Comment by pembrook
2 months ago
Out of all of HN’s biases, the violent hatred of advertising is by far one of the most misguided.
Human attention is scarce. Demand for that attention is endless. Scarcity + demand creates a natural market by default, meaning you must use brutal authoritarianism to disrupt it entirely (vs just regulating with guardrails). Disrupting natural markets with authoritarianism usually ends up worse than any downsides of the decentralized market regulation of that scarcity. Instead of something that attempts to land on fairness (even if imperfect), no market at all guarantees unfairness.
Advertising puts a price on the scarce commodity of attention in broad strokes, and it not always, but generally trends toward making the highest value messages for both the audience and advertiser get seen over lower value messages in any given situation (because those are the ones that can afford the market clearing price on said advertising). I know, please respond with all of your “all these times it didn’t work like that!” throw-the-baby out-with-the-bathwater Anecdotes.
Like all markets, we should regulate advertising to ensure it doesn’t get out of control. But to ban it outright would require an extreme policing of all speech at all levels of society.
Hence why this is a non-serious, silly idea.
> natural market by default, meaning you must use brutal authoritarianism to disrupt it entirely
Ok? If that's how we define "brutal authoritarianism," I guess I'm a brutal authoritarian. There's a natural market for mob hitmen (scarce + in-demand)—are you opposed to a "brutal authoritarian" crackdown on those too?
> Disrupting natural markets with authoritarianism usually ends up worse than any downsides of the decentralized market regulation of that scarcity.
Citation very much needed. Suppliers of lead paint, asbestos, ozone-destroying aerosols, contaminated foodstuffs, etc. did not regulate themselves in a decentralized manner. In fact, take virtually any toxic contaminant or hazardous product and you'll usually find that the market colluded to cover up evidence of harm, rather than "self-regulating."
> generally trends toward making the highest value messages for both the audience and advertiser
Absolutely not. Consumers do not exert demand for certain types of ads in preference to others. There's no mechanism for ads to converge toward high audience value. It's advertiser value that is optimized for, often to the detriment of consumers (e.g. advertisements for profitable scams, which have negative value).
Even if you want to argue that advertisements inform consumers to some extent, that's probably outweighed by the extent that they misinform consumers. Consider infomercial products: Regular kitchen knives don't need an advertisement because demand is inelastic. If you're cooking, you need a knife; nobody has to promote the idea of knives. But the "slap-chop" is a product with elastic demand, and thus the marginal value of advertising is much greater for them. Hence, they can afford to buy up huge amounts of ad space to drum up demand for an essentially worthless product. The advertising ecosystem has perverse incentive to promote scams.
> But to ban it outright would require an extreme policing of all speech at all levels of society.
There are a lot of noxious and socially destructive things which are not practical to ban.
You've taken small snippets of my text and stood them up as lone straw-men to argue against, instead of arguing against my actual premise.
No, murder is not comparable to advertising. And no, not once did I ever say the phrase "self-regulating" nor did I argue against regulation of advertising.
Your fundamental belief (and the prevailing view on HN) that advertising is a scam and intended to "misinform" is incorrect. Apparently I need to say this again because it's hard to grasp the concept of nuance--Are some advertisements scams? Absolutely. The market is not perfectly efficient, but again, markets trend in the direction of efficiency over long periods.
Ultimately, the vast majority of advertisements you see are for the products that are the most desired by people, hence why they can profitably continue advertising over time.
Just because you aren't interested in the product, doesn't mean it's a scam . Enough people in the audience of whatever media you consume think otherwise, hence why the company is advertising there. Again, there are absolutely stupid companies wasting money on stupid ads, but they tend to get outcompeted by the smarter ones. I get it though, giving people you believe are less intelligent than you the freedom to make decisions is frustrating.
Even in your example of the slap-chop, which you say is a "worthless product," funny enough, I literally just used a similar product yesterday to dice a large amount of onions quickly. Guess I'm stupid and I need an authoritarian like you to tell me a smarter way to live.
