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People in Silicon Valley Don’t Click on Ads

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Re: People in Silicon Valley Don’t Click on Ads

#91

Post by camillomiller »

patio11 wrote: post #24

Ad clicks are studied pretty extensively. A good search term is "compulsive clickers." The cariacature-with-a-bit-of-truth version is less-educated older white woman in Iowa. The heavy clicking user population, roughly 4% of users, is generally believed to contribute more than a majority of total clicks. This is as well-studied as you'd expect of clearly quantifiable data worth billions of dollars, and remains social…

This definition totally reinforces Rushkoff's vision of most contemporary Web Businesses as value extracting entities.

By the way, the fact that you have to be mildly stupid or technologically illiterate to really be clicking on ads is the proverbial pink elephant in the room. To further extend this reasoning, building up stupidity and lessening tech literacy is actually functional to Facebook's and Google's business models.

Re: People in Silicon Valley Don’t Click on Ads

#92

Post by manigandham »

As much as I like HN, there seems to be a lot of confusion and misinformation when it comes to ads.

People absolutely click on ads. All the time. Regardless of where they live. Digital advertising is not some mystical industry but actually one of the most scientific and data-driven with a massive amount of metrics generated everyday.

I know the author of this article but it's a very slim look at the entire ad ecosystem. There could be a thousand reasons why SV just has less ad clicks with anything from less facebook use to more adblocking to less fit for the audiences that many companies (that are advertising on facebook) are actually after.

There are just as many other adtech companies and channels that show that SV has very high interaction rates in clicking on whitepapers, signing up for emails/newsletters, webinars, etc and other kinds of advertising outside of facebook. Even google gets tons of search ad clicks in SV.

Facebook metrics are cool but it's important to remember that they are just a little sliver of the larger ad market and that the larger context matters anytime you analyze numbers like these.

Re: People in Silicon Valley Don’t Click on Ads

#93

Post by manigandham »

jfoster wrote: post #58
frik wrote: post #29

I want contextual ads, like the original AdSense "Contextual advertising is a form of targeted advertising in which the content of an ad is in direct correlation to the content of the web page the user is viewing. For example, if you are visiting a website concerning travelling in Europe and see that an ad pops up offering a special price on a flight to Italy, that’s contextual advertising. " https://en.wikipedia.org…

For this reason, I think the ultimate ad network would be a combination of Google's data, Facebook's data, and data from a payment processor (PayPal or Stripe). Google knows what you're after, right now. Facebook knows what you're into, in general. PayPal/Stripe know your propensity to spend money online. I would argue that the perfectly targeted ad will want to know about all of these. Google's data & mechanism (sea…

Unfortunately, this is at odds with the privacy/tracking debate, even though I think most people are worried about all the wrong things when it comes to ad network tracking vs real threats like government surveillance, malware, etc.

Re: People in Silicon Valley Don’t Click on Ads

#94

Post by kuschku »

manigandham wrote: post #92

As much as I like HN, there seems to be a lot of confusion and misinformation when it comes to ads. People absolutely click on ads. All the time. Regardless of where they live. Digital advertising is not some mystical industry but actually one of the most scientific and data-driven with a massive amount of metrics generated everyday. I know the author of this article but it's a very slim look at the entire ad ecosyst…

Yes, people click on ads. I click, on average, when not using an ad blocker, accidentally around 200 ads a day on mobile.

I've now made it a sport to click, after I accidentally clicked, another few dozen times. Kinda like Cookie Clicker.

Most clicks are accidental, or people doing fraud (for business or fun reasons)

Re: People in Silicon Valley Don’t Click on Ads

#95

Post by hga »

thedevil wrote: post #63
thedevil wrote: post #57

"Silicon Valley people don’t click on ads... Similarly, they appear not to be commenting or liking posts as frequently" The most successful drug dealers don't use their own stuff, I hear. Edit: I think I sounded a little snarky here. To be clear, I'm a huge fan of silicon valley. But I thought the analogy was humorous and thought provoking so I thought I'd share.

On that note, does anyone know anything about the impact of internet use in drug addiction (and crime)? I have a very speculative hypothesis that internet (social networks, porn, etc) might work as a super-crack, competing with (and crowding out) other addictions because it's cheap, abundant, and instant.

When trying to think about how you might prove this (I'm taking a break from proofreading an acquaintance's criminology paper this very moment), it occurred to me that by virtue of keeping people off the streets, the Internet will decrease arrest and other criminal statistics simply by decreasing exposure to predatory police who have arrest statistics to maintain.

Taking that further, it could mean the focus is even more intense on those who do go out, and when you go out. I suppose you could try to measure this by finding historical statistics on where people spend their time, inside our homes our outside. After dealing with confounding factors like decreased employment.

