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That’s surprising, because in my opinion Google doesn’t care about malicious anything. The other day I had to look for something on YouTube on my dad’s computer

That’s surprising, because in my opinion Google doesn’t care about malicious anything. The other day I had to look for something on YouTube on my dad’s computer with a disabled ad-blocker. I saw like 30 ads in 15 minutes, every single one of them was a scam, literally not a single non-fraudulent ad. Google is full cartoon villain evil at this point.

hnlmorg 17d ago
I went through a phase of reporting scams and every single time my report was rejected. I guess I shouldn’t have expected any differently when their income is dependent on displaying those scam ads.
- 72deluxe 16d ago
  Same here. Seems they love AI-generated nonsense ads!
wat10000 17d ago
As long as it makes them money, they're incapable of caring. Make them liable for what they show, and watch them suddenly discover they are able to care a lot.
WarmWash 17d ago
The more you ad-block and tracker block, the more scammy the ads when you take down the guards. People who never do any sort of blocking are the most valuable ad-targets, and hence get the highest bids when their views are auctioned. They get Toyota, Coke, and Downy ads. Scam advertisers are bottom feeders and the "advertiser of last resort". Google doesn't really care that much about people with blank profiles, and why would they, these people use their services and contribute nothing back. I don't think Google is vindictive, but it just doesn't make business sense to put a lot of resources into cleaning up ads that pay google nothing and mostly go to people who temporarily disabled their ad-block.
- skyberrys 17d ago
  That's interesting to note. So the fact that there is less data about someone makes them a preferred target for the bottom of the advertising bucket. Is there an equivalent in the paper world? I remember those old paper magazines that were constantly about aliens or other conspiracies. Maybe the same effect?
  - WarmWash 17d ago
    They aren't preferred targets so much as they are the cheapest targets. These scam ads are trying to play the numbers game that email spammers do. So they just bid on everyone at the minimum bid. For people with fleshed out ad-profiles, the big advertisers that pay decent money will buy those slots. The auctions almost never fall through. For people with no profile, no one bids, and the auction falls through to the scammer who will pay $0.00001 for their ad to load. So ironically, the (second?) best way to remove scammy ads from google is to keep loading ads from google.
    - AlexandrB 17d ago
      You're missing the fact that all ads are scammy and I don't want to see any of them. There's nothing that makes a Downy ad more honest or relevant to me than an ad for BigCoin Online Casino - it's all worthless trash that conveys zero genuine information about the product. At least the bottom tier ads are honest about what they are.
      - WarmWash 17d ago
        That's totally fine, but then the correct action is to not visit sites that have ads then. The protest of the ad-economy is boycotting ad based services. Not using those services while blocking the ads. That just sends the signal that there is demand for free shit, which is both obvious and meaningless.
        butlike 17d ago
        It's the best time to do this if you're serious. You can stay off the phone, mitigating all those ads, then simply pay for a streaming platform tier that doesn't show ads and the supermarket end caps are essentially the only advertising you get
tomjen3 17d ago
Sometimes I am convinced that there are no good products and so all advertising must happen for bad products. I mean how often do you see an ad for a product, buy it (not even from the ad itself, maybe from a recommendation from a friend) and you are happy with the product and think the ad was truthful?
- asdff 17d ago
  Advertising stopped really working on me as an adult. You just get burned too often with overly advertised products in the past and you get cynical with all of them going forward. I guess I just don't really buy stuff much at this stage of my life beyond necessities. I got hobbies with gear, but I already have all my gear, and know what I am looking for already with any new gear and have a good sense of enshittification.

hnlmorg 17d ago

I went through a phase of reporting scams and every single time my report was rejected. I guess I shouldn’t have expected any differently when their income is dependent on displaying those scam ads.

72deluxe 16d ago
Same here. Seems they love AI-generated nonsense ads!

wat10000 17d ago

As long as it makes them money, they're incapable of caring. Make them liable for what they show, and watch them suddenly discover they are able to care a lot.

WarmWash 17d ago

The more you ad-block and tracker block, the more scammy the ads when you take down the guards. People who never do any sort of blocking are the most valuable ad-targets, and hence get the highest bids when their views are auctioned. They get Toyota, Coke, and Downy ads. Scam advertisers are bottom feeders and the "advertiser of last resort". Google doesn't really care that much about people with blank profiles, and why would they, these people use their services and contribute nothing back. I don't think Google is vindictive, but it just doesn't make business sense to put a lot of resources into cleaning up ads that pay google nothing and mostly go to people who temporarily disabled their ad-block.

skyberrys 17d ago
That's interesting to note. So the fact that there is less data about someone makes them a preferred target for the bottom of the advertising bucket. Is there an equivalent in the paper world? I remember those old paper magazines that were constantly about aliens or other conspiracies. Maybe the same effect?
- WarmWash 17d ago
  They aren't preferred targets so much as they are the cheapest targets. These scam ads are trying to play the numbers game that email spammers do. So they just bid on everyone at the minimum bid. For people with fleshed out ad-profiles, the big advertisers that pay decent money will buy those slots. The auctions almost never fall through. For people with no profile, no one bids, and the auction falls through to the scammer who will pay $0.00001 for their ad to load. So ironically, the (second?) best way to remove scammy ads from google is to keep loading ads from google.
  - AlexandrB 17d ago
    You're missing the fact that all ads are scammy and I don't want to see any of them. There's nothing that makes a Downy ad more honest or relevant to me than an ad for BigCoin Online Casino - it's all worthless trash that conveys zero genuine information about the product. At least the bottom tier ads are honest about what they are.
    - WarmWash 17d ago
      That's totally fine, but then the correct action is to not visit sites that have ads then. The protest of the ad-economy is boycotting ad based services. Not using those services while blocking the ads. That just sends the signal that there is demand for free shit, which is both obvious and meaningless.
      - butlike 17d ago
        It's the best time to do this if you're serious. You can stay off the phone, mitigating all those ads, then simply pay for a streaming platform tier that doesn't show ads and the supermarket end caps are essentially the only advertising you get

tomjen3 17d ago

Sometimes I am convinced that there are no good products and so all advertising must happen for bad products. I mean how often do you see an ad for a product, buy it (not even from the ad itself, maybe from a recommendation from a friend) and you are happy with the product and think the ad was truthful?

asdff 17d ago
Advertising stopped really working on me as an adult. You just get burned too often with overly advertised products in the past and you get cynical with all of them going forward. I guess I just don't really buy stuff much at this stage of my life beyond necessities. I got hobbies with gear, but I already have all my gear, and know what I am looking for already with any new gear and have a good sense of enshittification.