Alternatively though, the idea that knife makers don't promote their products is just hilarious to me. The market for kitchen knives is extremely competitive and just because the advertising doesn't take the form of a 30 second TV spot from the 1990s doesn't mean they just throw their products on the market with zero promotion. How do you think certain brands even appear on the shelves of the stores you shop in? You're gonna hate this too...turns out shelf space is scarce so shelf space is a market as well, and it's more of an economic calculation than one of technical passion. Oh no not again!
> No, murder is not comparable to advertising.
Sure it is. You made a sweeping statement about services in a market; those are both services subject to market forces. You say (supposing for the sake of argument that advertising is as harmful as the article makes it out to be) that a ban would be unacceptably authoritarian and ineffective anyway. Well, we ban harmful things in the market all the time. Such as murder.
> not once did I ever say the phrase "self-regulating"
No, you said the phrase "decentralized market regulation," which means the same thing as "the market regulating itself," and suggests the absence of any actual regulation whatsoever.
> nor did I argue against regulation of advertising
You said natural markets could only be controlled through authoritarian means, which is always worse than "decentralized market regulation." This is an argument in favour of deregulation.
> Ultimately, the vast majority of advertisements you see are for the products that are the most desired by people
No, they're for products with the largest marginal return on showing ads. That's why you often see ads for pharmaceuticals that only a tiny segment of the population will ever need—because they're highly profitable and thus advertising offers high returns.
> that advertising is a scam and intended to "misinform" is incorrect
Intended to *manipulate. Whether they inform or misinform is totally orthogonal to their purpose.
> Are some advertisements scams? Absolutely. The market is not perfectly efficient
The efficient market hypothesis applies specifically to asset markets. There's no real model of what an "efficient price" is for most consumer goods, services, or advertising campaigns, because those are not assets and do not retain market value after sale.
Anyway, this strikes me as a bizarrely dogmatic way to "debunk" the widespread presence of scams in our society. Multi-level marketing schemes have not gone anywhere, nor has the related category of self-help seminar grifts. You can keep a lie going for a very long time, and make a lot of money doing so. "Efficient markets" do not protect us from that reality.
> Guess I'm stupid
…
> and I need an authoritarian like you to tell me a smarter way to live.
Try a mandoline slicer, with the julienne teeth up.
> The market for kitchen knives is extremely competitive [even though] the advertising doesn't take the form of a 30 second TV spot[.] [...] How do you think certain brands even appear on the shelves of the stores you shop in? [...] it's more of an economic calculation
So you're telling me that, when it comes to cooking knives, the incentives at play mean I'm primarily exposed to advertising for scam products? Wow I'm glad we agree.
> Suppliers of lead paint, asbestos, ozone-destroying aerosols, contaminated foodstuffs, etc.
Not sure those are good examples, because none of them were “regulated” or banned until there was already a decent alternative available. What is the alternative to advertising, for capturing human attention?
> What is the alternative to advertising, for capturing human attention?
Unsponsored product reviews, I suppose. I'm not a proponent of a complete ban on advertising—I just find the argument being made in favour of deregulation to be deeply silly.
> Not sure those are good examples, because none of them were “regulated” or banned until there was already a decent alternative available.
The argument I'm responding to there is, "Disrupting natural markets with authoritarianism usually ends up worse than any downsides of the decentralized market regulation of that scarcity." There's no mention there of the availability of alternatives—that's not the point being made.
Replace attention for kidneys. Or not being killed with swords. See how you argument works out.
Just because something is highly sought after e.g. kidneys and protection from violence doesn't mean we should commoditize it. See American health care. Some resources are inflexible and allow infinite rent seeking opportunities.
> generally trends toward making the highest value messages for both the audience and advertiser get seen over lower value messages in any given situation (because those are the ones that can afford the market clearing price on said advertising).
