When I worked at reddit, I refused to run Adblock. I felt like it would be hypocritical to work for a company that made its money from ads, and then block them. Also I wanted to make sure that I had the same experience as the users.
When I left reddit, for the longest time I still didn't run Adblock because as a shareholder it still felt hypocritical.
But a few years ago I couldn't take it anymore -- the web go so awful with ads on it became unusable. And so I relented and went full Adblock. And life got a lot better.
(I did however whitelist reddit and a few other sites that I like whose ads are bearable)
FB allows commenting on ads. This does not go well for certain types of advertisers. Political and religious ads especially. Even the bland corporate advertisers have to spend some time cleaning up the inevitable mess.
What's especially puzzling is that FB allows image uploads as an ad response unless the advertiser was smart enough to disable it.
I am pretty sure I still get comments on my ads. It's almost entirely spam and those comments you think are probably spam it's just a 'good job' response.
Is that the case ? We (rsync.net) used to advertise on reddit quite a bit and we would have sponsored posts that had a proper comment thread and Q&A, etc. - I thought it was fantastic.
I use adblock, makes it so much easier as an experience also surprises me how many companies are tracking me on some of these webpages. But, I am sympathetic to the idea of businesses depending on ad revenue.
I like how some websites e.g. news websites, put up a message that they depend on ad revenue and ask for adblockers to be disabled, I did it for some websites where I like the content, but then I also feel I am perhaps very unlikely to click on any of the ads (at some level I suppose my mind has learned how to focus on the content and ignore the ad space e.g. on google search I remember I had developed a habit of scrolling down and ignoring the first few ad results without actually consciously doing it). So, considering I am way less likely to click on an ad, perhaps I am not actually hurting the business, or maybe actually helping improve conversion if I can go that far :)..
Most clicks on ads are certainly misclicks. The business is to make store owners believe that they are getting exposure, not to actually give them sales.
All of the little guys like me who tried to run a Goggle Ads and Microsoft Ads campaign know that we can spend a few thousands dollars without a single impact on sales.
Then the salesman from Google calls you and tells you it’s because you’re doing it wrong. Try such and such keywords. Link to your payment button to see your ratios! Try to optimize for CTR and EWQ and ASDF (not the strange proximity between those ideas and random letters on a keyword). It must be you. It must be YOU!
The business is to make the business owner believe as long as possible that it will work.
> The business is to make store owners believe that they are getting exposure, not to actually give them sales.
To be scrupulously fair, the business is to make store owners believe that they are getting exposure, regardless of whether they actually get sales. Much like snake oil salemen, it's prefectly fine (nice, even) if the patient improves; that just means a chance to sell them more and 'better' snake oil ("brand maintainence", I think they call it) later.
I tried for a week. When my CPU melted I switched back to old.reddit. But I use the mobile app (which is basically the new interface) for about 50% of my redditing, so I sort of use both. But always the old interface on the computer.
This has to be the most misunderstood comment. Honestly eve tho I don't work for an and centric company I do feel what you went through. Because of how much YouTube helped me, I couldn't bear myself using an ad blocker. Then things like Patreon and sponsorship deals came along and I decided to treat myself a nice ad blocker. Still couldn't do the full thing, so I went with one called "fair ad blocker" that actually let's in some no -intrusive ones so it's a little light on my conscience. Still using it. It let's in some annoying pop ups too sometimes, but such is the price.
I once tried not running an ad blocker or noscript on a work computer. That lasted for a couple months until the day I got a redirected to a porn site from an innocuous search result. There are too many ways to weaponize a site to let your guard down. If the site operator can't or won't vet all of the code they send you then you should feel no obligation to execute it.
I've been in a similar situation. For me it was a different type of struggle... More, I need to be informed about the space.
I am a firm believer that there are ways to do ads in a manner that respects the end user, is not obnoxious as well, and isn't privacy invasive. And this applies to both buy and sell sides of the industry.
But much of the space is garbage and in some cases malicious, so I block ads with a prejudice, run NoScript on Firefox on desktop and mobile, etc. It's a PITA, but a better experience overall.
It is a bit amusing to watch the changes Reddit is making to "improve the user experience" though, when to people in the industry, it seems like fairly transparently telegraphing development of surfaces for new ad placements or signal collection for targeting models.
What pisses me off is Reddit leadership can't seem to just be transparent about it.
