it's possible that we're in some local minimum where it's really hard to set up a less terrible system. But the simpler explanation is people would rather "pay" with attention than money. I'm honestly not sure though.
Ukv 2y ago
Advertising is "worth it" in the same sense as sites with JS crypto miners. 10¢ of resources are wasted to cover 0.1¢ of operation costs.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
TeMPOraL 2y ago
> No one actually likes this stuff, and it still exists everywhere, so it must be worth it. I believe I covered that too, but maybe not explicitly enough. The root of the problem is that engaging in bad practices is a) allowed, and b) is profitable on the margin. In a competitive environment, this creates a zero-sum game, and that alone is enough of an explanation. Quoting myself from the article: If you have competitors, you can't not participate. > But those are just the cost of consuming all our favorite content for ~free, right? It's not like we're being given much of a choice. Most people have less money than they need to satisfy even just the reasonable needs and wants, so being extremely price-sensitive is the default state for customers. In this environment, "free with ads" is a one-way strategy: it's impossible to compete on price with "free", so once someone goes for this model, all their direct competitors are forced to follow suit. It's why I see "free + ads" as an extremely anti-competitive move: it prevents any other business model from working. > The size of the company has to be a major factor here. If your local shop takes out an ad in the local newspaper, I don't care what weird psychological tactics they use, does it really hit the same way? It can be a factor, but I think its effect is often inverse. Large companies are a big, fat target for lawyers and regulators; there's only so much they can get away with these days. Small businesses can and do get much more scammy without repercussion, because their impact is much smaller and localized, and they're individually too small a target for the legal system to bother. Also let's remember that, while small local companies are small and local, there's also a lot of them. And even as their "weird psychological tactics" affect only few people in each case, it isn't much of a consolation when you're one of those people.

danaris 2y ago

> so it must be worth it. ...To someone. That doesn't mean it's worth it to society. No one actually likes muggings, and they still exist everywhere, but that doesn't mean that our society would be worse off without muggings. No one actually likes the flu, and it still exists everywhere, but that doesn't mean that our society would be worse off without the flu. The idea that "it's still around/common, therefore it must be valuable" requires subscribing pretty hard to a version of free-market ideology that ignores a lot of objective reality.

ngriffiths 2y ago
I don't see it as subscribing to free-market ideology - more like "every bad thing has a certain prevalence, and that prevalence is a policy choice." The flu exists because we don't aggressively isolate/contact trace people who get the flu, but it isn't that prevalent and results in few deaths because of how much we invest in vaccination, hygiene, and medical care. The muggings continue because we don't spend the insane amounts on law enforcement and surveillance that would really be required to eradicate them. Also, these examples are different in another way - few people get mugged or get the flu, but literally everyone consumes ads daily. I think a lot of people dislike ads but I'm not sure I agree that there is a strong desire to dramatically reduce or change them - people seem happy to complain but pretty hesitant to pay actual money to reduce them.
- pavel_lishin 2y ago
  > The muggings continue because we don't spend the insane amounts on law enforcement and surveillance that would really be required to eradicate them. Or a society where people's drug addictions are treated as a medical problem, and poverty is fought with the same fervor that we fight "terrorism" and "drugs". > Also, these examples are different in another way - few people get mugged or get the flu, but literally everyone consumes ads daily. I think a lot of people dislike ads but I'm not sure I agree that there is a strong desire to dramatically reduce or change them - people seem happy to complain but pretty hesitant to pay actual money to reduce them. People consume ads like I consume mosquitos in the summer.
- danaris 2y ago
  In addition to what pavel_lishin says... > people seem happy to complain but pretty hesitant to pay actual money to reduce them. First, you have to look at this in the context of the actual economic situation of the average American, which has been, more or less, getting steadily worse in a relative sense for roughly 40-50 years. Second, you can't actually say this with any degree of rigor because in the vast majority of cases, there isn't an option to pay money to reduce the ads. Sure, I could subscribe to YouTube Premium to reduce the number of ads on YouTube—but it wouldn't eliminate sponsored segments of videos, most of it (all of it? I don't actually know the economics off the top of my head) goes to Google rather than to the creators of the videos you watch, and it doesn't do anything about ads outside of YouTube. Even if you were to subscribe to every single service that has an option to do so to remove ads, you would still be seeing intrusive online ads constantly (assuming you weren't using an adblocker). You would still have your personal data sold and sold again to try to squeeze every last drop of profit out of you for people already more wealthy than God. And, as can be seen on places like Netflix and Amazon Prime, there's zero guarantee that subscribing will actually keep the ads away permanently. Given all that, why would most people give up another $9.99 a month just to reduce the number of ads on Yet Another Website?
  - ngriffiths 2y ago
    > First, you have to look at this in the context of the actual economic situation of the average American, which has been, more or less, getting steadily worse in a relative sense for roughly 40-50 years. I don't have a good grasp of the broad economic trends, but the accessibility of ~free, high quality, valuable knowledge (as well as entertaining content) online has exploded in this time frame. That may be unrelated to wages but it certainly has to do with demand. > Second, you can't actually say this with any degree of rigor because in the vast majority of cases, there isn't an option to pay money to reduce the ads. Maybe, but this seems like a problem that could have been solved if it were actually profitable to do so, no? I mean, I guess it's possible that we're in some local minimum where it's really hard to set up a less terrible system. But the simpler explanation is people would rather "pay" with attention than money. I'm honestly not sure though.

Ukv 2y ago

Advertising is "worth it" in the same sense as sites with JS crypto miners. 10¢ of resources are wasted to cover 0.1¢ of operation costs.

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

TeMPOraL 2y ago

> No one actually likes this stuff, and it still exists everywhere, so it must be worth it. I believe I covered that too, but maybe not explicitly enough. The root of the problem is that engaging in bad practices is a) allowed, and b) is profitable on the margin. In a competitive environment, this creates a zero-sum game, and that alone is enough of an explanation. Quoting myself from the article: If you have competitors, you can't not participate. > But those are just the cost of consuming all our favorite content for ~free, right? It's not like we're being given much of a choice. Most people have less money than they need to satisfy even just the reasonable needs and wants, so being extremely price-sensitive is the default state for customers. In this environment, "free with ads" is a one-way strategy: it's impossible to compete on price with "free", so once someone goes for this model, all their direct competitors are forced to follow suit. It's why I see "free + ads" as an extremely anti-competitive move: it prevents any other business model from working. > The size of the company has to be a major factor here. If your local shop takes out an ad in the local newspaper, I don't care what weird psychological tactics they use, does it really hit the same way? It can be a factor, but I think its effect is often inverse. Large companies are a big, fat target for lawyers and regulators; there's only so much they can get away with these days. Small businesses can and do get much more scammy without repercussion, because their impact is much smaller and localized, and they're individually too small a target for the legal system to bother. Also let's remember that, while small local companies are small and local, there's also a lot of them. And even as their "weird psychological tactics" affect only few people in each case, it isn't much of a consolation when you're one of those people.