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> Websites’ use of ever more in-your-face advertising formats (videos that play automatically, pop-ups that obscure the text you are trying to read) have driven

> Websites’ use of ever more in-your-face advertising formats (videos that play automatically, pop-ups that obscure the text you are trying to read) have driven ever more people to seek ways to block them. Younger consumers seem especially intolerant of intrusive ads, and as they get older, overall ad-blocking rates are bound to rise further, predicts Peter Stabler of Wells Fargo Securities, one of the authors of a recent report on the phenomenon. Yep. Stop the "in your face" ads, stop the tracking, and people are less likely to block the ads and the tracking. It is really simple as that. I despite all ads that start playing videos, gif animations, etc. It distracts me from being able to read the article. I'm okay with Google Ads, it's purely text and not annoying. But the only reason I block it is because of the tracking. It scares the shit out of me when I saw something related to what I was doing on a completely different site on a different day. Fuck that.

swang 11y ago
Ads that you don't pay attention to are useless to the advertisers so they won't stop doing intrusive ads
- kentt 11y ago
  You can't seriously be saying that Google's text ads don't work? What are you getting at. I think the parent wants a reasonable balance between effective ads and ads that don't degrade the content by being obtrusive.
- Nadya 11y ago
  Advertisements are useless to advertisers if I refuse to buy their products based entirely on the fact that I've seen an ad for their product. So the jokes on them. I keep a spreadsheet where I add products/brands that have somehow snuck past my adblocker. I avoid buying from them altogether and will look for similar or offbrands. I do have a few exceptions to this rule. If enough of my friends/coworkers can testify on the products behalf, I may purchase it because it seems to be a good product. If I already have purchased the product in the past and enjoy it and later see it in an advertisement - I already know I like and buy the stuff so it doesn't get added. Imagine how fewer advertisements you'd see if more people kept a personal blacklist? :) "But how will you hear about _____"? The same way anyone eventually hears about any great product: word of mouth.
  - manigandham 11y ago
    You are absolutely not the norm. Ads do work and the data for decades has proven it. Many people do benefit from eventually finding and buying products/services that they want/need.
    - 6d0debc071 11y ago
      > Ads do work and the data for decades has proven it. Many people do benefit from eventually finding and buying products/services that they want/need. Rather nebulous claim. And it's not clear that the second sentence is even talking about the same thing as the first.
      - manigandham 11y ago
        The reason there's so much spending on digital ads is because its returns so many accurate metrics on how the ads are being seen and interacted with. If you're referring to whether people respond to ads, that's also been proven by hundreds of studies and the entire advertising industry. It's pretty easy to quantify sales before and after something as simple as a billboard to show that there's an increase. Nielsen alone has done lots of in-depth scientific analysis on this. This industry is pretty advanced and uses lots of science and data, contrary to what you might imagine. What is wrong with the 2nd sentence? Lots of people find what they're looking for through ads. They dont just have to be digital, simple things like coupons in newspapers still have massive reach and sales ROI. There's nothing wrong with it.
        Nadya 11y ago
        This is a larger issue with how easily impressionable people are. They are largely influenced by advertisements - even the people who deny that ads have any affect on them to purchase products they've seen in ads (can't remember where the study was done). It works because of all the wrong reasons, in my opinion. Which is why I go so far out of my way to avoid purchasing things from ads.
- anigbrowl 11y ago
  I do pay attention to low-profile ads. And I feel well-disposed towards those advertisers, whereas intrusive advertisers go on my mental blacklist and I select against their offerings when I go shopping.
  - seanp2k2 11y ago
    Anyone know of any studies on the effects of ad overload / negative associations with brands / products which are heavily advertised? There seems to be a line beyond which advertising more heavily does more harm than good (that's my theory, anyway).
manigandham 11y ago
Why is it scary? People always want more relevant ads... then say they dont like it when they get them. What exactly would be the better option?
- dec0dedab0de 11y ago
  Personally I want ads relevant to whatever content I am consuming, not relevant to my prior browsing habits.
wlkr 11y ago
I wholeheartedly agree and I'm sure others do, too. There are many sites which I have on my whitelist but tracking and the risk of malware causes me to maintain a whitelist as opposed to a blacklist. The reaction from many websites is often to either more aggressively target those without ad-blockers - thus leading more people to turn to ad-blocking, or to switch revenue models - a risky and IMO often necessary step. Eventually the pool of people who aren't blocking ads will be a deeply suboptimal demographic - as noted in the article the majority of people who use ad-blockers are at least somewhat tech savvy, fairly heavy internet users, one of the prime targets for advertising online. I haven't thought a great deal about this but it's very interesting to consider that through increased use of such software, perhaps end users can truly take control of how they are treated. There is absolutely no reason why advertising should cease to be a successful revenue stream but changes are undoubtedly needed to guarantee it into the future. FWIW, websites which I visit frequently that are transparent about their tailored advertising and sponsorships gain much more trust and respect from me.
hrehhf 11y ago
To monetize a website can anyone recommend decent advertisers that don't track viewers and aren't a nuisance? Perhaps like Google Ads but without the tracking?
alexqgb 11y ago
The thing to remember is that the Internet was never designed as a commercial, ad-friendly place. As many of its architects have noted, it would look very different if it were. That means trying to build an ad-supported business in a place that is - if not hostile - than at least fundamentally indifferent to the needs of ad-supported content producers was always going to be a tough row to hoe. If you succeed, well good for you. If not, don't feel too bad - the cards were stacked against you from the outset. In either case, the most important thing to remember is that Internet does not owe you a living. Nor does it owe advertisers an easy and easily controlled environment in which to operate. It has purposes that are significantly higher and deeper than hustling cheap, fast content while trying to make quick buck by selling your audience's personal details to fly-by-night ad networks. Not everyone operates like this, of course. Google, Facebook, and BuzzFeed are all examples of places with far cleaner models. All they sell is access. None of them make information available to others. Indeed, they all guard what they know very jealously. And Google aside, they haven't been vectors for piracy. But on balance, the Internet has been pretty terrible for people who work in the content industries, and the new media industries - in partnership with advertisers - have been pretty terrible for the Internet. You really need to go outside of this mutually debilitating flustercluck to find the truly awesome and wonderful things that the Internet makes possible. And many of these are things around which very good businesses can be built. For genuinely daring and visionary people, it's an extraordinary time to be alive. Here's what's not visionary, or helpful, or beneficial to humanity: trying to turn the Internet into a cheaper, faster, dirtier, amalgamation of print and broadcast media, only with much crappier advertising and a large helping of surveillance and malware thrown in. You're not saving the world with that crap. Indeed, you're the bad money that drives out the good, and the sooner your business model collapses, the better off the world will be. AdBlock on.
lewisl9029 11y ago
> Yep. Stop the "in your face" ads, stop the tracking, and people are less likely to block the ads and the tracking. It is really simple as that. I think it's too late. Ads have an irreparable PR problem. As soon as users find out about the existence of Ad Blocking, they will simply enable it and never look back because they've been burnt by deceptive and intrusive advertising for far too long on the internet. Whitelists, exceptions, even the very act of even thinking about turning off their Ad Blockers, are things that only principled, technical users will ever bother with, and we all know they represent a mere rounding error on the total internet population. It will probably be a more fruitful effort to start exploring other alternative methods of monetization than to try to make Ads work again.

