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Ads will be no longer a buisness model in 3-5 years when simple, locally run models that do nothing besides blocking ads become available. Twitter, Facebook etc

Ads will be no longer a buisness model in 3-5 years when simple, locally run models that do nothing besides blocking ads become available. Twitter, Facebook etc. already get past most modern adblockers, but the AI extension will be able to filter them. In-text advertising must be marked as advertisment in most countries, and even if it isn't, local AI will filter this probably out. So a free ChatGPT service with in-text AI can simply be countered by another local browser extension, that rewrites the text and removes ads. One can make the point that Google, Meta and others are investing so much into AI as they know, we are facing the end of the ad-based internet economy. The investments are to create new buiness models, because their old ones are gone soon.

asdff 9mo ago
Sad truth is vast majority of users today are not savvy enough to install a good adblocker. We live in a bubble here in technology where we assume people know to do things like block ads. Really at this point people don’t know what files are anymore or even what a website actually is.
- littlecranky67 9mo ago
  True, but some 20 years ago, I already could (and did) use photoshop to cut out the head of a woman (celebrity or from my social group) and put it onto a naked or bikini body of a woman. This is an old problem, but the bar to achieve that was too high and required tech savyness. The second Grok does it on twitter available for every idiot, suddently politicians see this as problematic and want to pass laws against it [0]. My point: Whatever local AI that you will have on your computer or browser, will react to "do not show me ads and filter all product placement in content out" as a single line prompt. And if we won't have a local AI capable of doing it in 5years or more, the whole investement into AI are clearly a bubble and AI will face another winter. [0]: https://www.tagesschau.de/inland/gesellschaft/ki-kuenstliche-intelligenz-missbrauch-justiz-hubig-100.html https://www.tagesschau.de/inland/gesellschaft/ki-kuenstliche... (sorry, german only, but this is an AI thread and you know what to do...)
  - Forgeties79 9mo ago
    The problem is the way consumer rights are going, companies will simply make it impossible for you to run a line like that, or at least make it difficult enough that only a small percentage of the population can do it. Every layer of friction they add means millions of people just throwing up their hands and accepting whatever nonsense is thrown at them.
    - littlecranky67 9mo ago
      You assume all models will be closed-source and there will be no competition. I can imagine that, but I would assume training an AI model for ad-filtering is something the community can and will do - maybe think 5 years ahead what hardware will be available for training and inference to a "small developer".
      - Forgeties79 9mo ago
        I don’t assume that at all. I’m saying that they just need to capture the vast majority of people, which has happened many times. For instance, Linux is available to everyone and would end a lot of frustrations and headaches they currently experience with macOS and windows. But for many reasons it still remains in the low single digit percentages when it comes to adoption, a lot of which is inflated by the steam deck. It’s the same reason people pay to get their oil changed rather than doing it themselves. We are willing to compromise for convenience. And for a lot of people, that means just not dealing with it. Accept the ads, pay a small fee, whatever is the quickest way to make the thing works again or to get where they need to go.
        littlecranky67 9mo ago
        > Linux is available to everyone and would end a lot of frustrations and headaches they currently experience with macOS That is a very bad argument for the AI thing, because as a Linux fan (started in the late 90s with Linux) I am using a Macbook because the Laptop story on Linux is not at all a success story. The headaches macOS causes would just be exchanged for the headaches Linux does.
luckman212 9mo ago
I pray you are right. Still, there's no guarantee that the next business model won't be an order of magnitude more user-hostile.
HDThoreaun 9mo ago
Adblockers already remove the vast majority of ads. Adtech works because most people dont use them.
- littlecranky67 9mo ago
  See my sibling response. More people will use adblock if all they have to do is prompt a single line into their computer. Hell people will not even visit websites. They will ask AI to present it in whatever form they prefer. I can have a big-breasted anime character reading my personalized news for me, or have it printed in a 1890 style newspaper. Ads will not make it into either format, because I prompt that out.
  - HDThoreaun 9mo ago
    Using adblock right now is even easier than that though. Most people will not use a command line, but going to https://chromewebstore.google.com/ https://chromewebstore.google.com/, searching adblock and clicking install is something literally anybody could do.
    - littlecranky67 9mo ago
      Not on mobile.
      - OGEnthusiast 9mo ago
        So then people also won't be able to one-shot prompt an ad blocker on mobile either then. And mobile is where most of the ad money is.
aniviacat 9mo ago
Alternatively, DRM for websites will start being a thing and remove any possibility of blocking ads.
- Vortigaunt 9mo ago
  Yeah some form of google's Web Integrity API will be forced one of these days https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/07/googles-web-integrity-api-sounds-like-drm-for-the-web/ https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/07/googles-web-integrit...
- utopiah 9mo ago
  There are already DRM for Websites e.g. several audio and video streaming services.
bontaq 9mo ago
More than an extension, imagine us having good enough, fast enough, vision models that you never even see a real website. Maybe the whole OS in Microsoft's case if they keep putting more ads in. It will be a level of inefficiency inconceivable but really something.