I really wish reddit would begin to pay small amounts to its moderators. I feel like it would be a basic income experiment and kinda neat since the mods do most of the content and user moderation for reddit and spend thousands upon thousands of hours there.
I disagree. If income was paid out Reddit would then be sending out 1090s or W2s to every mod. Analytics and time tracking would be put in place. An entire team would need to be stood up to oversee mod management. Mods from certain regions of the world would be disavowed, and the barrier to enter would naturally be higher for new mods.
I say mods should be either full employees or volunteers, you can't mix between the two.
Subscriptions? Could be a local thing but in my country newspapers have always been paid with them.
News has never been assumed "free" until the internet came around. In fact the first newspapers all the way back to the 17th century were intended for diplomats, nobility and merchants.
Free news is usually shite anyway.
I have subscribed (and might still be subscribed) to several news magazines and papers, though not my local. It's kind a circular drain of "lower pay > lower quality > fewer subscribers > lower pay".
So subscribe and pay them directly. From all metrics I've seen direct payment is the most efficient vs merch, super chats, and views themselves. Pay for premium.
I've never had it explained to me what's wrong with hypocrisy. None of us live by our high ideals, do we? It's funny when a comedian points that out, but why should we do as we say?
Hypocrisy is usually dishonest ("I'm going to tell you a lie in hopes that you believe it; my behavior shows that I don't actually believe the lie") or unfair ("I'm going to try to convince you to play by a more restrictive set of rules than I do so I can get an advantage over you (or just avoid having the drawbacks of those rules myself)", both of which are bad things.
Moreover, just because you're not capable of perfectly adhering to a set of principles doesn't mean that it's not worth trying. "Oh, I know that I'm not going to be able to uphold every single commitment I make, so I'm not going to worry about upholding any of them."
Yes it might be a hint that you don't believe what you say, but that shouldn't detract from you saying being potentially correct. After all the truth value isn't affected by who says something. I bet there were smokers who were part of discovering that smoking is unhealthy.
The thing about pointing out hypocrisy is that you're actually lending authority to the person you criticize, you're saying that you believe in the side he's revealed to actually support.
I did the same when I worked on Google Ads; I felt it was important for me to have the full ad experience. It was easier back in the early 2000s though, before the Web ad ecosystem got so horrible.
Now I block ads and trackers with great zeal. Google's most of all. Surveillance capitalism is bad for almost everyone. Advertising is a mind virus.
My experience of ads is that they're much better than they were in the early 2000s. Back then major websites would have literal scams advertised on their site. Things like you're the 1 millionth visitor click here to collect your prize. Now I rarely see that sort of thing.
Perhaps scams have a high selection pressure to evolve to be less detectable (while we are also being trained to detect them better). You might be seeing plenty of scams, but they are just camouflaged far better?
Not really the same. The implied agreement when you visit an ad based site is that you get the ads. Otherwise if no one got them, the site could not exist. It’s a form of payment for what the site provides to you, not the product itself.
There's no implied agreement - a product is offered at no cost, and I'm under no legal, ethical or moral obligation to look at anything. I'm a weirdo who still buys the paper newspaper. I throw out the Thursday auto advertisements and the Sunday ads.
Content producers made a conscious decision to aggregate their screen real estate and outsource ad placement to unrelated third parties. The result is a cesspool of awful, low engagement content. Its so bad that they enter into awful agreements with aggregators to repackage their content for pennies. That's their problem, not mine.
On the flip, I live in a state capital, and when the legislature is in session, interest groups spend 10x what they spend on useless online ad spots to buy full-page or panel ads in the printed newspaper. Presumably they aren't doing that in an effort to set money on fire.
>"I'm under no legal, ethical or moral obligation to look at anything"
That would depend on you moral theory of choice; applying Kantian (deontological) moral theory, your behavior violates the principle of 'universalizability'.
Seems like an absurd leap to me. Am I obliged to read the sports section of a newspaper?
What does it mean when a entire category of commerce is so toxic that government security officials recommend that civilian agencies preclude employees from seeing it?
>"The precise meaning of universalizability is contentious, but the most common interpretation is that the categorical imperative asks whether the maxim of your action could become one that everyone could act upon in similar circumstances."
>"For instance, one can determine whether a maxim of lying to secure a loan is moral by attempting to universalize it and applying reason to the results. If everyone lied to secure loans, the very practices of promising and lending would fall apart, and the maxim would then become impossible."