This is true, but only for the set of messages that produce value that can be captured by the advertiser. This set is a small subset of messages that produce value. For example, a message about the benefits of excercise/socializing/climate action would produce a lot of value, but not in a form that any single advertiser can capture. So a lot of high value messages don't get produced in the current system, and might have a better chance in a more "natural" attention economy.
Advertising also increases the value of a product, so the value of things whose value can be captured by advertisers will be inflated when compared to their value in an environment without advertising.
Quite an interesting idea tbh, however if you want to frame it in commodity terms then you should also admit that currently, this very valuable commodity is taken from its owners without their consent. You could compare it to e.g. human labour, maybe: sure, there will always be a market for it, yet we allow labour to be extracted from people only in a heavily regulated framework and don't just let it be taken by force from them. Or property: there is a near infinite demand for physical objects, yet when I own a physical object you nevertheless can't just take it from me. So it should be with our attention.
Is it taken without consent? Don't you consent when you watch YouTube, or use some ad-funded site? Don't you get something (the content) in return?
There are alternatives, but most people choose to pay with attention, so that's where creators are being pulled to. But that doesn't mean that you're forced to consume it.
It is taken without consent if you leave your house or use public transport, or use certain private sector services that are de facto required to live a normal life.
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I think the difference here is people don't really know what they're giving up psychologically.
When you're manipulating someone to choose against their best interests, it's happening on an unconscious level and freedom of choice is completely removed from the picture. In these types of cases, no I don't believe there is consent involved.
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Is it taken without consent?
There's no clearer lack of consent than attempts by advertisers to circumvent, block, or ban ad-blockers.
These advertisers could choose to put up paywalls but that would harm their search rankings, so they don't. Instead, they play games with cloaking [1] and other SEO techniques in order to bypass the user's wishes and show them ads (or even ads + cloaked paywalls).
At least YouTube offers a paid premium service which remains ad-free.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloaking
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Would you support a regulation that all ads must offer a paid opt out?
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In practical terms there isn't an alternative. Sure there are websites without ads, but they won't tell me about what happens in my community. Sure, I could go to the town hall and watch sessions, but it's not practical.
Also: Even alternatives to YouTube will end up in the ad market. Just see the different streaming services where one already pays and who are rolling out ads. And well, YouTube still is the central place with all the videos. The only choice I have is using an ad blocker, which could be seen as amoral.
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Plutonium is scarce. Demand for that plutonium is endless. Scarcity + demand creates a natural market by default, meaning you must use brutal authoritarianism to disrupt it entirely (vs just regulating with guardrails). Disrupting natural markets with authoritarianism usually ends up worse than any downsides of the decentralized market regulation of that scarcity. Instead of something that attempts to land on fairness (even if imperfect), no market at all guarantees unfairness. The black market puts a price on the scarce commodity of plutonium in broad strokes, and it not always, but generally trends toward making the highest purity plutonium for both the bombed and bomber get used over lower purity plutonium in any given situation (because those are the ones who are winning the nuclear war with said plutonium). I know, please respond with all of your “all these times it didn’t work like that!” throw-the-baby out-with-the-bathwater Anecdotes. Like all markets, we should regulate plutonium to ensure it doesn’t get out of control. But to ban it outright would require an extreme policing of all weapons at all levels of society. Hence why this is a non-serious, silly idea.
Plutonium is scarce, but demand for it is even more scarce. Hence why most of the plutonium that exists is untapped. It’s not even a functioning market because of this, it requires governments to prop up its production.
Plutonium is one of the most niche things ever. All humans and businesses desire human attention, whereas virtually nobody desires plutonium.
The amount of people who can do anything with it amounts to likely 0.000001% of the population.
This is not a good rebuttal.
Ugh, the point is that your argument "if there's a market for something there's no point banning it" is special pleading for advertising. If you put other powerful things in there (plutonium, human organs) you quickly see this. But, sure, let's do it the boring way.
> Human attention is scarce.
Compared to what? Do you mean limited, highly desired, or what? Also I'd say there's 8 billion human attentions. That doesn't sound scarce to me.
