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Predicting OpenAI's ad strategy

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Re: Predicting OpenAI's ad strategy

#451

Post by 9rx »

metabagel wrote: post #217
csense wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Advertising spend being too high is a symptom of a supply glut. Too many products in the marketplace, not enough consumers to buy them. In a different world where there are higher wages, more people would have more spending power. Then companies wouldn't have to spend as many dollars on advertising, which they could split between higher wages, higher margins and lower prices. Alas, the short-term single-firm directio…

Stronger unions would help bring wages up.

That is an interesting chicken and egg problem. A strong union requires members who can demonstrate that prolonged work stoppages are a credible threat. If the employer thinks everyone will be starving and begging to come back after a week, the union has no power.

In other words, in order for a union to become strong, wages already need to be up to allow the workers to be able amass considerable savings to get them through the months and years when they aren't working. So higher wages have to come first. But to complicate matters, once workers have that, they often start to feel like they don't need a union.

The one time when unions did become strong, workers were so desperate for safer working conditions that potentially being thrown out on the street and left to starve was seen as a better option than being crushed by a machine. But the law now ensures that workers are just comfortable enough to prevent an uprising like that again.

Re: Predicting OpenAI's ad strategy

#452

Post by dyauspitr »

yoyohello13 wrote: post #187

The ad based business model is the most destructive technology of the new millennium. The whole point of advertising, to make people feel unsatisfied with their current life. The current state of the world makes perfect sense when you think of the last 20 years we've been cultivating fear, and dissatisfaction among the populace. All in the hopes of selling 0.1% more widgets.

Ads are what capitalism runs on. It would be next to impossible for a new business to get off the ground without ads.

Re: Predicting OpenAI's ad strategy

#454

Post by 9rx »

antisthenes wrote: post #306
sooheon wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is misuse of language. Rent seeking is anti-competitive by definition. The current system, as far as it encourages and rewards rent seeking, is anti-capitalist.

It isn't. Both perfectly competitive markets and monopolistic markets are part of the broad term capitalism. Capital consolidates over time and seeks to influence policy-makers to create anti-competitive regulations. Every single time.

Like most words, capitalism has multiple definitions. Among the popular ones, the one that is about capital doesn't concern itself with markets, only capital, so you are quite right that any kind of market goes. It could even be centrally planned! But another popular definition is about the "invisible hand". Rent seeking is absolutely considered to be at odds with the "invisible hand". This is most likely what the parent is talking about.

And no doubt there are a bunch of other definitions that aren't so popular, so the parent commenter could even be using one of those. It might even be his own pet definition that he just made up on the spot right now. The author always gets to choose what a word means, so if something seems off "It isn't" isn't a logical retort. You first need to clarify what the author intended the word to mean.

Re: Predicting OpenAI's ad strategy

#457

Post by mitthrowaway2 »

gruez wrote: post #291
sdenton4 wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is how we had a major boom in middle-class wealth int he US post WW2. If you are only selling coconuts, a single raw material, yes, you will run into supply constraints such that prices go up. But that isn't how economics works. Your zero-sum economics example is only applicable in short-term scenarios: over the longer term, new industries develop to solve persistent problems that people are willing to pay to so…

>This is how we had a major boom in middle-class wealth int he US post WW2. The fact that Europe got bombed no doubt helped too, same with the elites being concerned that communism was on the rise and giving workers a better deal in an effort to stave that off. >Your zero-sum economics example is only applicable in short-term scenarios: over the longer term, new industries develop to solve persistent problems that pe…

It's a frequent refrain, but I actually don't believe that blowing up European factories would really make Americans materially wealthier.

Re: Predicting OpenAI's ad strategy

#458

Post by yoyohello13 »

dyauspitr wrote: post #452
yoyohello13 wrote: post #187

The ad based business model is the most destructive technology of the new millennium. The whole point of advertising, to make people feel unsatisfied with their current life. The current state of the world makes perfect sense when you think of the last 20 years we've been cultivating fear, and dissatisfaction among the populace. All in the hopes of selling 0.1% more widgets.

Ads are what capitalism runs on. It would be next to impossible for a new business to get off the ground without ads.

I’m not really against ads. I think the problem is in the influencer style business model. People are making a living fighting to get clicks by driving negative emotions. That’s the problem. ‘Influencer’ should not be a legitimate job. There is definitely a way to allow business to advertise without the negative externalities. It just requires regulation, which is basically impossible in the modern political climate.

Re: Predicting OpenAI's ad strategy

#459

Post by mitthrowaway2 »

gruez wrote: post #287
tjr wrote: post #286

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the economy is 100% coconuts — all supply is coconuts, all demand is coconuts — then coconuts are all. Business owners sell coconuts in exchange for coconuts in order to acquire more coconuts. Employees are paid in coconuts which they trade for more coconuts. Paying workers more coconuts gives them more of what they want, which is coconuts, that they turn around and spend on coconuts.

That's exactly the problem. At the end of the day, unless you increase production of "stuff" (or coconuts), there isn't going to be magically more "stuff" (or coconuts) to go around just because people are shuffling "stuff" (or coconuts) around.

Not for coconuts, but in the real world, most products have economies of scale. If one rich guy has 99% of the money, the entire economy will be structured to serve his needs and yet nothing he buys will reach economies of scale. He just doesn't care to have that many Rolexes. So production methods will be fairly inefficient.

But if everyone has a bit of money, stuff can get mass produced, which actually makes for much greater total welfare, because the production methods are just a lot more efficient.

Re: Predicting OpenAI's ad strategy

#460

Post by bontaq »

littlecranky67 wrote: post #319

Ads will be no longer a buisness model in 3-5 years when simple, locally run models that do nothing besides blocking ads become available. Twitter, Facebook etc. already get past most modern adblockers, but the AI extension will be able to filter them. In-text advertising must be marked as advertisment in most countries, and even if it isn't, local AI will filter this probably out. So a free ChatGPT service with in-t…

More than an extension, imagine us having good enough, fast enough, vision models that you never even see a real website. Maybe the whole OS in Microsoft's case if they keep putting more ads in. It will be a level of inefficiency inconceivable but really something.
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