But how do I get visitors in the first place, this is the first challenge. Twitter is pretty good at hiding my promotion tweets from other users...
Not trying to put words in your mouth, but are you offended that the company spent money on a promoted tweet? That it was an overreach on their part?
Blocking the company stops the tweet appearing everywhere I see tweets. That's on my home computer, laptop, Chromebook, office computer, my phone, etc. It continues to block the ads from that company if/when Twitter work out ways around ad-blockers. And it makes me feel like I'm proactively looking after my account.
I use ad blockers as well.
are you offended that the company spent money on a promoted tweet?
I just find that Twitter promotes the same tweets over and over again, so if you don't block them it gets very repetitive. If I was actually offended I'd reply first so they had to pay for an engagement as well as the promotion.
I don't care about the business model of the whole internet. It is obviously a house of cards. A business model based on bad UX? I hope it collapses.
No, I don't know what will replace it. I don't care, as long as it doesn't involve ads.
I really don't care if the ads are innocuous or labeled or relevant. I don't ever want to see an unsolicited nudge to spend money on something. Ever. I can't be any more clear than this. I hope there are more like me every day.
I don't care if your ad is clever, relevant, organically sourced, environmentally friendly, necessary for financing your product, something I actually want, need, or didn't know I wanted yet.
The internet is plagued with this cancer everywhere you go, no matter what you do. Somehow it's become acceptable that every second of our attention and time is competed for by corporations trying to sell us things.
I simply do not want to see ads, ever.
How else would people learn about it? Turns out, if you don't talk about it, very few will come...
I think this is why HN has a lot more goodwill towards self promotion (Show HN style posts) than a lot of other communities (reddit notably, depending on the sub). Entrepreneurs know that advertisement is a necessary part of any business.
I think we mostly appreciate the need for the so-called "getting the word out there", but it ought to be done in way that's appropriate. There's a balance to be made between the potential value of a product, and the amount of attention you're trying to steal. Most people think the products they make are more valuable than they really are.
It's never "just" an ad. Like the way you see an ad in a newspaper. It's the spyware that comes with it and the fact that tons of them are animated!
And yes, I consider it spyware and virus-like behaviour to track me wherever I go and I will actively do what I can to stop it. Even if it means you don't get paid... you chose that seedy medium to make money, not me. It's not my job to validate your business model.
By all means block me. I will go elsewhere.
Browsing the internet without an ad blocker is actually impossible for me now... whenever I rebuild a machine I have those few hours or so before I get the ad blocker installed where the internet is a horrific assault on the senses with everything trying to steal my attention away from the thing I am there to see and slowing down the page load (significantly in some cases)
I still remember when plenty of the internet was running fine from hobbyists and whatnot without resorting to ads and tracking... it costs practically zero to run a website (granted, at scale it's a whole other ball-game but how many people have that problem?)
The internet would survive fine without ads. It would have a different mix of behemoths and hobbyists sites but it would survive just fine.
That being said... I do remember trying to punch the monkey to win :D
Edit: added stuff for clarity
I see it as exactly at odds with what I'm trying to do with my life and my attention. I do not consent to have my time and attention taken from me in this way.
Yes, I am a free rider on much of the internet today, such as it is. That the entire internet is based on this absurd proposition is a symptom of its rapid growth and industries going after the lowest hanging fruit. I am confident that the internet will find another way forward.
If you're just getting folks on facebook to promote your products in the hope of some minor dispensation or something (a popular gimic these days). That's easily identifiable and blockable.
What about a set of sponsor logos at the bottom of a webpage that let you visit the companies?
Ads wouldn't be there unless they work for the advertiser.
For example if you read a tutorial on how to build a weather station and the author provides referral links to a component on Amazon, I'm happy to use those links.
Referral systems are open to abuse though, like the myriad of ultra specific comparison websites with tenuous "expert" reviews.
There's no reason that most ads couldn't fit this model, but due to greed and laziness they mostly don't.
A lot of those referral links do have logging (seeing who visited / hoe many people have) and tracking (general location, some demographics). Is that okay to you?
I'm fine with a site owner knowing their demographic. That's potentially useful for other things, eg should you invest in localisation? Otherwise unless you have a vpn, your IP is going to be visible anyway.
It probably depends on the referral site. For example, do Amazon have any reason to sell my data to anyone else? It's most valuable to them and they already have a decade+ of purchase and browsing history.
I still think this a preferable situation to targeted ads which try to guess what I want.
Ads aren't just the business model of the internet. They've been subsidizing human interaction since ancient times.
That makes perfect sense!
Sure, some of it can be puff-pieces for the company and they are quite clearly just bullshit but it's easy to leave and go elsewhere if they take the piss.
A banner at the top of a blog post saying "this content was kindly sponsored by <insert company relevant to the content>" is a great idea and more should do it.
But they don't!
They use ad networks that track the ever-living shit out of every move you make.
That's the issue for me!
I mean if your product fills a unique niche it should be really easy to rank high. Get your first few customers like that, then because your product is revolutionary, word of mouth will do the rest.
A real-world example: Monzo, a modern bank in the UK. They only very recently started using advertising, but got their first million customers with nothing but word of mouth. Their secret? Simply making a product that's light-years ahead of what the existing banks provide.
Your product is not revolutionary? Oh then I don't know (actually I do - make a revolutionary product - switch industries if necessary), but you're not entitled to waste my time, attention & privacy with ads just so your business can survive. Being profitable is not a right, I couldn't care less if you go out of business.
All those things are acceptable to most people who block ads, IMO.
If someone doesn’t want ads in their life and Twitter provides a tool to block them, why wouldn’t that person use the tool?
"They don't reach me, I reach them."
I don't find out about them then, and my savings and 401K continue to grow unabated. Maybe I'm missing out on cool stuff, but assuming I never found out I was missing out, then my life isn't impacted negatively regardless. I don't really know what an "influencer" is; is it the internet equivalent to the ShamWow or OxiClean guys?
I have 0 tolerance for people or companies actively telling me what I should buy or like, and distrust anyone who does so.
I tend to by generic/commodity items over brands, but there are some notable exceptions.
I pick my groceries by checking the grocery ads and seeing what's on sale.
I don't think I've ever clicked on a search ad or a mobile ad except accidentally.
Concerts and stuff I learn about through ads.
It's kind of an eclectic list, I guess, but ads do seem to serve some purpose. I'm just hard to reach via them unless I'm going looking for something.
I like hearing about cool stuff, I like sharing it with friends. I like style, looking fashionable, and being apprised of trends. I don't plan to die with savings.
You wouldn't trust me, because I often tell my friends about things they should know about; not because I have anything to gain, but because we all do this in all of my social circles. If I hear about a nootropic they might like, I tell them. If they know of a bar I should try, they tell me.
I like a lot of ads because I like knowing what's going on in the world. Even in a post-capitalist Star Trek world, I'd want people who made stuff to tell me.
Neither way of living is wrong.
The ads are blocked until then.
I'll pay for them on the long run. For me, the CPC cost will make it worth.
There are also other ideas, like launching an affiliate program, app marketplaces.
Look at where the traffic is in your niche.