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Meta projected 10% of 2024 revenue came from scams

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Re: Meta projected 10% of 2024 revenue came from scams

#441

Post by bluGill »

carlosjobim wrote: post #423
terminalshort wrote: post #399

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I understand that impact calculation for ads is, at best, an inexact science. But I refuse to believe that businesses spend hundreds of billions of dollars on ads every year for absolutely no gain. That's chips in the vaccine level conspiratorial thinking.

Go talk to any small business owner of your choosing. When they have a slow day and nothing to do they like to chip in a few hundred dollars into the Meta casino. Since you can tweak endless parameters on which people will see the ads, you can always spend more until you find your winning number, like on the horse race track or in the lottery.

I was talking about large business which should track this. Small do gamble on hope like that.

Re: Meta projected 10% of 2024 revenue came from scams

#442

Post by getnormality »

ryandrake wrote: post #282
getnormality wrote: post #11

As my children become old enough to have more unfettered internet access, I plan to tell them the lessons of my experience: that all online ads are for products that range from disappointing to fraudulent, so do your best to completely ignore them. I would hope that every parent does the same and we end up with a generation that dries up the revenue for this sick racket. I suppose the next move by advertisers will be…

I think even more general lessons are appropriate: "Anyone approaching you trying to sell you something, is selling garbage." which includes ads but also other forms of unsolicited commercial communication. Or "Anyone approaching you, when you can't figure out what it is they want, is likely trying to sell you garbage." You need to have your shields way up these days.

I have never forgotten this since the day I naively sat through a meandering two hour pitch from hell for James Hardie siding.

Honestly, in every area of my life where I have to rely on others, someone has tried to grift me at least once. And that's only the cases where I have definitive evidence.

Re: Meta projected 10% of 2024 revenue came from scams

#443

Post by mrguyorama »

GuinansEyebrows wrote: post #324
random9749832 wrote: post #272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Supplements industry? I only take whey protein and creatine from known sources. Anything on this?

i think they're talking about Hims-type businesses and the type of stuff that makes low/mid-level right-wing grifters their money: colloidal silver, methylene blue, anything else Alex Jones is hawking. maybe you could group Tucker Carlson's Nicotine Pouches For Christian Nationalists in there too, idk.

Guys they are putting chemicals in the water that make frogs gay!!!!

Anyway you should buy my bottle of research chemicals that will make your balls bigger. Evidence? What are you, the Illuminati?

Also check out this hat purported to protect your head from electromagnetic radiation even though it is shaped exactly like a lens pointed directly at your brain.

Don't forget to harass random telecom repairman about how dangerous 5G is! We will be talking all about it on our app you can buy so you can watch us anywhere!

I just... I just don't understand. There are people who seem to have near infinite credulity, at least for the "right" people.

At least something like "Miracle Mineral Solution" had a partially fake "study" where they actually gave people a harmful thing to drink just to say they did.

That guy from FoldingIdeas had a comment that resonates with me: There are people who trust something implicitly entirely because an actual authority told them not to trust it. "They believe the fake facebook story because facebook told them it was fake". But even those people are still demonstrably unable to connect past actions to current results to a point that I'm not sure how they trust that breathing is required for being alive.

Like there's so much about reality that is so simple and clear and demonstrable, and they just don't seem to be at all capable of squaring even those simple facts... No, crystals can't do shit. No "vibrations" just aren't a thing. These people live in a different reality than I do, but I don't understand how they can look around them and match that to the reality they have been sold. Those pills haven't made you any fucking smarter! Haven't you noticed?!

Like even Joe Rogan told Matt Walsh "Hey, you are wrong, there's really only a few thousand sex change operations a year" instead of the millions Walsh claimed and he just said "I don't believe that" and I'm like what the hell buddy do some basic math how many people do you know that got a sex change operation last year?

