4 ms·

Promotion of anything at all is advertising, with or without compensation. The word advertising is pretty well defined, and the dictionary definitions don’t usu

by dahart 8mo ago

Promotion of anything at all is advertising, with or without compensation. The word advertising is pretty well defined, and the dictionary definitions don’t usually mention compensation, e.g. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/advertise https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/advertise. An example I’m sure you would consider advertising - consider Google advertising Google Fiber in Google search results, or Facebook advertising business services on Facebook, or Apple, Netflix, Cinemark advertising their own shows & products in their own channels. You’ve seen lots of these, I’m sure you would consider them ads, but it’s not the compensation that makes them ads.

xigoi 8mo ago
Alright, if you want to be pedantic abuot the definition, then ban compensated advertising.
- dahart 8mo ago
  Seems like you missed the point; banning compensated advertising wouldn’t fix the problem at all.
  - fsflover 8mo ago
    I don't see why it wouldn't.
    - dahart 8mo ago
      Even though I gave an example of a huge swath of advertising that isn’t “compensated”?
      - ajam1507 8mo ago
        Surely you're just being pedantic by pointing out that platforms can advertise themselves without paying money to themselves. If those same advertisements were on another platform they would be compensated ads.
        dahart 8mo ago
        And? Those ads aren’t on other platforms, and they won’t go away if you ban compensated advertising. Surely you’re just being completely naive if you think banning “compensated” advertising would change the advertising rather than the compensation mechanisms.
        fsflover 8mo ago
        Any compensation mechanism will become outlawed, so what are you talking about?
        dahart 8mo ago
        You can try to stop the payments, but you won’t stop the ads. I’m talking about the same reasons billionaires pay far lower tax rates than you and I. When that much money is on the line, they will find (or make) a legal way. (Anyway, it’s also time to come back from outer space; corporations own the laws and the advertising channels. Our economy, for better or worse, currently depends on advertising. Compensated advertising will never be banned.) The hypothetical you’re talking about does not stop today’s uncompensated for-profit advertising at all, and there is a lot of that. It also would only stop direct payments to content channels from a second party in exchange for advertising. That wouldn’t stop indirect marketing/advertising, nor indirect compensation. Furthermore, content distributors could offer service bundles where advertisers pay for other business services, and ads become a free add-on from a legal accounting perspective. Similarly, advertisers can offer other services, and channels can gift air-time to businesses. Channels could “sponsor” or “endorse” products they “like” without an attached financial transaction. It just would not be that hard to legally sever advertising from compensation, so if you aren’t banning all advertising including the uncompensated kind, then advertising will happen. And banning all advertising is even more of a non-starter than trying to somehow block payments.
        xg15 8mo ago
        By that logic any and all regulation would be pointless because people will try to circumvent the regulation.
      - xigoi 8mo ago
        Such advertising is generally not a problem. That’s the point.
        dahart 8mo ago
        Why? I completely disagree, they are the same as any other ads. But you’re still not seeing the big picture. If you ban advertising compensation, suddenly uncompensated will become the entire problem and the only category. That’s the point.
        fsflover 8mo ago
        Can you give an example? I can't imagine that. Who will start advertising for free?
xg15 8mo ago
Yes, but if we're talking about incentives and "primordial domino tiles" then compensated advertising is what createa the incentives for the whole attention economy and addictive design in the first place. Feel free to keep doing "pro-bono" advertising, but shareholders definitely wouldn't.
- stingraycharles 8mo ago
  That’s my thinking. Follow the money, get rid of the source of money, and the whole thing falls down. Of course that will not happen as there are way too many interests involved.
- fauigerzigerk 8mo ago
  >compensated advertising is what createa the incentives for the whole attention economy Why would you not want to keep people engaged and even "addicted" in order to keep them as subscribers and make them upgrade to more expensive subscriptions?
  - ajam1507 8mo ago
    Do you have a specific example of a subscription based platform that is as insidiously addicting as the ad supported ones?
    - codethief 8mo ago
      Netflix?
    - fauigerzigerk 8mo ago
      - Games. - Gambling while rarely subscription based is usually paid for directly rather than ad funded. - Newspaper subscriptions are no less addictive for news junkies than purely ad funded newspapers. - I watch a lot of Youtube, far more than I used to before I started paying for the subscription. - Netflix and in the olden days TV. I'm not entirely sure what "insidiously addictive" actually means. I do sometimes scroll through some TikTok vids. I don't find it particularly addictive compared to, say, Hacker News.