If everyone were to block ads, the publications that you're reading would not be able to pay for the content they publish. Note that 'universalizability' requires a somewhat static analysis, and usually doesn't look at how systems might adapt to changed circumstances, though this is not a big problem here, as you have voluntarily chosen to interact with ad-supported publishers under the current regime.
Content on the web was much better before the scourge of advertising took over. I very much wish everybody would universally block ads. Appealing to the current situation in a static sense is a cop out that lets you condemn what would be a welcome reversion.
Say what you actually mean rather than just invoking a nebulous condemnation of "privilege".
The information on the web used to be of much higher quality. Within the first page of search results you'd usually find a no-nonsense website full of painstakingly curated information. Who had the means to access that information is orthogonal to its quality.
Take a moment to consider how expensive and exclusive access to the internet was "back in the good ol' days" and maybe you'll be able to connect the dots. If you still can't there's nothing I can do for you sorry.
You might be arguing that privileged people make better websites, or implying that the other person is saying that, or some variant, or...?
mindslight is not saying we should revert everything back to those days, such as the internet being expensive and exclusive. They want sites to stop using ad revenue. Those two things are not tied together. Unless you're arguing they are tied together, in which case again you need to explain yourself.
I can infer several arguments that you could hope to be implying. But I'm not going to guess at the specific one you're trying to make just to argue with myself.
In general: Correlation is not causation. As I said, the quality of information was orthogonal to who could access it. And furthermore, even in modern times advertising does not pay for Internet access nor computing devices.
> Note that 'universalizability' requires a somewhat static analysis
Sounds very convenient. You are allowed to make one logical step (everyone blocks adds => publishing companies go bankrupt) but are not allowed to make the equally sound step of (everyone blocks adds => publishing companies will seek other revenue sources such as paywalls).
But if you say i’m not allowed to argue the second one let’s talk about the first kind.
So universal add blocking puts those companies who keep clinging to add supported operation into bankruptcy. Goodridance. It is not like one must have free-as-in-beer services to have a coherent moral compass. They go bankrupt and we will manage without them. Totally consistent.
Similarly you wouldn’t say that the idea of punishing murderers lacks ‘universability’ just because it would shut down the Assasin’s Guild.
But you seem to want to read the publications with ads...
If I extend your (unreasonable) murder analogy, I'd have to say that you were hiring the Assassin's Guild, but refusing to pay because you don't like their terms.
> The implied agreement when you visit an ad based site is that you get the ads.
That's not the agreement that ad companies think is being implied, though. The ad companies think the deal is "Looking at this website gives us permission to spy on you across the web".
> The implied agreement when you visit an ad based site is that you get the ads.
They are putting stuff out on a server for public consumption. The implied agreement is that I'm allowed to view it, or not view it, in whole or in part. Their business plan is their problem.
One should also try out the alternatives as well, regarding the GP, I personally believe there was an equal obligation to experience it without the ads to determine the impact.
Likewise it would be nice for the alcohol producer to experience drinking every day, as well as being the only person at the party not drinking. Even being the allocated driver and seeing the consequences of their product up close. Perhaps they would gain some insight or perspective regarding their product.
I would find it hypocritical if someone who worked at an alcohol producer joined MADD, or someone who worked at a candy company joining a PAC that supports soda bans.
But no, they don't need to consume the product daily.
Yeah I think Phillip morris execs should be forced at gunpoint to smoke as many cigarettes a week as the global median. Might lead them to think twice before advertising poison.
The reasoning here is not the dissonance in behavior, but dissonance in belief.
A person can believe alcohol is not harmful to humans health without consuming alcohol, therefore it's morally acceptable if an alcohol producer does not consume alcohol.
But if they don't consume alcohol because they believe alcohol is harmful, while advertising (explicitly or implicitly by helping the alcohol company) that it is not harmful, then that is dishonesty. Because in this case, the person purposefully acts like they believe something for personal benefits, but actually they don't.
I used to work on sports gambling apps and yet I never once gambled using the real production app. Because I saw the data. And behind those data points are real people having their lives ruined by some growth hackers and psychologist PMs trying to increase session length. I know how the sausage is made. I practically have the gambling addiction hotline number memorized because it was required to be on every screen.
Pretty much everyone I know gambles on sports and for most of these guys its like a $50 bet, not a lot of money. No more than a few beers these days at a bar. People get addicted to anything, lets work on having people receive treatment if things become a problem rather than ban everything that most users are using responsibly. Might as well ban video games of you really want to get some people out of some deep holes.
