Advertising Is a Cancer on Society • Hacker News Board

Re: Advertising Is a Cancer on Society

#41

Post by cm2012 » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 7:29 PM UTC

alephnan wrote: post #13

OrgNet wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

reducing consumption would be a benefit if you think about it from a climate change angle... For restaurants, I usually search for them in a directory and not in ads...

In NYC, there are many pop up events including food events, which wouldn’t show up in a food directory site, but they do show up on Instagram ads.

Pop-up events are likely "advertising" according to this site, which includes pretty much every form of communication or display not explicitly asked for.

Re: Advertising Is a Cancer on Society

#42

Post by ziddoap » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 7:29 PM UTC

_petronius wrote: post #26

starpilot wrote: post #2

We get rid of it, Google/Facebook/etc. shut down. While social media is of arguable benefits, Google has provided incalculable value to the world. Ads are the magic money fountain that give them the power to organize all of human knowledge, a phenomenal resource anyone can tap.

> Google has provided incalculable value to the world I'm not convinced by this statement, and I'd be genuinely interested to hear your reasoning behind it. Is it specific products? Specific technologies? Although Google has built some interesting stuff, I can't think of anything off the top of my head that they've done that was either a) something that couldn't have been invented without them, or b) only unique due…

The problem with arguing your viewpoint is that no one can prove something wouldn't have been invented without Google. So, no matter what is listed, you can just say "someone else might have invented that".

And regarding your second point, what would the practical difference be to the consumer if the innovation happened because of their ability to scale out, or "true innovation"?

You don't need to like Google to admit they have added value to the world.

Re: Advertising Is a Cancer on Society

#43

Post by StavrosK » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 7:29 PM UTC

alephnan wrote: post #13

OrgNet wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

reducing consumption would be a benefit if you think about it from a climate change angle... For restaurants, I usually search for them in a directory and not in ads...

In NYC, there are many pop up events including food events, which wouldn’t show up in a food directory site, but they do show up on Instagram ads.

A few years ago, I made a website that used the Facebook API to look up events in my city (I had to manually add all the venues) and show them in a nice interface on a single page, with no ads, etc.

It was amazing, I loved being able to see all the week's events in a single view. Then Facebook decided to shut down the public events API, and that was the end of the site.

The morals of the story are two: You can be notified of pop up events without being data-mined, and fuck Facebook (I know, it's "their" data, but I hate it anyway).

Re: Advertising Is a Cancer on Society

#44

Post by dudul » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 7:29 PM UTC

t34543 wrote: post #22

If you stop watching ads for awhile and go back to it you’ll see how mind numbing it all really is. I aggressively block ads - no exceptions.

When I moved from Europe to the US I just couldn't believe it. In my home country there is one commercial break during a 2 hour movie. It's a little longer than the breaks in the US, but there is only one. There is also one during a 45minute TV show, and none during a 20minute show.

I can't tell you the shock when I started watching American TV. I couldn't believe people were putting up with this.

Re: Advertising Is a Cancer on Society

#45

Post by irrational » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 7:30 PM UTC

GauntletWizard wrote: post #31

wpietri wrote: post #23

He doesn't quite say it by name, but most advertising is a classic arms race. Especially given how the internet now makes information easily available, a great deal of advertising is about manipulating consumers to pick company A's products over those from competitors B, C, and D. This forces those other companies to spend to get and keep customers. It's pure waste. For example, everybody on the planet is now familia…

If you were to take away all of the coke tomorrow, the first thing I'd spend all that extra money (and more!) on would be to try to invent a new cola.

They aren't saying get rid of coke. They are saying get rid of coke advertising. Everyone already knows about coke and is indoctrinating the rising generations without the need for additional advertisement.

Re: Advertising Is a Cancer on Society

#46

Post by hinkley » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 7:30 PM UTC

natalyarostova wrote: post #34

Anyone else find the user of 'cancer' in these terms to be frustrating? Having had to experience the pain of people I care about having cancer, it immediately just makes me feel like shit. I guess maybe I'm just sensitive...

You could try bringing the word 'blight' back, but some farmers and foresters might get their jimmies rustled.

Re: Advertising Is a Cancer on Society

#47

Post by falcrist » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 7:31 PM UTC

t34543 wrote: post #28

tathougies wrote: post #5

No its not. I had to move quickly last week. Needed to find someone who could take some stuff. Remembers the 1800gotjunk commercials. They fixed my problem. I guess I could have used google but without ads google wouldn't exist so...

Phone books still exist.

I don't know what they're like these days, but when I was younger, the vast majority of the phone book was a series of advertisements for various businesses.

Re: Advertising Is a Cancer on Society

#48

Post by gdulli » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 7:31 PM UTC

solidsnack9000 wrote: post #3

Maybe some of it...but without any advertising at all it would be really hard to know what products or out there or even that there is a restaurant on the other end of the block.

One of the best concerts I ever saw, I only knew about because of a TV commercial. In theory I could have found out about it another way, but I don't follow music news closely.

I generally mute/fast-forward commercials. Those are the best kinds of ads we can hope for because they're easy to skip and they're completely distinct from content. I'd rather fast-forward through an anonymous, non-targeted commercial for diapers than have Netflix manipulate me into watching what's profitable for them with their browse interface, based on my viewing and internet history, and then there's Coca-Cola all over the show itself.

Re: Advertising Is a Cancer on Society

#49

Post by tacos_supreme » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 7:32 PM UTC

starpilot wrote: post #2

We get rid of it, Google/Facebook/etc. shut down. While social media is of arguable benefits, Google has provided incalculable value to the world. Ads are the magic money fountain that give them the power to organize all of human knowledge, a phenomenal resource anyone can tap.

Ok, great, it provided incalculable value to the world. At what point do we decide it is just existing as a barnacle and pumping money into making billionaires richer? How do we move past Googles dominant position and reclaim that monetary stream for better causes? Like you said, it is incalculably valuable, kind of like you might consider some public services to be.

Re: Advertising Is a Cancer on Society

#50

Post by sjh » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 7:32 PM UTC

I recall watching, some years ago, a documentary about the making of Tetris in which one of the contributors noted how much less colourful public spaces were in the advertising-free Soviet Union compared to the West.

Which isn't to say that a better balance couldn't be struck (in the West and elsewhere) now, but 'cancer' is the sort of thing you want to eradicate rather than moderate.