> Demand for that attention is endless.
"Endless"? Surely not. What if I have it all?
> Scarcity + demand creates a natural market by default
Doesn't this mean almost everything we care about is a market? The supply of almost everything (actually everything?) is limited, qed right?
> meaning you must use brutal authoritarianism to disrupt it entirely (vs just regulating with guardrails).
I don't think this means anything. What's an example of using brutal authoritarianism to disrupt other markets?Cocaine? Human organs?
> Disrupting natural markets with authoritarianism usually ends up worse than any downsides of the decentralized market regulation of that scarcity.
Again if there are any concrete examples I would imagine most people would agree that stuff should be banned.
> Instead of something that attempts to land on fairness (even if imperfect), no market at all guarantees unfairness.
Wait I thought scarcity + demand poofs a market, how can there be scarcity + demand and no market? Isn't this the foundation of your argument?
> Advertising puts a price on the scarce commodity of attention in broad strokes,
The strokes are way too broad. If you're a magazine or a road sign, you're selling the slice of attention you're getting, which isn't anywhere near the whole attention market. Even if you're something like FB or TikTok, you're max getting like 70% of someone's attention. But then is influencer placement more effective than movie product placement? What about an interstitial ad? Blah blah blah. What happens when people are offline, like making breakfast or reading a book (things lots of people still do, believe it or not). This is a market in such a loose sense it loses meaning, but the worst part is the people who own attention aren't getting paid! At least in a human organ market I get cash for my kidneys. Where's the site I can go to where I just watch ads and rack up sweet cheddar?
> and it not always, but generally trends toward making the highest value messages for both the audience and advertiser get seen over lower value messages in any given situation (because those are the ones that can afford the market clearing price on said advertising).
"Value" for who? You've done no work to establish the value of advertising to the audience. Again, less of a market and more of a sheep shearing operation.
> But to ban it outright would require an extreme policing of all speech at all levels of society.
You might be surprised to learn there's a pretty rich diversity of advertising bans. Here in The Hague we ban ads for meat and fossil fuels. Things are still OK!
> Advertising puts a price on the scarce commodity of attention
Why should I be allowed to sell my attention any more than I can sell my own kidneys? It's even worse because I let other people sell my attention for me and get nothing back. What point are you trying to make? The market for manipulating my behaviour shouldn't exist at all so I really don't care how efficient it is
> the highest value messages for both the audience..
Obviously not. If this was true then people would pay to see more ads and everyone knows that doesn't happen
> Out of all of HN’s biases, the violent hatred of advertising is by far one of the most misguided.
Interesting, I perceive it exactly the other way around. I'm surprised this thread is as high up as it is, usually as per my perception, anti-advertisement sentiment gets shot down hard, presumably because a large part of the HN-crowd works for companies like google or facebook which rely on ads as a business model, or start-ups whose products are only used because users were shown ads for them.
My take: The human mind is hackable; it's just too easy and efficient to appeal to our emotions and most basic instincts. And while it was mostly fine to ignore it while it was "only" increasing consumerism, we currently see what happens when the same is applied to elections, with predictably terrible outcomes.
Your stance is still the old HN stance; the market actually works, any change that would impact the status quo is neither welcome nor needed, etc. etc. - this was the gospel for at least a decade, but we're finally awakening to the fact that hey, maybe this is actually bad, even if it made loads of money for many of us. Maybe it led us to the awful situation we're currently in, with big, ad-based monopolies, an absolute clownshow in the highest of offices and CEOs of said monopolies playing the lackeys.
Most big social developments in human history were non-serious and silly to many people before they actually happened.
Just tax the hell out of it, to pay for the environmental damages.
> Hence why this is a non-serious, silly idea.
I don't know if I go that far. I can see arguments for both sides of the issue. And at the same time, I know it would be impossible to do, but I could see that not having advertising would fix a lot of problems in our society. And yes, advertising is a broad term. Maybe we have clear rules around what's advertising and what's propaganda.
