6 ms·

Normally I'd be upset that another patent troll was winning in court - but come on, this is about a slimy patent troll that will be suing even more slimy advert

Normally I'd be upset that another patent troll was winning in court - but come on, this is about a slimy patent troll that will be suing even more slimy advertising scum. I have to say I'm on the fence on this one.

austenallred 13y ago
Google, YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, Gmail, Wordpress, and over half of the top websites in the world are slimy advertising scum?
- nfoz 13y ago
  Yes.
  - diminoten 13y ago
    Exactly what is so terrible about advertisement, may I ask?
  - devcpp 13y ago
    No.
- gonzo 13y ago
  Google, YouTube, and Gmail are all the same company.
john_b 13y ago
Thankfully, one's legal rights don't depend on how "slimy" you are and abuses of the law remain abuses even when slimy entities are the ones abused.
moomin 13y ago
Except WildTangent isn't scrappy ad farm, it's a games company.
- goldfeld 13y ago
  Regardless, I don't side with advertising models, they're what got us into this whole collecting data as a business hole, so if these scumbags can prevent companies from getting revenue from ads and thus encourage them to seek actual decent business models (as a non-intended adaptative collateral effect), I'd think it's one evil doing us good.
  - cglace 13y ago
    You are against all ad revenue?
    - goldfeld 13y ago
      Taking the internet as a whole, I think what ads contribute negatively more than offsets what small businesses and independent publishers gain from, well, existing and surviving because of ads. If that wasn't an option, we'd be forced to come up with more intelligent business models that would also tend to respect more the end user (i.e. so I'm not the product). Making ad revenue, e.g. from Google, means you're reinforcing the big corporations who really need to market themselves through ads--those are the ones who could not live without ads (they need the constant intrusive, paid-for flow of unwilling eyeballs to keep their investors happy), not the independ publishers (who I think could.) Niche ad networks are alright, but nevertheless they contribute to making it easy not to think hard (and work hard) to pursue alternate business models.
      - chaz 13y ago
        Advertising is a two-sided market. As a business with a product/service to be advertised, how would I go about acquiring customers without ads? Everyone from credit card companies to the local dentist has the need to market.
        icebraining 13y ago
        Instead of looking from the point of view of business, why don't you try to look from the point of view of the consumer and see where it gets you? That's the approach taken by the people behind Project VRM and Doc Searls' Intention economy[1]. [1]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intention_economy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intention_economy
deckar01 13y ago
These media providers may have to pay licensing fees to show ads. The margins are so slim, some media could become paid content or just stop being produced.
robomartin 13y ago
Let me suggest you are not thinking straight. Advertising, like it or not, is what keeps the internet alive. Without this revenue stream it would collapse. The internet doesn't run on idealism, it runs on money. Before making statements like that go start a non-trivial internet-based based business and gain some understanding.
- goldfeld 13y ago
  I think what crowdfunding has been showing us is that we have gone through a dark ages of internet business models (ads), in that the ease of marketing through ads blindsided people to pursuing more creative (and yes, often more laborious) business models. I disagree ads are what keeps the internet alive. What keeps it alive are hackers and artists. They share this: an itch to create. They will create even for free. But we would have been so much ahead in creative business models that they could explore (see Kickstarter) in an alternate reality where ads did not exist.
  - coldcode 13y ago
    Unreality. You can't run a business on Kickstarter money. It's a kick start. After that you need money from somewhere. Or do you expect people to eat bits?
  - robomartin 13y ago
    If you are going to create an internet-based business that will support more than a few people (both users and employees with their families) you need money. Lots of it. The user side is simple: As the user base grows your infrastructure requirements grow as well. And, at certain milestones these needs grow in large capex bursts. Flexible services such as AWS have made scaling far cheaper, more linear and less expensive, but it it still very expensive once you cross certain business-dependent thresholds. Hardware is hardware, whether you own it or not. Of course, the team will scale based on other parameters. More engineers, more designers, customer service, accounting, operations, whatever. More people. Not working for peanuts of feel good hippie thoughts but for money. They need it to live, rent or buy a place to live, feed themselves and their families, save, invest, have fun, etc. Given that internet culture quickly --from the very early days-- levitated to free and add-supported free most internet users only want to pay for their connectivity. Nobody wants to pay for anything on the internet. That's just a fact. Pick any service, say LinkeIn, far more free users than paid users. It's like that across the board. Hell, it's even like that in mobile. Unless you get lucky it's nearly impossible to make money with paid apps. Make them free and then sell them something from within the app or support it with ads. I stand by my original sentiment: The internet would collapse tomorrow if advertising was banned. That doesn't mean I prefer it that way. I am simply reflecting reality.

