141–150 of 292 posts
I have long predicted this outcome and always thought I was being a bit too realistic. It's nice to see someone else making the same forecast.
Of course, only time will tell.
The correct answer is to never use programmatic ads. Ever. If you own a site, just curate a set of ads on your site that actually enhances your sites appeal. A fashion site should have matching fashion ads. A tech site should have matching tech ads. A local site should have matching local ads. Reach out to advertisers to get these ads. Never use an algorithm. You, as an editor, should be better than the algorithms. A…
Intent-driven ads are far more relevant to a site's audience than hand-picked, static ones. They have much higher CTR and conversion rates, when done right. You're asking sites to remove sources of income that people find relevant in exchange for ads that some higher up in marketing thinks relates to its users. Not all publishers subscribe to the low quality Google AdExchange. In fact, they typically have a variety o…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
My current setup blocks almost all ads by simply blocking trackers. It's ridiculous, really, since there is no targeted adblocking going on. The only ads I see are native ones like you describe, and they're usually actually useful.
What blocker are you using, and what config?
The correct answer is to never use programmatic ads. Ever. If you own a site, just curate a set of ads on your site that actually enhances your sites appeal. A fashion site should have matching fashion ads. A tech site should have matching tech ads. A local site should have matching local ads. Reach out to advertisers to get these ads. Never use an algorithm. You, as an editor, should be better than the algorithms. A…
> The correct answer is to never Ah sweet, it's that one commenter who can prescribe the absolute correct answer to very complex situations with a couple of simple platitudes! Since you seem to be in a mood to drop the correct answer, maybe you can help me with some difficult decisions I'm facing: what programming language should I use? what should the next move of my business be? is she really the one, or should I m…
>what programming language should I use?
Haskell.
>what should the next move of my business be?
If you're not in a Series C, growth hack; if you've done your Series C, look into the Caymans.
>is she really the one, or should I move on?
Have a divorce attorney on retainer, be ready to delete your Facebook account at a moment's notice, and ideally start going to the gym now, but with those preparations in mind pursue her as if she's the one.
>Regardless of how good your advice is, proscribing a thing for every possible complex situation with the wave of a hand is disingenuous at best and dangerous at worst.
This isn't a question and I don't understand how to respond to it.
I know HN is pedantic about original titles, but shitty ones like this are better to be edited.
Ok, this is a fantastic piece that says a lot of useful and thoughtful things, some of them critical about the priorities of the SF startup scene. And what are a nontrivial portion of the HN comments doing? Complaining that he was unfair to Elon freaking Musk!! This is exactly the sort of techno-douchebaggery that the author is writing about, so way to prove his point, nimrods. The one redeeming quality of such comme…
It's easier to call out the author on a nitpick than to thoughtfully refute his arguments for the sake of racking up more imaginary internet points.
One way to stop this would be to have people who post low-value high-expected-karma-yield posts get randomly banned. This would function as a variable punishment and should be quite effective at training HN users.
Thank you for this talk. Especially the part about fighting against the tobacco industry. It really made me realize that this is a fight that can be won. I honestly thought this was a lost battle. It will, however, be a more subtle battle as the advertising industry (Big Ads ?) cannot be linked to something as clearly detremental as lung cancer and will be quick to point out that the technology developped can help fi…
I guess my reluctance to raise any hopes here is caused by two things;
a) Unless I'm missing a trick this is a legislative issue, and fighting for privacy isn't on the political agenda (except maybe in Iceland because those folks are phenomenal). What's more, until the ERMAGHERD TERRRRRSM narrative changes it won't get a look in, and even then you'd need to get enough people interested in privacy to make it a fair fight against all the lobby groups who'd want to shut you down.
b) Some of these proposals seem overly privacy-centric to me, which I guess is fair in the early stages of an idea, but it makes me worry that it won't be taken any further. The example that comes to my mind is limiting behavioural data to 90 days. Some insights from behavioural data might take a year or more to come to light. While as a consumer I might shrug at 90 days, as someone trying to understand how people use new types of products I personally would push back against that as being unreasonable (and a hinderance to innnovation).
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> We should just spend that money on like... I dunno. Better park benches or something. That'll solve everything. How about ending hunger worldwide? It's mostly a distribution problem nowadays. Or what about providing things like sanitation, electricity or some form of education for each and everyone on this planet? I guess what I want to say is that there are much, much more elemental things to spend your money on t…
>How about ending hunger worldwide? It's mostly a distribution problem nowadays. It's also incentives problem if you are not all in communist. If you simply send food from Europe to Africa, it disincentives food production in Africa. Which causes unemployment and hinders economic growth with it. And it also causes huge security of supply problem and might cause starvation if something happens to the shipping. My best…
That's already happening.
http://www.ipsnews.net/2007/06/africa-food-for-12-billion-so...
> Jean Ziegler, U.N. special rapporteur on the right to food, alerted the more than 500 delegates that while 854 million people went without food in the world last year, enough food was produced to feed 12 billion people. "This is why a child that dies from famine is murder," Ziegler said.
> Food is being over-produced in industrialised countries where some 349 billion dollars have been spent on agricultural subsidies for a minority of people. Only 2.5 percent of the French and 4.9 percent of the Swiss population are farmers, said Ziegler.
> "You can go to the Dakar market (in Senegal) and find Spanish, French, German and Italian fruit and vegetables at half or one-third of the local prices. The African farmers work 15 hours a day but they cannot compete with subsidies. This is systematically destroying Africa's agriculture," he pointed out.
> "Nothing is being done about the dumping policy. The Third World is feeding us (Europeans). That is what is keeping this system in place."
> Ziegler called the International Monetary Fund (IMF) the "mercenary organisation of the financial oligarchies that dominate the world".
http://www.theguardian.com/world/poverty-matters/2012/oct/05...
> Löpfe: Why is it that Africa is the continent where most people starve and which imports more than a quarter of its food supply?
> Ziegler: Because the colonial pact is still enforced.
> Löpfe: Isn't this a bit too simple? Colonialism has been over for more than half a century.
> Ziegler: But there still is a small upper class, dependent on rich countries, and extremely corrupt. Again Senegal: The country exports peanuts and at the same time imports three quarters of its food requirements.
> Löpfe: Why?
Ziegler: Because the colonial pact was never broken. The Senegalese farmers are forced to grow and exports peanuts because the revenue serves to pay for foreign debt. At the same time, Europe sells its food surplus at dumping prices on the African markets. How can a small farmer survive under these conditions?
> Löpfe: African farmers are not very productive. Their productivity is less than 10 percent of Europe's agriculture. Are they not just lazy?
> Ziegler: On the contrary. Nobody works harder than farmers in Africa. They just cannot thrive because they are not supported: no irrigation, no seed, no draft animals, no tractors, no fertilizer, nothing.