swang 11y ago

Ads that you don't pay attention to are useless to the advertisers so they won't stop doing intrusive ads

kentt 11y ago
You can't seriously be saying that Google's text ads don't work? What are you getting at. I think the parent wants a reasonable balance between effective ads and ads that don't degrade the content by being obtrusive.
Nadya 11y ago
Advertisements are useless to advertisers if I refuse to buy their products based entirely on the fact that I've seen an ad for their product. So the jokes on them. I keep a spreadsheet where I add products/brands that have somehow snuck past my adblocker. I avoid buying from them altogether and will look for similar or offbrands. I do have a few exceptions to this rule. If enough of my friends/coworkers can testify on the products behalf, I may purchase it because it seems to be a good product. If I already have purchased the product in the past and enjoy it and later see it in an advertisement - I already know I like and buy the stuff so it doesn't get added. Imagine how fewer advertisements you'd see if more people kept a personal blacklist? :) "But how will you hear about _____"? The same way anyone eventually hears about any great product: word of mouth.
- manigandham 11y ago
  You are absolutely not the norm. Ads do work and the data for decades has proven it. Many people do benefit from eventually finding and buying products/services that they want/need.
  - 6d0debc071 11y ago
    > Ads do work and the data for decades has proven it. Many people do benefit from eventually finding and buying products/services that they want/need. Rather nebulous claim. And it's not clear that the second sentence is even talking about the same thing as the first.
    - manigandham 11y ago
      The reason there's so much spending on digital ads is because its returns so many accurate metrics on how the ads are being seen and interacted with. If you're referring to whether people respond to ads, that's also been proven by hundreds of studies and the entire advertising industry. It's pretty easy to quantify sales before and after something as simple as a billboard to show that there's an increase. Nielsen alone has done lots of in-depth scientific analysis on this. This industry is pretty advanced and uses lots of science and data, contrary to what you might imagine. What is wrong with the 2nd sentence? Lots of people find what they're looking for through ads. They dont just have to be digital, simple things like coupons in newspapers still have massive reach and sales ROI. There's nothing wrong with it.
      - Nadya 11y ago
        This is a larger issue with how easily impressionable people are. They are largely influenced by advertisements - even the people who deny that ads have any affect on them to purchase products they've seen in ads (can't remember where the study was done). It works because of all the wrong reasons, in my opinion. Which is why I go so far out of my way to avoid purchasing things from ads.
anigbrowl 11y ago
I do pay attention to low-profile ads. And I feel well-disposed towards those advertisers, whereas intrusive advertisers go on my mental blacklist and I select against their offerings when I go shopping.
- seanp2k2 11y ago
  Anyone know of any studies on the effects of ad overload / negative associations with brands / products which are heavily advertised? There seems to be a line beyond which advertising more heavily does more harm than good (that's my theory, anyway).