austenallred 13y ago

Google, YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, Gmail, Wordpress, and over half of the top websites in the world are slimy advertising scum?

nfoz 13y ago
Yes.
- diminoten 13y ago
  Exactly what is so terrible about advertisement, may I ask?
- devcpp 13y ago
  No.
gonzo 13y ago
Google, YouTube, and Gmail are all the same company.

john_b 13y ago

Thankfully, one's legal rights don't depend on how "slimy" you are and abuses of the law remain abuses even when slimy entities are the ones abused.

moomin 13y ago

Except WildTangent isn't scrappy ad farm, it's a games company.

goldfeld 13y ago
Regardless, I don't side with advertising models, they're what got us into this whole collecting data as a business hole, so if these scumbags can prevent companies from getting revenue from ads and thus encourage them to seek actual decent business models (as a non-intended adaptative collateral effect), I'd think it's one evil doing us good.
- cglace 13y ago
  You are against all ad revenue?
  - goldfeld 13y ago
    Taking the internet as a whole, I think what ads contribute negatively more than offsets what small businesses and independent publishers gain from, well, existing and surviving because of ads. If that wasn't an option, we'd be forced to come up with more intelligent business models that would also tend to respect more the end user (i.e. so I'm not the product). Making ad revenue, e.g. from Google, means you're reinforcing the big corporations who really need to market themselves through ads--those are the ones who could not live without ads (they need the constant intrusive, paid-for flow of unwilling eyeballs to keep their investors happy), not the independ publishers (who I think could.) Niche ad networks are alright, but nevertheless they contribute to making it easy not to think hard (and work hard) to pursue alternate business models.
    - chaz 13y ago
      Advertising is a two-sided market. As a business with a product/service to be advertised, how would I go about acquiring customers without ads? Everyone from credit card companies to the local dentist has the need to market.
      - icebraining 13y ago
        Instead of looking from the point of view of business, why don't you try to look from the point of view of the consumer and see where it gets you? That's the approach taken by the people behind Project VRM and Doc Searls' Intention economy[1]. [1]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intention_economy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intention_economy

deckar01 13y ago

These media providers may have to pay licensing fees to show ads. The margins are so slim, some media could become paid content or just stop being produced.

robomartin 13y ago

Let me suggest you are not thinking straight. Advertising, like it or not, is what keeps the internet alive. Without this revenue stream it would collapse. The internet doesn't run on idealism, it runs on money. Before making statements like that go start a non-trivial internet-based based business and gain some understanding.

goldfeld 13y ago
I think what crowdfunding has been showing us is that we have gone through a dark ages of internet business models (ads), in that the ease of marketing through ads blindsided people to pursuing more creative (and yes, often more laborious) business models. I disagree ads are what keeps the internet alive. What keeps it alive are hackers and artists. They share this: an itch to create. They will create even for free. But we would have been so much ahead in creative business models that they could explore (see Kickstarter) in an alternate reality where ads did not exist.
- coldcode 13y ago
  Unreality. You can't run a business on Kickstarter money. It's a kick start. After that you need money from somewhere. Or do you expect people to eat bits?
- robomartin 13y ago
  If you are going to create an internet-based business that will support more than a few people (both users and employees with their families) you need money. Lots of it. The user side is simple: As the user base grows your infrastructure requirements grow as well. And, at certain milestones these needs grow in large capex bursts. Flexible services such as AWS have made scaling far cheaper, more linear and less expensive, but it it still very expensive once you cross certain business-dependent thresholds. Hardware is hardware, whether you own it or not. Of course, the team will scale based on other parameters. More engineers, more designers, customer service, accounting, operations, whatever. More people. Not working for peanuts of feel good hippie thoughts but for money. They need it to live, rent or buy a place to live, feed themselves and their families, save, invest, have fun, etc. Given that internet culture quickly --from the very early days-- levitated to free and add-supported free most internet users only want to pay for their connectivity. Nobody wants to pay for anything on the internet. That's just a fact. Pick any service, say LinkeIn, far more free users than paid users. It's like that across the board. Hell, it's even like that in mobile. Unless you get lucky it's nearly impossible to make money with paid apps. Make them free and then sell them something from within the app or support it with ads. I stand by my original sentiment: The internet would collapse tomorrow if advertising was banned. That doesn't mean I prefer it that way. I am simply reflecting reality.