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Comment by dbbk | Hacker News Reader

Are you suggesting people would prefer ads that are completely irrelevant to them?

I'm suggesting everyone on the planet automatically tunes out ads, what is shown is irrelevant no matter how relevant it is. There is no ad industry on the internet, there is only a tracking industry, the ads are just an excuse. There's no good reason Apple should even provide the id.

This is unequivocally false. Ad spend is so high specifically because advertisements work. Advertisers especially love digital because its so easy to attribute revenue back to their ad spend. Google didn't take in $118B for showing ads because "everyone on the planet automatically tunes [them] out."

"advertisements work"

Everyone always wants to believe they're above this. You're not, ads work.

I held this mindset ("I never click ads, and hide them whenever I see them. The whole industry is a giant bubble") for a long time.

Then instagram started showing me ads for small live music events featuring artists I regularly listen to.

I thought I was somehow above it all, but they just hadn't targeted me well enough yet.

Not if you do some mental gymnastics and actively ignore the content. I've gone completely ad-free (sounds like some sugar-free diet, only for the mind), and its a luxury and quality of e-life that is very easy to get used to.

And then you by accident open web in browser without necessary ad-blockers and want to run away from the horrible pathetic mess a lot of internet became.

Its easy - have you ever bought anything via ad? If yes, you support this industry and current state of affairs.

Ads aren’t only online and you buying directly from a single ad impression is not the only form of conversion.

You are definitely influenced by ads.

Ads work for whom? This is unequivocal false for whom? I mean we're talking about consumers, right? Do you really have the intuition that the population of ad-block users are generally worse off for it, as ill-performing shoppers? Because if you're not getting an edge on your shopping performance, then who are the ads working for? Coca-Cola?

Is it that ads are working -- against you?

Rational companies wouldn't be paying for ads and minting multi-billionaires in the process if the results did not surpass the costs. The dominance of online advertising over print/television/physical is largely due to metrics and ROI visibility provided by tracking.

They aren't paying for ads, they're paying for access to the tracking data. There's like 20 primary companies that show up in "targeted" ads, that's not by mistake. They're hip to the what the system actually provides (tracking) and are all in.

Companies, like people, aren’t rational.

And yet companies grow and profit from advertising and it's the default method of monetization on the internet.

Sayings it's not rational is not an argument against whether it works.

That's ridiculous. If everyone tuned them out, it wouldn't be a multi billion dollar industry. People pay attention to ads, and they click ads and companies get very rich pushing their products through ads.

What exactly do you think all these companies want with all this tracking data if not to sell you products with ads?

People pay attention to ads precisely because they constantly steal your attention.

This is clearly not true. Advertisers are not pouring cash into big piles and setting those piles on fire. If everyone on the planet tuned out ads and what is shown was irrelevant no matter how relevant it is then they would stop advertising in that way.

edit: should have just read a few of the replies

They're paying for tracking data, advertising is just a bonus.

>I'm suggesting everyone on the planet automatically tunes out ads, what is shown is irrelevant no matter how relevant it is

Makes you wonder what all the people around here who dreamed of and/or do work for Google/Facebook are doing with their lives. Saving the world, I guess.

I do, irrelevant ads aren't going to alter my behaviour, relevant ads might well do so.

I use ad blockers for anyone I setup a computer for. Are we all becoming less performant shoppers for it? When one views ads, I ask if you're really getting an information edge.

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