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Comment by girvo | Hacker News Reader

> Subscription models just don't work

I'm not disagreeing with you, but that still doesn't refute the argument that you're selling your audience to someone else without their consent (and before you say "then don't use the site", you don't get to choose whether or not you're exposed to the given sites ads until you go on it, in which case it's already too late. Unless, of course, you use an ad-blocker -- which is why I'm of the opinion that people should use ad-blockers, but I disagree with the article in that I feel there can be cases of responsible, acceptable advertising. Things aren't so black and white, from either side)

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> but that still doesn't refute the argument that you're selling your audience to someone else without their consent

You watch the big bang theory and they play an ad during the commercial break for colgate. Did you get sold something without your consent? It's literally the exact same thing.

When you browse the web or when you watch TV, it's inherent to the media that you will see ads and that ads subsidize that content. Admitting to anything else but that inherent truth is (to me) just technicalities and/or pointless pedantry. Unless it's your first time on the 'net, you understand ads subsidize the content you see. Pretending like it's some injustice is almost laughable. It's like you're saying commercials on TV are taking advantage of you every time they cut to a commercial break.

TV ads are not tracking you, taking data from you and/or providing an attack vector for malware or other cybercrime.

So literally not the exact same thing.

That's an argument against a certain type of advertising. The link explicitly rejects the distinction between ads that monitor and track you and ads than are entirely passive.

I agree with the position set forth by the link. I don't want to be advertised to at all. I cut the cord, I no longer watch TV, I've stopped following sports, I run uBlock Origin... Any site that decides to block ad blockers will simply no longer get a visit from me.

I think advertising is one of the lowest, most pernicious forms of psychological manipulation out there. It simply cannot be done in good faith, by definition.

Some content creators even try to level with their audience about it and say "I'm just putting up this ad to get paid, just ignore it (or click it but don't buy anything) if you want." That's not dealing with the advertising company in good faith.

To me, the only good faith relationship between content creator and audience is the patronage model. This model has endured for centuries and some of our culture's very best artists have relied on it.

Is there such a thing as an entirely passive online ad? Any clickable ad at least knows which site you were on when you clicked; TV advertisers don't know what I was watching when I saw their ad.

That aside, the crucial difference is still this:

TV ads cannot be removed. If they could be, they would be.

Since online ads can be removed, and since doing so provides an enhanced user experience, and since (passive or not) online advertising facilitates the gross pollution of the internet by financing endless numbers of splog, malware and other content-free junk sites, that nobody would ever pay for directly, why not block them?

Laugh all you want. Laughter doesn't change facts.

And facts are -- nobody is indebted to companies who snuck themselves in the content we're interested in. I didn't ask for them there. Did I sign a contract mandating me to not use ad blockers? No. Your move then.

What's so hard to comperehend here?

No there isn't anything inherent in the way commercial TV happens to work in the US. There are many other models, including, but not limited to:

- Taxpayer funded television (ala BBC)

- Direct viewer funded television (ala PBS)

- Subscription television (ala HBO, Netflix, etc.)

- Television subsidized by some organization that doesn't advertise but wants to produce content (probably doesn't currently exist, but could)

- Community produced television (ala cable access)

- Any other model you'd like.

Just because the current model exists doesn't mean nothing else could work, and doesn't mean that I should assume anything when I turn on the TV. There's nothing inherent about advertising.

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