I think the only reason that demand is endless is due to how profitable it is to sell that attention to advertisers...
There are forms of advertising which are consensual - someone who buys a copy of Vogue presumably does so because they want to see the products being advertised - but the advertising I would ban is that which responds to the demand for attention by flat-out stealing it. If it's not consensual, it should not be legal.
> you must use brutal authoritarianism to disrupt it entirely
I'm not usually a fan of brutal authoritarianism, but you're making it sound pretty good.
<< the violent hatred of advertising is by far one of the most misguided.
I am willing to give you that there is hatred. I don't know if it is violent, but there is actual hatred. I do not believe it is misguided. As the OP mentions, a lot of people on this site saw how the sausage is made.
<< Human attention is scarce.
True, but each ad makes it even more scarce as humans instinctively try to filter out noise suggesting that ads do not belong in our vicinity.
<< Demand for that attention is endless.
I disagree, but I do not want to pursue this line of argumentation, because it is a deep rabbit hole with a lot that can trip it ( and I sadly do not have time this Sunday ).
<< meaning you must use brutal authoritarianism to disrupt it entirely
You may be onto something. Current breed of corporations are effectively nation-states that require focus of an entity nearly as singular. Hmm.
<< no market at all guarantees unfairness.
Meh, I saw the fairness and I think I am ok with its absence from the world at large.
<< generally trends toward making the highest value messages for both the audience and advertiser get seen over lower value messages in any given situation
Hardly, "make your penis bigger" likely being most obvious example.
<< please respond with all of your “all these times it didn’t work like that!” throw-the-baby out-with-the-bathwater Anecdotes.
I think you are misunderstanding something. The reason OP even considers such a drastic move is because throwing the baby out with the water is easier than attempt at gentle removal. I will add one more thing though. I was in a meeting with non-technical audience yesterday and, oddly, advertising and face tracking in apps came up. This is all starting to trickle down to regular people, which does suggest some level of correction is coming.
<< we should regulate advertising to ensure it doesn’t get out of control
It is already out of control, but adtech managed to normalize it.
<< But to ban it outright would require an extreme policing of all speech at all levels of society.
Hardly, maybe you could argue for freedom of association as we are talking mostly third parties, but the business would still be able to huff and puff as much as they want.
> Human attention is scarce. Demand for that attention is endless. Scarcity + demand creates a natural market by default, meaning you must use brutal authoritarianism to disrupt it entirely
This logic is just bad, plain and simple. You know what else has a high demand? Drugs.
So I guess fuck it, right? Sell heroin in Walmart, who cares. It's a "natural market". Of course people want to shoot up, it feels fucking amazing and humans are hard-wired to do shit that makes them feel good.
So let's just give up and do nothing. Yeah, in fact go ahead and advertise heroin on TVs. Yeah, go ahead and give it to infants too, let's get them young. After all, it's a natural market or something.
Please, I am begging you, stop bending over so severely for "markets". Sit back, and think about consequences.
If something ONLY HARMS PEOPLE, why are we doing it? Seriously, if everyone is a loser then why are we here? We don't have to make life hell just because capitalism would like it! That's a choice!
What is a "natural market"?
Please explain with examples from nature.
Your argument begs the question. Attention is indeed scarce, but that's because ad tech has created an attention economy.
Assuming that advertising is the best use of human attention is - how can I put this politely? - really quite eccentric.
> Please explain with examples from nature.
In nature there is limited access to food, water, mates, and shelter.
Economizing is the process of dealing with scarce resources.
Economizing is a uniquely human delusion whereby you suddenly think that principles of human centric markets somehow ascend to a primal force of the universe and aren't just a coping mechanism we use to try to peaceably coexist with one another without sinking all our time into killing one another to decrease competition like the rest of the life on the planet.
Nature doesn't do markets. We do. If you apply market thinking to the wrong things, bad things happen. You don't serve the market. The market serves you.
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