I happen to know a handful of people who started pet food companies, albeit boutique ones. (California.) They all taste their pet foods. I've tried some of the treat biscuits, and they aren't half bad, though I wouldn't necessarily reach for them.
I'm not an expert on cat or dog digestion. But I think anything they can eat, humans can, too. (Just not the other way.)
Growing up in California, one thing we were taught as kids is that pet food is safe for human consumption, and can be used for food after an earthquake as emergency rations.
It won't taste good, but it will prevent starvation!
This is false in general, and dangerously misleading at best. In particular, some dog foods contain ingredients (bone meal IIRC, but don't rely on that) that can pretty much destroy a human's intestines (which are much less hardy than most animals's because coevolution with cooked food allowed cost-cutting). Pet food sold in California might (might) be required to be safe, but that's dangerously unreliable at best.
Well, when I search human consumption of bone meal I get results saying it might be good or might be bad. There's a risk of intestinal blockage but that takes a whole lot and would happen in dogs too.
Searching is not suggesting any other particularly dangerous ingredients, other than to say it's not great long term. But on a level like "be careful not to get scurvy", not "will destroy your intestines". And that you should watch out for bad storage and still probably avoid raw meat.
If I work for purina then my _dog's_ gonna eat that dog food, by golly. And maybe I'll at least give it a sniff.
Speaking of the devil, I had to carry somebody's stray dog home (again) when I was on my jog this morning, and man that was a fat dog! Dunno what he eats, felt like krispy kreme and quarter pounders. Maybe I oughta start me a dog food company. Too many fat dogs in this danged town.
Do alcohol makers try their own products to ensure consistency day-to-day? I would hope so. I would certainly hope candymakers do too. Those are particularly bad examples.
ask yourself if you're willfully misconstruing what i'm saying in order to low brow dismiss my point.
jedberg claims he consumed ads every day in order to empathize with this customers. the obvious implication is that everyone at such a company has the obligation to "try their own products".
Your analogy is weak, so I pointed it out. Reddit created their experience a certain way; why would you go out of your way to avoid seeing your product the way your users do?
You haven't presented a single argument as to WHY an employee of a software company shouldn't experience their product as their users do.
Talking about product testing is a deliberate red herring, though. Nobody was talking about some web designer using adblock during the process of implementing ads on a site. That would be a very difficult hurdle to put in front of yourself.
Jedberg, who I know for a fact ran Reddit's infra singlehandedly for a while, claimed he consumed ads as a matter of understanding the user while holding the job. Apparently he grew a brain and decided to block ads after that job, as smart and well informed users tend to do.
I suggest turning off JavaScript for most sites, which keeps the ad blocking tasks to a minimum. Blocking trolling users is another matter entirely.
No, but if an alcohol seller practiced temperance because they felt alcohol was deleterious to people, wouldn't it be rather hypocritical? He was not actively consuming ads, he was just not seeking to avoid them.
Well, about pharma: I believe at least one person with veto power at FDA should try the pill personally. And the pharma company management should be able to take it. This would have helped with OxyContin, among others.
Tobacco firms were notorious for expecting their employees to be tobacco users.
My mom was a sales clerk for Macy's and one of her friends was a sales clerk there who later became a tobacco company rep who went to convenience stores to manage the marketing displays.
She smoked like a chimney. After my dad died and her friend got divorced, her friend moved in a for a while with my mom and got my mom smoking again. My mom hid it from everybody and we found out only after she died from a cardiovascular event because we found a pack of cigarettes, one half-finished, in the cupboard.
I used to be in ad tech, and I did the same thing. I didn't use an ad blocker so that I could understand what the users were seeing.
A few years in though, it started to get bad enough that I enabled the ad blocker on my personal stuff and kept a browser session for work where the ad blocker was off.
I see. But then you continue to willfully see ads after you left Reddit. I presume you viewed ads everywhere not just on Reddit?
Still strikes me as absolutely bizarre to do this. On one hand it’s commendable that you’d like to empathize with users, but on the other hand you’re working at Reddit who earns revenue by glueing people to their endless feed of ads. Expecting anything else is foolish.
When I left reddit, for the longest time I still didn't run Adblock because as a shareholder it still felt hypocritical.
But a few years ago I couldn't take it anymore -- the web go so awful with ads on it became unusable. And so I relented and went full Adblock. And life got a lot better.
(I did however whitelist reddit and a few other sites that I like whose ads are bearable)