The average cost for displaying and ad is 0.005$. I am assuming that 30% of that goes to publisher. Would you pay 0.005*0.3 = 0.0015$ per page view? I would.
The ethics of modern web ad-blocking
71–80 of 249 posts
Re: The ethics of modern web ad-blocking
#72A good writeup, though I don't agree with the statement about web devs and browser makers -- we read the web too, perhaps more than anyone! :)
It's possible to want to make the platform more powerful and not like some of the ways the power is being used.
Re: The ethics of modern web ad-blocking
#73What I really can't understand, that permeates this whole discussion, is plenty of people that try to sell the idea that ads let us have content "for free", and that all we have to tolerate is "a little annoyance". It's insane. If companies are buying ad-space, it's because they expect to get more business in return. This means that someone out there is being influenced by said ads, so that if the content cost X to p…
>If these costs are being borne evenly, then it's complete societal waste. We could pay X for the content, and not incur the overhead. If these costs are not borne evenly, and some people are paying for the consumption of more disciplined people, it's probably contributing to terrible cycles of poverty (ie: some kid spending money on fancy new shoes he doesn't need and can't afford is paying for a well-paid tech-user…
Essentially, advertising is useful when you need to tell people about a new product or service. Beyond that, it's playing a game. Once people know a service exists and have been accurately informed as to its benefits, then for the most part, people will use it if they need it and spread it by word of mouth if its useful for other people (and/or they had a good experience).
Advertising beyond that mostly serves to solidify brand integrity and trust and ways to undercut competitors and is an ever growing conflagration of an arms race. It has little to do with the interests of the public.
Re: The ethics of modern web ad-blocking
#74In my book, it's no longer a question of ethics, at least not directly. Way back when, we all agreed that if I look at some ads, a web site will let me view some content. Fair enough, it's a proven model and though I might not particularly like advertising, I'll trade some eyeballs for some content. Way back when, maybe it _was_ a question of ethics. But not anymore.
What "we" didn't agree to was being tracked all over the web, malware being shoved down the pipe via ads, ignoring "do not track", and all of the other nefarious things ad networks have been trying to get away with. Ethics have gone out the window, if ethics ever existed on the side of advertisers. So I run an ad blocker, and I make no apologies for doing so.
"What about the little guy who pays for hosting with ads?" You mean the "little guy" who has to scrape couch change to pay for the site that contains his latest post about artisanal mayonnaise and her latest gadget acquisition? Yeah, that $100/year for hosting is really going to break her, might not be able to get next year's Apple Watch on release day.
The big boys and girls like The Verge and what have you? Well, using The Verge as an example, they could go under tomorrow and IMO the world would be no poorer, given that they've kind of turned to poo in recent days. I blame the web advertising model for part of their deterioration, but that's a long digression. Specific examples aside, what about the sites I like? I pay money to the sites I like, specifically Ars Technica, NYT, and the Economist (and some others I'm sure I've forgotten about). Some, like Daring Fireball, use unobtrusive, single-image ads that I'll occasionally click on because they interest me, as well as a desire to reward a job well done.
But at the end of the day, the whole thing isn't my problem. If a few bad actors (or, in reality, a lot of bad actors) want to crawl into my machine and have their way, I'm blocking all of them. If there's collatoral damage because of some bad actors, it's not my job to fix it. I did my part and said, "no, you don't". Don't lay the onus on me to play nice, because you're berating the wrong party.
Re: The ethics of modern web ad-blocking
#75How come everyone is using the closed-source, ad-network friendly Ghostery instead of the open-source https://disconnect.me/ ?
Because actually stopping tracking requires premium (paid) version? Or because mobile version is not a browser plugin, but virtual vpn, so it doesn't work with your real vpn?
The Disconnect website says that the free version "[blocks] malware & tracking (Desktop only)".
Re: The ethics of modern web ad-blocking
#76What I really can't understand, that permeates this whole discussion, is plenty of people that try to sell the idea that ads let us have content "for free", and that all we have to tolerate is "a little annoyance". It's insane. If companies are buying ad-space, it's because they expect to get more business in return. This means that someone out there is being influenced by said ads, so that if the content cost X to p…
> If these costs are being borne evenly, then it's complete societal waste. That doesn't make sense. You are saying because User reads Content, Advertiser pays Content, and User pays Advertiser, that the middle step of Advertiser paying Content is unnecessary, because User could pay Content. Simple counterexample: I like reading techcrunch, but would never pay for it. But I might see an ad for a new device that I lik…
See, I really like markets, and I have a problem with phrases like:
> I like reading techcrunch, but would never pay for it.
Sounds to me a lot like Mitt Romney talking about how his wife has the most important job in the world, but she's essentially his unpaid housewife. Sounds hollow.
You are paying for techcrunch, by buying products advertised on it. It would be good for the finances of everyone in society to know exactly how much. If the product company could slice prices in half because their arms-race marketing budget is soaring, maybe you'd change your mind and pay techcrunch directly, so that you, techcrunch, and the R&D department of the product benefit, while marketing stops soaking up a large chunk of the money exchanged.
Re: The ethics of modern web ad-blocking
#77people aren’t agreeing to write a blank check and give up reasonable expectations of privacy by clicking a link. They can’t even know what the cost of visiting a page will be until they’ve already visited it and paid the price. This is the crucial point to me. How can I agree to a website's trackers before I know they exist?
This is also what the much-maligned EU cookiewall was intended to address: you inform visitors about your tracking /before/ you start tracking them.
Though I don't know at which stage that incentive was bungled (other than: "doomed from the start, because people").
Re: The ethics of modern web ad-blocking
#78I wonder, what opponents of ad-blocking think about email spam? Is it different if spam ads are injected by email client? (some email and even messaging apps do this -- not to the actual mailbox, of course, but to the displayed inbox contents)
Re: The ethics of modern web ad-blocking
#79Earlier quoted context omitted.
> If these costs are being borne evenly, then it's complete societal waste. That doesn't make sense. You are saying because User reads Content, Advertiser pays Content, and User pays Advertiser, that the middle step of Advertiser paying Content is unnecessary, because User could pay Content. Simple counterexample: I like reading techcrunch, but would never pay for it. But I might see an ad for a new device that I lik…
In your example, there are two possibilities: either you did want and need to buy the product before the advertisement or you didn't. In the first case, the advertisement was wasteful: the company that sold you the product has unnecessarily spent money, which goes to the product price. And this is not a small amount: big consumer companies spend billions on advertisement space/time alone, an amount comparable to thei…
He might have had the need before seeing the ad but hadn't seen a solution.
Adverts are at their basic level a way of informing end users about what they can purchase. They are also there to try and raise brand awareness. People are more likely to trust a brand that they have heard of rather than some unknown.
Re: The ethics of modern web ad-blocking
#80I used to use ad-block and later disabled it to support websites that generate good content, but now I'm going back. What's driven me back to ad-blocking software is that ad tracking makes it nearly impossible to buy gifts for a spouse. If I want to buy my wife a pair of sunglasses and google "Ray Ban sunglasses", guess what she starts seeing ads for all over the web. We noticed this a while back and would do gift sh…
Do you have separate (client- and server-side) user accounts or browser profiles?
We use completely different accounts on completely different computers.