Comment by gip
3 days ago
I'm just wondering why governments think it's a good idea to regulate ads. IMO that is something the market (e.g. the users) should take care of.
3 days ago
I'm just wondering why governments think it's a good idea to regulate ads. IMO that is something the market (e.g. the users) should take care of.
Ad driven internet content is at least 25 years old, so it’s had time to settle into the equilibrium the market will converge to. The current state of things is precisely where the market drove it to, so it seems pretty clear that the “invisible hand” isn’t going to make it better and appears to favor making it worse. This seems like an obvious case where an external force is required to push the market in a direction it doesn’t naturally want to land at.
Beyond the ad driven internet, ad driven content has been at least 150 years old. Ever seen a photo of a pre-WW1 baseball stadium? Or soccer stand? Covered in ads. Old newspapers are awash in ads. Day time TV soap operas are so named because they were sponsored by soap companies.
All a giant waste. Just propaganda blasted at our eyes and ears all day, a drum beat of distraction attacks on our attention. Almost all forms of advertising should be banned or regulated till they are as quiet and unobtrusive as possible.
How, as a user, do I avoid getting ads shoved in front of my eyes on buses? on billboards? on subways? on tv channels? at movies? in my mail? in my email? in my search results? in my map app?
i'm just wondering what you want the "market" to do and how.
Best argument I can think of is the fact that half of ads on American TV have the words "ask your doctor about ___" in them. Drugs ads should be banned.
The market inevitably trends toward the lowest common denominator. We deserve better.
You can make better. But there's a reason non-ad-supported businesses barely ever work out.
They aren't even regulating the ads, they're mandating that video platforms show content without monetization.
Live TV had unskippable ads for like the last 80 years, and somehow YouTube is different? Why?
I hate ads, I block ads, and even I think this is stupid. Idk what Vietnam's constitution is like, but I think it's absurd from a free country perspective. If I'm paying to serve you videos, why don't I get to set the terms of that deal? Nobody is forcing you to go to a specific website. If you think they're crap because of all the ads, I likely would agree with you. I think blocking them can't be criminalized, because after all it is your device you're using to remove the ads. But how can you fine or punish a company for not explicitly letting you take the content without complying with their terms?