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but let's not kid ourselves that ads have no informational content Every piece of knowledge has an opportunity cost.[1] To make this point more explicit, the c

• kbenson 13y ago
  But the cost is already paid. We aren't talking about increasing advertising, we are talking about increasing the usefulness of advertising. Interspersed with that schizophrenic's nonsense is the useful tidbit reminding you it looks like rain, and there's a cheap umbrella a few steps ahead... Not to mention in-between his ramblings he does a pretty entertaining Hamlet. ;)
  • 001sky 13y ago
    Everyon understand's advertising makes other people money. It does so at the expense of polluting the information flow of other people. That is a market externality being exploited by one group at the expense of another. One person's eye0sore is another person's "information". But they have zoning laws that dis-allow LA style billboards in expensive neighborhoods...for good reason. The "information" has a negative externality on real-estate costs (aka: its an eyesore). And just like IRL, online advertising is the same way. Who makes the rules is just a matter of people's self-respect. It turns out that wealth white people find it degrading to be subject to advertising, so they put all of those ads for menthol ciggarettes in and alchohol in the black people's neighborhoods.
    • kbenson 13y ago
      I'm honestly unclear why you keep trying to shift the argument to whether advertising is a good or bad thing. That wasn't the assertion (or statement of preference, if you will) of the comment you first replied to, and it isn't my assertion one way or the other either. I believe I've made my position clear on whether making existing advertising more useful for the targeted individuals is a good thing, given that privacy is protected. You've made your opinion on some other issue very clear. And just like IRL, online advertising is the same way. Who makes the rules is just a matter of people's self-respect. It turns out that wealth white people find it degrading to be subject to advertising, so they put all of those ads for menthol ciggarettes in and alchohol in the black people's neighborhoods. So what's the online equivalent to wealthy white people keeping large obnoxious advertising out of their neighborhoods, and the advertising dollars being redirected towards less affluent or influential people? Who are the elites in this situation?
      • 001sky 13y ago
        User's time and bandwidth are valuable commodities. To safeguard these resources, people engage in social activities which exclude people likely to waste their time. There are entire industries that peddle influence through social engineering to penetrate this approach. Surely I don't need to spell these out ... ;D. But you don't see much of the activity you are interested in here at HN, and when you do the evicence suggests it is the exceptions that prove the rule. And also when those exceptions are not in place it is the typical case demonstrating the case quite nicely. The issue about "better targeting" is that the delterious elements of advertising do not go away. This is the reason why sometimes we decline to take a phone call in the middle of the meeting. Its not always the targeting, the content, or the message that it counter-productive. Sometimes it is the time and the context. So it is not just that privacy is protected, or not. Nor is it sufficient that "better targeting" should be an excuse to increase attack surface for placing adds; or that "more secure" should increase the attack surface for data-intensive surveilance and information gathering. Part of the art of marketing is reaching people in a constructive way. Advertising is not always the way to do that. No matter how "well targeted" it is. That is why we have PR and lobbying, informal networking, social circles, and country clubs, alumni networks...etc. And why we don't accept advertisments in front of phone calls like we do at the movies. Etc.