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> "Personalized" advertising isn't good for anyone except the ad networks. According to Meta, their personalized advertising alone generates over $0.5 trillion

by beejiu 1y ago

> "Personalized" advertising isn't good for anyone except the ad networks. According to Meta, their personalized advertising alone generates over $0.5 trillion of economic activity per year. As much as the Hacker News crowd hates on ads, it's indisputable that it's good for businesses and the broad economy. https://research.facebook.com/economiccontribution/ https://research.facebook.com/economiccontribution/

mdhb 1y ago
JFC… I’m begging for you to please think about things like this in ways that aren’t strictly about “the economy”. It’s so so so clearly a net loss for society it’s not even close. You have to literally ignore everything else other than this idea of “shareholder value” to come to such a ridiculous position.
unicamelkje 1y ago
Not sure if relying on research made by an advertising company, about it's own positive impact, is something that you should blindly trust.
sensanaty 1y ago
You mean the same Meta and their ads and data collection that have been directly and indisputably linked to literal, actual Genocides? And teen suicides? And Cambridge Analytica? Oh, but they shuffled some money around the economy (mostly into their coffers), so it was all worth it in the end, because as we all know the magic economy is the only thing that matters.
mrweasel 1y ago
I think what many of us question is whether nor not those same $0.5 trillion would be generated by contextual ads. There's no doubt that ads work, but we really don't know to what extend. E.g. if I'm on a pages looking at watches, should I get ads for watches, or would it be better to show ads for the washing machine I was looking up last night? Google, the search engine, clearly thinks it's better to show ads relevant to my search term, but they are also in a special position that's not applicable to a news website. People working in the field has also previously commented, here on HN, that the ad networks are basically hustling the advertisers, selling them ad space / users that they know will perform badly, to move more "inventory". That generates economical activity, but does that benefit anyone beyond the ad networks?
chgs 1y ago
According to Jack the rock slinging glazier, the broken windows he creates generates massive returns to the economy when people pay him to fix the windows.
marcus_holmes 1y ago
> it's indisputable that it's good for businesses and the broad economy. I dispute this. Therefore it is not indisputable. I support my dispute thusly: imagine a world where there were no ads. All the money spent on ads would be spent on other things. Those other things would, I assert, be better for everyone involved than ads. The world would be a better place. I support my assertion that anything else would be better than ads by pointing out that for businesses advertising is an arms race, all your competition and you are in an auction for customer attention in which the winner is one of the duopoly that control all internet advertising. And for users I just point to waves hands at everything we hate about the modern internet all that. QED.
- hgomersall 1y ago
  I don't disagree with you broad statement that ads are a shitty thing on the whole, but their cost should be viewed in real terms not financial terms. That is, the cost is the people that work on the tech, the resources spent delivering them, the attention diverted to looking at them etc etc. The ad companies are sitting on huge cash piles so clearly there's a shortfall in the value of resources that can be bought if we stopped spending on ads.
  - marcus_holmes 1y ago
    This is the Parable of the broken window [0] in action. The piles of cash that the ad duopoly are sitting on could (and would) be spent elsewhere, and that would benefit us more (by my assertion above) It's not "look at all the money they made, this service must be valuable", it's "is the money they made the best possible use of those resources?" and my answer is "definitely not" [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of_the_broken_window https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of_the_broken_window
microtonal 1y ago
According to Meta, their personalized advertising alone generates over $0.5 trillion of economic activity per year. Why should I care that they make a boatload of money while making the life of everyone else crappier? Advertising turns everything into shit. Crapware pre-installed onto your brand-new phone or laptop [1]? Advertising. Pervasive tracking added to Windows? Generating profiles for advertising. Smart TVs sending regular screengrabs to Samba TV? Analytics for advertising. Like your $2000 smart fridge? It's going to be much worse because Samsung is piloting advertising. Every tech product is getting infected by this disease, both shoving unwanted ads into your face and tracking your pervasively. Of course, someone is going to argue that we cannot have 'free' products without advertising. In the end the consumer is paying for advertising as part of (increased) product prices.
czottmann 1y ago
There's a lot of money in international drug trading, and some people/orgs are getting filthy stinking rich pursuing that, consequences be damned. By your logic, that makes it a good business. I dispute that.