Re: People in Silicon Valley Don’t Click on Ads

#96

Post by lordnacho »

patio11 wrote: post #24

Ad clicks are studied pretty extensively. A good search term is "compulsive clickers." The cariacature-with-a-bit-of-truth version is less-educated older white woman in Iowa. The heavy clicking user population, roughly 4% of users, is generally believed to contribute more than a majority of total clicks. This is as well-studied as you'd expect of clearly quantifiable data worth billions of dollars, and remains social…

Have you got some links to studies? I know someone who is starting a web shop.

Re: People in Silicon Valley Don’t Click on Ads

#97

Post by gonzo41 »

thedevil wrote: post #63
thedevil wrote: post #57

"Silicon Valley people don’t click on ads... Similarly, they appear not to be commenting or liking posts as frequently" The most successful drug dealers don't use their own stuff, I hear. Edit: I think I sounded a little snarky here. To be clear, I'm a huge fan of silicon valley. But I thought the analogy was humorous and thought provoking so I thought I'd share.

On that note, does anyone know anything about the impact of internet use in drug addiction (and crime)? I have a very speculative hypothesis that internet (social networks, porn, etc) might work as a super-crack, competing with (and crowding out) other addictions because it's cheap, abundant, and instant.

Smoke crack for a while, your interest in computers/reddit/hackernews etc will fall away as something far more important to you takes over your life.

Re: People in Silicon Valley Don’t Click on Ads

#98

Post by [deleted] »

thedevil wrote: post #63
thedevil wrote: post #57

"Silicon Valley people don’t click on ads... Similarly, they appear not to be commenting or liking posts as frequently" The most successful drug dealers don't use their own stuff, I hear. Edit: I think I sounded a little snarky here. To be clear, I'm a huge fan of silicon valley. But I thought the analogy was humorous and thought provoking so I thought I'd share.

On that note, does anyone know anything about the impact of internet use in drug addiction (and crime)? I have a very speculative hypothesis that internet (social networks, porn, etc) might work as a super-crack, competing with (and crowding out) other addictions because it's cheap, abundant, and instant.

[deleted]

Re: People in Silicon Valley Don’t Click on Ads

#99

Post by OvidNaso »

slang800 wrote: post #86
thedevil wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On that note, does anyone know anything about the impact of internet use in drug addiction (and crime)? I have a very speculative hypothesis that internet (social networks, porn, etc) might work as a super-crack, competing with (and crowding out) other addictions because it's cheap, abundant, and instant.

Non-substance addictions (including internet use) lack the physical dependence created by drugs like cocaine. So, it would be hard to compare them to "super-crack". I could certainly see how, for example, repeatedly checking your phone could mirror the behavioral aspect of smoking cigarettes. However, losing your phone won't cause withdrawal symptoms like headache, nausea, or fatigue. Also, I'd agree that social beha…

"Physical dependence" with respect to addiction really is nothing. Substances that create physical withdrawal symptoms can certainly be very very unpleasant (even dangerous), but if they were at all the main factor in addiction, drug abuse treatment would be a glorious, happy, incredibly successful industry.

Think about it: Even the worst "physically addictive" substances, let's say heroin, will be completely clear from physically in 7-10 days. Two weeks tops. Anybody can put up with that and, in fact, many addicts do it all the time. If that was the differentiating factor, locking up an addict would work because they would come to their "senses" after no longer physically dependent. Obviously, that's not how it is. Real addiction is something much deeper and cognitively still mysterious. Physical withdrawal (those first two weeks of hell) is called, in the treatment community, the easy part.

I think when most people use the "physical dependence" reference like you did, they are really trying to categorize and emphasize (internally or externally) that among substances and behaviors that are addictive, certain ones more often consume a persons entire being. This process is still a complete mystery and even if people can't or won't accept the amazing power and bizarre scope of cognitive function...it is certainly not 'physical dependence' and I therefore don't think there is any real need to continue with that minor classification.

Re: People in Silicon Valley Don’t Click on Ads

#100

Post by frik »

jfoster wrote: post #58
frik wrote: post #29

I want contextual ads, like the original AdSense "Contextual advertising is a form of targeted advertising in which the content of an ad is in direct correlation to the content of the web page the user is viewing. For example, if you are visiting a website concerning travelling in Europe and see that an ad pops up offering a special price on a flight to Italy, that’s contextual advertising. " https://en.wikipedia.org…

For this reason, I think the ultimate ad network would be a combination of Google's data, Facebook's data, and data from a payment processor (PayPal or Stripe). Google knows what you're after, right now. Facebook knows what you're into, in general. PayPal/Stripe know your propensity to spend money online. I would argue that the perfectly targeted ad will want to know about all of these. Google's data & mechanism (sea…

Is your comment about "contextual advertising"??

You dream about things people don't want. There is no reason to solve it with complex technical solutions, when "contextual advertising" makes sense and is relatively easy to implement - and everybody loves ads that make sense too.

If I read an article about a book (book review), please show me an ad to buy the book.

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