asdff 9mo ago

Sad truth is vast majority of users today are not savvy enough to install a good adblocker. We live in a bubble here in technology where we assume people know to do things like block ads. Really at this point people don’t know what files are anymore or even what a website actually is.

littlecranky67 9mo ago
True, but some 20 years ago, I already could (and did) use photoshop to cut out the head of a woman (celebrity or from my social group) and put it onto a naked or bikini body of a woman. This is an old problem, but the bar to achieve that was too high and required tech savyness. The second Grok does it on twitter available for every idiot, suddently politicians see this as problematic and want to pass laws against it [0]. My point: Whatever local AI that you will have on your computer or browser, will react to "do not show me ads and filter all product placement in content out" as a single line prompt. And if we won't have a local AI capable of doing it in 5years or more, the whole investement into AI are clearly a bubble and AI will face another winter. [0]: https://www.tagesschau.de/inland/gesellschaft/ki-kuenstliche-intelligenz-missbrauch-justiz-hubig-100.html https://www.tagesschau.de/inland/gesellschaft/ki-kuenstliche... (sorry, german only, but this is an AI thread and you know what to do...)
- Forgeties79 9mo ago
  The problem is the way consumer rights are going, companies will simply make it impossible for you to run a line like that, or at least make it difficult enough that only a small percentage of the population can do it. Every layer of friction they add means millions of people just throwing up their hands and accepting whatever nonsense is thrown at them.
  - littlecranky67 9mo ago
    You assume all models will be closed-source and there will be no competition. I can imagine that, but I would assume training an AI model for ad-filtering is something the community can and will do - maybe think 5 years ahead what hardware will be available for training and inference to a "small developer".
    - Forgeties79 9mo ago
      I don’t assume that at all. I’m saying that they just need to capture the vast majority of people, which has happened many times. For instance, Linux is available to everyone and would end a lot of frustrations and headaches they currently experience with macOS and windows. But for many reasons it still remains in the low single digit percentages when it comes to adoption, a lot of which is inflated by the steam deck. It’s the same reason people pay to get their oil changed rather than doing it themselves. We are willing to compromise for convenience. And for a lot of people, that means just not dealing with it. Accept the ads, pay a small fee, whatever is the quickest way to make the thing works again or to get where they need to go.
      - littlecranky67 9mo ago
        > Linux is available to everyone and would end a lot of frustrations and headaches they currently experience with macOS That is a very bad argument for the AI thing, because as a Linux fan (started in the late 90s with Linux) I am using a Macbook because the Laptop story on Linux is not at all a success story. The headaches macOS causes would just be exchanged for the headaches Linux does.

luckman212 9mo ago

I pray you are right. Still, there's no guarantee that the next business model won't be an order of magnitude more user-hostile.

HDThoreaun 9mo ago

Adblockers already remove the vast majority of ads. Adtech works because most people dont use them.

littlecranky67 9mo ago
See my sibling response. More people will use adblock if all they have to do is prompt a single line into their computer. Hell people will not even visit websites. They will ask AI to present it in whatever form they prefer. I can have a big-breasted anime character reading my personalized news for me, or have it printed in a 1890 style newspaper. Ads will not make it into either format, because I prompt that out.
- HDThoreaun 9mo ago
  Using adblock right now is even easier than that though. Most people will not use a command line, but going to https://chromewebstore.google.com/ https://chromewebstore.google.com/, searching adblock and clicking install is something literally anybody could do.
  - littlecranky67 9mo ago
    Not on mobile.
    - OGEnthusiast 9mo ago
      So then people also won't be able to one-shot prompt an ad blocker on mobile either then. And mobile is where most of the ad money is.

aniviacat 9mo ago

Alternatively, DRM for websites will start being a thing and remove any possibility of blocking ads.

Vortigaunt 9mo ago
Yeah some form of google's Web Integrity API will be forced one of these days https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/07/googles-web-integrity-api-sounds-like-drm-for-the-web/ https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/07/googles-web-integrit...
utopiah 9mo ago
There are already DRM for Websites e.g. several audio and video streaming services.

bontaq 9mo ago

More than an extension, imagine us having good enough, fast enough, vision models that you never even see a real website. Maybe the whole OS in Microsoft's case if they keep putting more ads in. It will be a level of inefficiency inconceivable but really something.