manigandham 11y ago

Why is it scary? People always want more relevant ads... then say they dont like it when they get them. What exactly would be the better option?

dec0dedab0de 11y ago
Personally I want ads relevant to whatever content I am consuming, not relevant to my prior browsing habits.

wlkr 11y ago

I wholeheartedly agree and I'm sure others do, too. There are many sites which I have on my whitelist but tracking and the risk of malware causes me to maintain a whitelist as opposed to a blacklist. The reaction from many websites is often to either more aggressively target those without ad-blockers - thus leading more people to turn to ad-blocking, or to switch revenue models - a risky and IMO often necessary step. Eventually the pool of people who aren't blocking ads will be a deeply suboptimal demographic - as noted in the article the majority of people who use ad-blockers are at least somewhat tech savvy, fairly heavy internet users, one of the prime targets for advertising online. I haven't thought a great deal about this but it's very interesting to consider that through increased use of such software, perhaps end users can truly take control of how they are treated. There is absolutely no reason why advertising should cease to be a successful revenue stream but changes are undoubtedly needed to guarantee it into the future. FWIW, websites which I visit frequently that are transparent about their tailored advertising and sponsorships gain much more trust and respect from me.

hrehhf 11y ago

To monetize a website can anyone recommend decent advertisers that don't track viewers and aren't a nuisance? Perhaps like Google Ads but without the tracking?

alexqgb 11y ago

The thing to remember is that the Internet was never designed as a commercial, ad-friendly place. As many of its architects have noted, it would look very different if it were. That means trying to build an ad-supported business in a place that is - if not hostile - than at least fundamentally indifferent to the needs of ad-supported content producers was always going to be a tough row to hoe. If you succeed, well good for you. If not, don't feel too bad - the cards were stacked against you from the outset. In either case, the most important thing to remember is that Internet does not owe you a living. Nor does it owe advertisers an easy and easily controlled environment in which to operate. It has purposes that are significantly higher and deeper than hustling cheap, fast content while trying to make quick buck by selling your audience's personal details to fly-by-night ad networks. Not everyone operates like this, of course. Google, Facebook, and BuzzFeed are all examples of places with far cleaner models. All they sell is access. None of them make information available to others. Indeed, they all guard what they know very jealously. And Google aside, they haven't been vectors for piracy. But on balance, the Internet has been pretty terrible for people who work in the content industries, and the new media industries - in partnership with advertisers - have been pretty terrible for the Internet. You really need to go outside of this mutually debilitating flustercluck to find the truly awesome and wonderful things that the Internet makes possible. And many of these are things around which very good businesses can be built. For genuinely daring and visionary people, it's an extraordinary time to be alive. Here's what's not visionary, or helpful, or beneficial to humanity: trying to turn the Internet into a cheaper, faster, dirtier, amalgamation of print and broadcast media, only with much crappier advertising and a large helping of surveillance and malware thrown in. You're not saving the world with that crap. Indeed, you're the bad money that drives out the good, and the sooner your business model collapses, the better off the world will be. AdBlock on.

lewisl9029 11y ago

> Yep. Stop the "in your face" ads, stop the tracking, and people are less likely to block the ads and the tracking. It is really simple as that. I think it's too late. Ads have an irreparable PR problem. As soon as users find out about the existence of Ad Blocking, they will simply enable it and never look back because they've been burnt by deceptive and intrusive advertising for far too long on the internet. Whitelists, exceptions, even the very act of even thinking about turning off their Ad Blockers, are things that only principled, technical users will ever bother with, and we all know they represent a mere rounding error on the total internet population. It will probably be a more fruitful effort to start exploring other alternative methods of monetization than to try to make Ads work again.