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Our approach to advertising

openai.com

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Re: Our approach to advertising

#181

Post by fragmede »

falloutx wrote: post #179
Anon1096 wrote: post #166

Interesting that OpenAI is trying to hammer the point that they won't sell user data to advertisers. That's how all the major ads platforms work. I don't personally agree that it constitutes "selling your data" but certainly people describe it that way for Google/Meta ads which function the same way. By framing it this way they're clearly trying to fool users who really bought into the messaging that Google et al lit…

I refuse to believe OpenAI wont sell the data. They will add the ads then couple days later you will "Change to our privacy policy". Thats how every company did it.

Neither Google nor Facebook sell the data. Why would OpenAI?

Re: Our approach to advertising

#182

Post by observationist »

ed_mercer wrote: post #173

Lots of negative comments here. OpenAI has to make a move, they are not profitable and have massive costs and debt. I think this one of the least bad moves, given all data that they have on users. They could have monetized their data so much more, and sooner.

I think it's damning that they possibly have the most advanced AI on the planet right now, unfiltered, no guard rails, and as much compute as they could possibly want for deep reasoning and inference, and despite that, the best move they could make was enshittification.

I've been bullish for OpenAI, but that's starting to fade. Sama is a master of the artful dodge, though, so it'll be interesting to see what happens. Between the burn rate and the lawsuits and the need for more compute, there's a ton of pressure on them right now.

Re: Our approach to advertising

#183

Post by charcircuit »

neumann wrote: post #157
charcircuit wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It doesn't know what it's about. It just knows that their product was relevant to it. I don't think this is a big deal. It's like saying that if a user downloads a gacha game, then the game studio learns that the user is likely interested in gacha games. Learning that a user was talking about gacha games with ChatGPT does not really give any additional information.

Approach it from the other angle - what scenario would it be bad in. It's not hard to see very real possibilities in the short term where it does matter: A 16yro looks up on chatGPT how she can check discreetly whether she is pregnant or not and what potential avenues she has. The advertiser could literally by anyone targeting pregnancies, including government or action groups who now have some information about that…

You don't need ChatGPT to know that someone buying a pregnancy kit from you has an above average chance to be pregnant.

Re: Our approach to advertising

#184

Post by johannesrexx »

jonplackett wrote: post #160
rpdillon wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Came here to mention this. > Ads are always separate and clearly labeled. Indeed. Let's look at Google's launch of Adwords in October 2000: > Google’s quick-loading AdWords text ads appear to the right of the Google search results and are highlighted as sponsored links, clearly separate from the search results. https://googlepress.blogspot.com/2000/10/google-launches-sel... Things evolved from there, and that's likel…

Google also famously intent Isla made their search engine _worse_ so you have to look through more results, and then see more ads. The enshitificstion begins. The only saving grace is the promise to have an ad-free tier. If something is valuable to you, paying for it to not have ads is very reasonable.

The [enshittification](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enshittification) begins.

Fixed that for you, and I agree fully with that assessment.

Re: Our approach to advertising

#185

Post by usef- »

personjerry wrote: post #87
wrs wrote: post #19

This sounds exactly like what Google used to say about search results. Just a few ads, clearly separated from organic results, never detracting from the core mission of providing the most effective access to all the world’s information. (And certainly not driven by a secret profile of you based on pervasive surveillance of your internet activity.)

(In)famously, Google's motto used to be "Don't be evil" Scary to think about, if moving away from "Don't be evil" is the precedent for an "AGI company"

Are you defining "evil" as "has an ad-supported product"?

In every tech generation, for good or bad, mainstream consumers choose the ad-based product over the paid product.

So every company that wants scale in the long-term ends up adopting an ad-based free tier to avoid becoming niche, it seems. Even the majority of HN users now appear to use gmail despite paid email hosts being incredibly cheap.

Edit: Not sure why the downvotes. Would you prefer that OpenAI leaves Google (who is ad-supported) to win the general public? I'm saying the above as someone who does purchase the ad-free plan when available, and uses paid email.

Re: Our approach to advertising

#186

Post by tomnipotent »

falloutx wrote: post #174
rm445 wrote: post #162

People are reacting negatively to the ads, but there's a bigger point. This is bearish as heck for AGI. If OpenAI were recursively improving their general-computer-using agent, who was going to be superhuman at every job, they wouldn't need to be messing around with things like this. ChatGPT is a useful product, which they're monetising in a well-travelled internet company way. The bad news is you're going to have ad…

$20/month product with ads, you would have to be an exec to think thats a good idea. Can they even push enough ads to ever make profit? Like the best care scenario for openAi at this point is to declare bankruptcy.

Except the existing $20 plan isn't getting ads.

Re: Our approach to advertising

#187

Post by lelandbatey »

asdff wrote: post #163
rm445 wrote: post #162

People are reacting negatively to the ads, but there's a bigger point. This is bearish as heck for AGI. If OpenAI were recursively improving their general-computer-using agent, who was going to be superhuman at every job, they wouldn't need to be messing around with things like this. ChatGPT is a useful product, which they're monetising in a well-travelled internet company way. The bad news is you're going to have ad…

They don't need AGI to fire you or not make jobs you would have taken. All these pro ai devs on here talking about 10x productivity gains in their own work like management isn't looking at those claims and thinking about a 10x reduction in headcount.

Sure, but any competitor is looking at their competition maintaining level productivity w/ 10x headcount reductions and wondering "if I use AI and the staff I have without firing them, I can provide 10x the product as the idiot cutting off their own nose over there."

Re: Our approach to advertising

#189

Post by schmichael »

falloutx wrote: post #174
rm445 wrote: post #162

People are reacting negatively to the ads, but there's a bigger point. This is bearish as heck for AGI. If OpenAI were recursively improving their general-computer-using agent, who was going to be superhuman at every job, they wouldn't need to be messing around with things like this. ChatGPT is a useful product, which they're monetising in a well-travelled internet company way. The bad news is you're going to have ad…

$20/month product with ads, you would have to be an exec to think thats a good idea. Can they even push enough ads to ever make profit? Like the best care scenario for openAi at this point is to declare bankruptcy.

> $20/month product with ads

That's a Netflix + Hulu subscription - with ads in both. Before streaming people regularly paid $50/mo (not adjusted for inflation) for cable TV with ads.

While it's easy to bemoan Google pushing ads into every corner of our digital lives, I think they arguably offered an unprecedented level of services relative to the number of ads, and we all got used to that.

Now whether OpenAI could ever push enough ads to make a profit: I have no idea! It's very interesting to see this race actually start.

Re: Our approach to advertising

#190

Post by kyboren »

Anon1096 wrote: post #166

Interesting that OpenAI is trying to hammer the point that they won't sell user data to advertisers. That's how all the major ads platforms work. I don't personally agree that it constitutes "selling your data" but certainly people describe it that way for Google/Meta ads which function the same way. By framing it this way they're clearly trying to fool users who really bought into the messaging that Google et al lit…

It's true. They don't sell your data. They just use your data to help pimp you out to advertiser Johns.

   Bitch, where's my money?
- sama
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