Re: Meta projected 10% of 2024 revenue came from scams

#444

Post by random9749832 »

mrguyorama wrote: post #435
random9749832 wrote: post #272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Supplements industry? I only take whey protein and creatine from known sources. Anything on this?

Creatine is the closest the supplements industry has ever gotten to actually producing something that helps people. If you are physically active, you could probably see minor benefits from it. If you eat an American diet, you do not need protein supplements. You do not need the absurd amount of protein per day that mens health influencers insist, and they usually push you pretty close to the actual danger zone, and i…

I do weightlifting so taking 1.5-2 grams * bodyweight of protein makes sense. I am not American but a lot of it just looks like sodium, carbs, sugar and fat rather than lean meat.

Re: Meta projected 10% of 2024 revenue came from scams

#446

Post by ChrisMarshallNY »

cj wrote: post #42
fouronnes3 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see how the yearly tech support I do with my parents at Christmas will not one day converge to an outright ban of the internet. I am now demoing the level of sofistication of AI powered scams, telling them that it is now entirely possible they will get a VIDEO CALL from me that's not actually me asking for God knows what in a very convincing way using my face and voice. I am scared and this close to setting u…

My guess is the already-existing trend towards walled gardens will simply continue. When a public space is dangerous, people retreat into "safe" enclosed spaces. - "Never download anything unless it's from the Apple App Store" - "Never buy anything unless you're on amazon.com" - "Dont use the internet outside of ChatGPT"

> "Never buy anything unless you're on amazon.com"

Too late for that one. I have been scammed a few times from Amazon sellers.

Re: Meta projected 10% of 2024 revenue came from scams

#447

Post by Workaccount2 »

reaperducer wrote: post #338
Workaccount2 wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's because google has no profile on you, likely because you block all tracking. Which is fine, but at least understand that it's not the norm. Normal non-tech users (from watching youtube at friends houses or at my parents), mostly get ads for fabric softener and cat litter.

If Google doesn't know what ad to show me, why not show no ad, instead of a scam? Does trillion-dollar Google desperately need the 3½¢ of revenue the scam ad generates?

It's not that Google doesn't know what to show you, it's that no advertiser outbids the scam ad for your 30 seconds of attention.

To put it another way, you have next to no value, and it's only by the goodwill of Google that they even let you on the platform.

Re: Meta projected 10% of 2024 revenue came from scams

#448

Post by terminalshort »

bluGill wrote: post #440
terminalshort wrote: post #406

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If this theory were true companies would see no revenue impact from ad buys on Meta. Then they would stop buying, and Meta would go out of business. You need to face the facts here that no matter how much you hate Meta, it isn't a scam.

Why do you think there is no revenue impact? I would assume there is. Companies should have a good idea how much. That is also why companies should care about scams - if ads on meta lose value they lose.

The comment I was replying to implied that targeted advertising is a scam that finds people who were going to buy anyway and then advertises to them. If that were true, there would be no revenue increase because all the customers would have bought anyway.

Re: Meta projected 10% of 2024 revenue came from scams

#449

Post by BLKNSLVR »

cryptoegorophy wrote: post #238
colechristensen wrote: post #232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I pay for YouTube so all I get is paid creator promotions for VPNs and Squarespace unless it's someone being sent a free thing in exchange for a review Normalize paying for things instead of selling your attention to the highest bidder.

Buying YouTube premium is the single best online decision one can make.

So, now we should all pay money to avoid being advertised scams?

That's a pretty good scam.

Re: Meta projected 10% of 2024 revenue came from scams

#450

Post by BLKNSLVR »

timpera wrote: post #18
cjonas wrote: post #8

At least 50% of the YouTube promoted videos I get are crypto currency scams where some paid actor walks you though deploying an eth contract that empties your wallet. I report every one and nothing changes :(

Same for me, and the worst thing is that they always take 3 days to review my report and delete the scam.

Ironically, one of the potentially greatest uses of AI, and it doesn't seem to be getting applied at all.
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