by dahart 8mo ago

xigoi 8mo ago

Alright, if you want to be pedantic abuot the definition, then ban compensated advertising.

dahart 8mo ago
Seems like you missed the point; banning compensated advertising wouldn’t fix the problem at all.
- fsflover 8mo ago
  I don't see why it wouldn't.
  - dahart 8mo ago
    Even though I gave an example of a huge swath of advertising that isn’t “compensated”?
    - ajam1507 8mo ago
      Surely you're just being pedantic by pointing out that platforms can advertise themselves without paying money to themselves. If those same advertisements were on another platform they would be compensated ads.
      - dahart 8mo ago
        And? Those ads aren’t on other platforms, and they won’t go away if you ban compensated advertising. Surely you’re just being completely naive if you think banning “compensated” advertising would change the advertising rather than the compensation mechanisms.
        fsflover 8mo ago
        Any compensation mechanism will become outlawed, so what are you talking about?
        dahart 8mo ago
        You can try to stop the payments, but you won’t stop the ads. I’m talking about the same reasons billionaires pay far lower tax rates than you and I. When that much money is on the line, they will find (or make) a legal way. (Anyway, it’s also time to come back from outer space; corporations own the laws and the advertising channels. Our economy, for better or worse, currently depends on advertising. Compensated advertising will never be banned.) The hypothetical you’re talking about does not stop today’s uncompensated for-profit advertising at all, and there is a lot of that. It also would only stop direct payments to content channels from a second party in exchange for advertising. That wouldn’t stop indirect marketing/advertising, nor indirect compensation. Furthermore, content distributors could offer service bundles where advertisers pay for other business services, and ads become a free add-on from a legal accounting perspective. Similarly, advertisers can offer other services, and channels can gift air-time to businesses. Channels could “sponsor” or “endorse” products they “like” without an attached financial transaction. It just would not be that hard to legally sever advertising from compensation, so if you aren’t banning all advertising including the uncompensated kind, then advertising will happen. And banning all advertising is even more of a non-starter than trying to somehow block payments.
        xg15 8mo ago
        By that logic any and all regulation would be pointless because people will try to circumvent the regulation.
    - xigoi 8mo ago
      Such advertising is generally not a problem. That’s the point.
      - dahart 8mo ago
        Why? I completely disagree, they are the same as any other ads. But you’re still not seeing the big picture. If you ban advertising compensation, suddenly uncompensated will become the entire problem and the only category. That’s the point.
        fsflover 8mo ago
        Can you give an example? I can't imagine that. Who will start advertising for free?

xg15 8mo ago

Yes, but if we're talking about incentives and "primordial domino tiles" then compensated advertising is what createa the incentives for the whole attention economy and addictive design in the first place. Feel free to keep doing "pro-bono" advertising, but shareholders definitely wouldn't.

stingraycharles 8mo ago
That’s my thinking. Follow the money, get rid of the source of money, and the whole thing falls down. Of course that will not happen as there are way too many interests involved.
fauigerzigerk 8mo ago
>compensated advertising is what createa the incentives for the whole attention economy Why would you not want to keep people engaged and even "addicted" in order to keep them as subscribers and make them upgrade to more expensive subscriptions?
- ajam1507 8mo ago
  Do you have a specific example of a subscription based platform that is as insidiously addicting as the ad supported ones?
  - codethief 8mo ago
    Netflix?
  - fauigerzigerk 8mo ago
    - Games. - Gambling while rarely subscription based is usually paid for directly rather than ad funded. - Newspaper subscriptions are no less addictive for news junkies than purely ad funded newspapers. - I watch a lot of Youtube, far more than I used to before I started paying for the subscription. - Netflix and in the olden days TV. I'm not entirely sure what "insidiously addictive" actually means. I do sometimes scroll through some TikTok vids. I don't find it particularly addictive compared to, say, Hacker News.