Why don't we just ban advertising?
I don't see how that would be possible.
There are effective bans on advertising for certain products, e.g. cigarettes, in large parts of the globe.
Why Don’t We Just Ban Targeted Advertising?
11–20 of 188 posts
Re: Why Don’t We Just Ban Targeted Advertising?
#12The argument for massive Pigouvian taxes on advertising seems much clearer. Advertising imposes massive costs on society and the viewers. These costs aren't borne by the advertiser, so they should be captured through massive taxes and put to good use.
And many brands wouldn't feel much of an impact: what matters to Coke is that it spends more than Pepsi. If their $6B on advertising only buys 1/10th as many ads as it used to it still has the same impact because they still have twice as many ads as Pepsi does.
Re: Why Don’t We Just Ban Targeted Advertising?
#13I'm all for it. Remember that days when a fishing website hat a ad banner for a fishing related website - that's still targetet enough on my watch.
Yeah our societies functioned for centuries without targeted ads, and we can do it again. It's only the past decade or two that we've had targeted ads. I think you could compare targeted ads to selling drugs: there's clearly a market for it and it will sustain many peoples' livelihoods, but as a society we've seen the ill effects of letting them run rampant and decided we're better off highly regulating them. It's ti…
We've had targeting for at least as long as we've had publications with different subscriber bases. Do you think there are the same ads in Wired magazine, Sports Illustrated, and the Wall Street Journal?
And even just traditional local newspapers targeted based on locale and readership. The New York Post is going to have different advertising than The New York Times.
Re: Why Don’t We Just Ban Targeted Advertising?
#14Why don't we just ban advertising?
> Why don't we just ban advertising?
Newspapers would need to be subscription-only or patronage-based.
Distributors become kingmakers. If the incumbent's product is in the grocery stores and the upstart can't advertise, there's no path to entry apart from winning over a distributor.
Niche products become nonviable. If you can't reach out to your customers, they have to reach out to you. That requires they know (a) they have the problem you solve, (b) you exist and (c) you solve the problem they have. That only happens organically for problems with scale.
Re: Why Don’t We Just Ban Targeted Advertising?
#15How would such a law define targeted advertising? (Serious question.)
Any advertisement that is displayed/not displayed based on personal information of the potential viewer perhaps?
Re: Why Don’t We Just Ban Targeted Advertising?
#16Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah our societies functioned for centuries without targeted ads, and we can do it again. It's only the past decade or two that we've had targeted ads. I think you could compare targeted ads to selling drugs: there's clearly a market for it and it will sustain many peoples' livelihoods, but as a society we've seen the ill effects of letting them run rampant and decided we're better off highly regulating them. It's ti…
We've had targeting for at least as long as we've had publications with different subscriber bases. Do you think there are the same ads in Wired magazine, Sports Illustrated, and the Wall Street Journal? And even just traditional local newspapers targeted based on locale and readership. The New York Post is going to have different advertising than The New York Times.
When people say "targeted ads" these days, that's not what they're talking about. Perhaps it's a poor term. "Targeted ads" means ads that are targeted to a specific user, as opposed to a publication.
Re: Why Don’t We Just Ban Targeted Advertising?
#17I'm all for it. Remember that days when a fishing website hat a ad banner for a fishing related website - that's still targetet enough on my watch.
Yeah our societies functioned for centuries without targeted ads, and we can do it again. It's only the past decade or two that we've had targeted ads. I think you could compare targeted ads to selling drugs: there's clearly a market for it and it will sustain many peoples' livelihoods, but as a society we've seen the ill effects of letting them run rampant and decided we're better off highly regulating them. It's ti…
We also functioned for centuries without electricity, hot and cold running water, or good sanitation.
The fact that we functioned without something doesn't imply that we're better off without it.
Re: Why Don’t We Just Ban Targeted Advertising?
#18The images of Sao Paolo before and after banning billboards https://99percentinvisible.org/article/clean-city-law-secret... illustrate the difference in a different space.
Personally, I found the difference greater and more lovely than I expected and support reducing advertising. Other cities are doing it.
The parties that would suffer most are shareholders of companies that advertise products most people probably wouldn't want without all the advertising -- Coca-Cola, Gatorade, McDonald's, fast fashion, etc, generally multinationals. I imagine ones that would benefit: local businesses, vegetable and fruit farmers, manufacturers of lasting goods instead of fast fashion.
Re: Why Don’t We Just Ban Targeted Advertising?
#19We can’t even get Mickey Mouse out of copyright...
Re: Why Don’t We Just Ban Targeted Advertising?
#20Earlier quoted context omitted.
We've had targeting for at least as long as we've had publications with different subscriber bases. Do you think there are the same ads in Wired magazine, Sports Illustrated, and the Wall Street Journal? And even just traditional local newspapers targeted based on locale and readership. The New York Post is going to have different advertising than The New York Times.
When people say "targeted ads" these days, that's not what they're talking about. Perhaps it's a poor term. "Targeted ads" means ads that are targeted to a specific user, as opposed to a publication.
Yes, the tools are different and (very much in theory) more precisely targeted. But, at the end of the day, you're still mostly targeting populations based on their propensity to spend money with you. So you now target me with sports gear ads not just because I subscribe to Sports Illustrated but because I've bought sports gear and I'm in the Male 18-25 demographic.
I agree that attempts to target at an individual level feels different than just targeting a magazine's subscription base, but it's still targeting. So if someone wants to ban "targeting" they need to be more precise about what they're proposing to ban.