by beejiu 1y ago

mdhb 1y ago

JFC… I’m begging for you to please think about things like this in ways that aren’t strictly about “the economy”. It’s so so so clearly a net loss for society it’s not even close. You have to literally ignore everything else other than this idea of “shareholder value” to come to such a ridiculous position.

unicamelkje 1y ago

Not sure if relying on research made by an advertising company, about it's own positive impact, is something that you should blindly trust.

sensanaty 1y ago

You mean the same Meta and their ads and data collection that have been directly and indisputably linked to literal, actual Genocides? And teen suicides? And Cambridge Analytica? Oh, but they shuffled some money around the economy (mostly into their coffers), so it was all worth it in the end, because as we all know the magic economy is the only thing that matters.

mrweasel 1y ago

I think what many of us question is whether nor not those same $0.5 trillion would be generated by contextual ads. There's no doubt that ads work, but we really don't know to what extend. E.g. if I'm on a pages looking at watches, should I get ads for watches, or would it be better to show ads for the washing machine I was looking up last night? Google, the search engine, clearly thinks it's better to show ads relevant to my search term, but they are also in a special position that's not applicable to a news website. People working in the field has also previously commented, here on HN, that the ad networks are basically hustling the advertisers, selling them ad space / users that they know will perform badly, to move more "inventory". That generates economical activity, but does that benefit anyone beyond the ad networks?

chgs 1y ago

According to Jack the rock slinging glazier, the broken windows he creates generates massive returns to the economy when people pay him to fix the windows.

marcus_holmes 1y ago

> it's indisputable that it's good for businesses and the broad economy. I dispute this. Therefore it is not indisputable. I support my dispute thusly: imagine a world where there were no ads. All the money spent on ads would be spent on other things. Those other things would, I assert, be better for everyone involved than ads. The world would be a better place. I support my assertion that anything else would be better than ads by pointing out that for businesses advertising is an arms race, all your competition and you are in an auction for customer attention in which the winner is one of the duopoly that control all internet advertising. And for users I just point to waves hands at everything we hate about the modern internet all that. QED.

hgomersall 1y ago
I don't disagree with you broad statement that ads are a shitty thing on the whole, but their cost should be viewed in real terms not financial terms. That is, the cost is the people that work on the tech, the resources spent delivering them, the attention diverted to looking at them etc etc. The ad companies are sitting on huge cash piles so clearly there's a shortfall in the value of resources that can be bought if we stopped spending on ads.
- marcus_holmes 1y ago
  This is the Parable of the broken window [0] in action. The piles of cash that the ad duopoly are sitting on could (and would) be spent elsewhere, and that would benefit us more (by my assertion above) It's not "look at all the money they made, this service must be valuable", it's "is the money they made the best possible use of those resources?" and my answer is "definitely not" [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of_the_broken_window https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of_the_broken_window

microtonal 1y ago

According to Meta, their personalized advertising alone generates over $0.5 trillion of economic activity per year. Why should I care that they make a boatload of money while making the life of everyone else crappier? Advertising turns everything into shit. Crapware pre-installed onto your brand-new phone or laptop [1]? Advertising. Pervasive tracking added to Windows? Generating profiles for advertising. Smart TVs sending regular screengrabs to Samba TV? Analytics for advertising. Like your $2000 smart fridge? It's going to be much worse because Samsung is piloting advertising. Every tech product is getting infected by this disease, both shoving unwanted ads into your face and tracking your pervasively. Of course, someone is going to argue that we cannot have 'free' products without advertising. In the end the consumer is paying for advertising as part of (increased) product prices.

czottmann 1y ago

There's a lot of money in international drug trading, and some people/orgs are getting filthy stinking rich pursuing that, consequences be damned. By your logic, that makes it a good business. I dispute that.