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The correct amount of ads is zero

manuelmoreale.com

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Re: The correct amount of ads is zero

#411

Post by alexvitkov »

shortformblog wrote: post #265

Stances like this probably feel good to write out, but they miss the reality that when running a media business, relying on one revenue stream is dangerous. That’s why newspapers had classified ads, even though they charged a nominal fee to subscribe. People won’t pay $5 a day to subscribe to a newspaper, but the ads subsidize enough of it to make it so that a paid subscription is accessible to more people. On the in…

This really doesn't add up to me. I don't have the numbers, but I would assume that:

1. A very small percentage of website visitors will end up paying for a subscription.

2. They make way less than $5 per user per month from ads.

The money they'd lose by providing an ad-free experience to paying customers should be a rounding error. Removing ads will also increase conversion, but who knows whether or not that will be enough to offset the revenue lost.

I don't particularly care about their "business reality" - if you're an online news outlet you're not paying the costs of printing and distribution - your expenses are just journalist salaries and the marginal costs of keeping a website running. If you need to charge anything close to $5 per user per day to keep such an operation running, you should be out of business.

Re: The correct amount of ads is zero

#412

Post by blibble »

racecar789 wrote: post #99
jillesvangurp wrote: post #44

It's why I use Firefox and avoid situations where I might get exposed to annoying ads. I was watching some Amazon Prime recently (the new rings of power season). Pretty OK and completely ad free experience. Except I noticed these weird cuts every few minutes. It took me quite a while to realize that Amazon introduced ads some time ago for Amazon prime and uBlock origin was doing a great job of simply blocking them. H…

I would pay for YouTube premium if you can afford it. The cost is pretty reasonable and 55% of the subscription goes to content creators. It's not a huge amount but probably similar to what a creator would make if ads were shown.

so that's a 45% cut for Google

makes the widely hated app store look generous by comparison

Re: The correct amount of ads is zero

#413

Post by bogwog »

HeatrayEnjoyer wrote: post #121

Advertising is fundamentally corrosive to society and should be outlawed with few and carefully tailored exceptions. Any business models that consequently fail, fail because their externalities to collective society are now priced in.

I hate the modern advertising ecosystem, but ads themselves are not evil. We're just in a place where there is no limit to the what/when/where/how many. Without advertising, it would be really difficult to run a business.

Back when Google was great, they kind of acted as an advertising police on the entire internet, keeping ads unobtrusive and negatively ranking sites with bad user experiences. That system worked pretty well back in the day (although definitely not perfect), and I think it gives a good model to start from if we as a society ever decide to try and fix this hellscape we're living in.

Re: The correct amount of ads is zero

#414

Post by 93po »

Aerroon wrote: post #125
HeatrayEnjoyer wrote: post #121

Advertising is fundamentally corrosive to society and should be outlawed with few and carefully tailored exceptions. Any business models that consequently fail, fail because their externalities to collective society are now priced in.

You will just get other kinds of advertisement. Ads that are technically not ads. Things like product placements, free promotions, word of mouth campaigns etc.

we already have laws that make it illegal to accept money for certain circumstances, e.g. sex, bribery, extortion. Just make it illegal to accept money to promote products. I say this not because I think it's illegal but rather to challenge the status quo - i don't think there's a reason we couldn't do this other than humans being fragile and inflexible

Re: The correct amount of ads is zero

#415

Post by benj111 »

xixixao wrote: post #322
bambax wrote: post #316

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Okay, and probably true, but the difference with newspaper is, it would be prohibitively expensive to produce different versions of the same newspaper for different subscription options, while it's trivial to do on the web. Why not offer an ad-free tier?

The richest people, hence the most valuable for advertisers, would buy it. This significantly affects the whole ad business value. Such that the ad-free tier would have to be priced too high. It’s more profitable to “force” everyone to watch ads. I’m afraid.

Reverse (Dutch?) Ad sense.

You compete with advertisers not to receive ads.

If youre wiling to spend 1 galactic credit to not see an ad, and advertiser must spend 1.01GC to show it to you.

Whether this work, only hinges on the question of whether we are already in the situation of having the maximum number of ads served to us, that it is possible to.

Re: The correct amount of ads is zero

#416

Post by benj111 »

ToucanLoucan wrote: post #351
eterevsky wrote: post #345

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is always possible to have several tiers of subscriptions, a cheap tier with some additional feature and ads, and a higher tier with no ads at all. I am perfectly willing to pay extra to support a website or service that I'm using, but only if it removes all ads.

The problem is: advertisers will argue that if you're offering a tier of service that removes ads, that's specifically going to be the most appealing to the group of your user-base that has the most money to spend and whom is most ready to spend it, evidenced by the fact that they have subscribed to your ad-free tier, and is therefore worth the most in terms of reaching with ads. Those people are self-selecting as th…

Surely in this reverse Catch-22 hypothetical anyone who is willing to pay to escape ads is therefore worth more, so they would need to be served fewer ads for the same income.

So the subscription should be free. And with less ads.

Re: The correct amount of ads is zero

#418

Post by pythonguython »

refulgentis wrote: post #143
HeatrayEnjoyer wrote: post #121

Advertising is fundamentally corrosive to society and should be outlawed with few and carefully tailored exceptions. Any business models that consequently fail, fail because their externalities to collective society are now priced in.

> Advertising is fundamentally corrosive to society Interesting, why?

Noam Chomksy’s critique is that the advertising industry’s main goal is to ensure that uninformed consumers make irrational choices. Essentially it undermines the market, due to the fact that in theory markets are efficient when people make rational decisions. Subject to advertising, people may pay more for a lesser quality product.

Re: The correct amount of ads is zero

#419

Post by knorker »

bogwog wrote: post #404
shortformblog wrote: post #265

Stances like this probably feel good to write out, but they miss the reality that when running a media business, relying on one revenue stream is dangerous. That’s why newspapers had classified ads, even though they charged a nominal fee to subscribe. People won’t pay $5 a day to subscribe to a newspaper, but the ads subsidize enough of it to make it so that a paid subscription is accessible to more people. On the in…

> miss the reality that when running a media business, relying on one revenue stream is dangerous. Why would I, as a consumer, compromise on what I want to make some MBA's life easier? That almost sounds like corporate welfare. Businesses sign up to take risks the moment they're created. A news organization doesn't need to be in business. There is nothing unjust or morally wrong with letting a business shutdown becau…

Voting with our wallets got us infowars and two major fake news groups of media (mainstream and not).

Why should you want some MBA's life to be easy? So that it's feasible to keep producing what you actually want.

I just wish it were possible to pay $1 for an article whose headline sounds interesting, or someone recommended. Subscribe, even with a free trial? Pass.

The free market is great. But we should not deny it when it leads to bad outcomes. If we do, then we're no better than those who say "real communism has never been tried".

Re: The correct amount of ads is zero

#420

Post by [deleted] »

bogwog wrote: post #404
shortformblog wrote: post #265

Stances like this probably feel good to write out, but they miss the reality that when running a media business, relying on one revenue stream is dangerous. That’s why newspapers had classified ads, even though they charged a nominal fee to subscribe. People won’t pay $5 a day to subscribe to a newspaper, but the ads subsidize enough of it to make it so that a paid subscription is accessible to more people. On the in…

> miss the reality that when running a media business, relying on one revenue stream is dangerous. Why would I, as a consumer, compromise on what I want to make some MBA's life easier? That almost sounds like corporate welfare. Businesses sign up to take risks the moment they're created. A news organization doesn't need to be in business. There is nothing unjust or morally wrong with letting a business shutdown becau…

[deleted]
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