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Comment by sha666sum | Hacker News Reader

> Second, blocking cookies without another way to deliver relevant ads significantly reduces publishers’ primary means of funding, which jeopardizes the future of the vibrant web.

Herein lies the issue. Users blocking cookies are trying to avoid being tracked and "seeing relevant ads". Essentially, he is trying to create web standards in order to do the thing that users specifically don't want them to do. Google's business model requires Schuh to twist logic in a manner that makes it seem like it isn't so.

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Is "I don't want to see relevant ads" really the user's ultimate goal? Or is their goal actually something more like: "I don't want advertisers tracking me", and not seeing relevant ads is just a side-effect of that?

It sounds to me like Google's goal here is to give users what they want (less tracking, better privacy) without hurting their ad revenue. That seems like a reasonable compromise to me, assuming they can pull it off. At the very least, it's an improvement over the status quo.

I left out of my comment that there's significant overlap between users who block cookies and those who use adblockers. Many users simply don't want to see ads, but are subject to intrusive tracking nevertheless.

However, you are right that most people would probably be fine with personalized ads if it was possible to show them without identifiable tracking.

Personalizing content without identifiable tracking is a really hard issue that I'll be surprised if anyone ever manages to solve. It will also most likely involve some compromises that hurt Google's bottom line, so I think the financial incentives just aren't there for them. Given those two assumptions and Google's track record, I think it's absurd to assume that any standard they create will meaningfully improve user privacy.

Also, I fear their new standards would most likely just circumvent the tools available for users to avoid tracking, as the tracking would be baked into the browser itself.

What gets me is that you can very easily have personalized ads just by showing an ad relevant to the content on the current page.

There's no need for harvesting any data on the user, or tracking them across sites in this case.

This, is, indeed, a big part of Duck Duck Go's business model: showing you ads that are related to what you just searched for.

This isn't a foreign concept, either. It's how everyone started out. Google just thought they could charge more for ads if they also began tracking users so they could display higher-value ads that are supposedly relevant to a user regardless of the content of the page they are on. It turns out that they were right, and they are able to make more money doing this. Unfortunately for the rest of us, privacy is collateral damage.

Those are valid concerns, though at first glance it doesn't seem to me like any of Google's actual proposals[1] have those issues. In fact, FloC seems like a rather promising way to achieve "personalizing content without identifiable tracking". Perhaps that particular problem isn't as hard as you thought?

[1]: https://www.chromium.org/Home/chromium-privacy/privacy-sandb...

Floc is still a surveillance machinery that comes with the usual bells and whistles like mass propaganda and behaviour control. They admit to as much in the concerns section of the readme.

No it isn't; that's ridiculous.

The concerns section explains that broad interest categories (traits shared with thousands of other people) are revealed to ad networks. That's it. No "surveillance machinery", nor is there any mention of "mass propaganda and behaviour control".

And I quote

> A flock could be used as a user identifier. It may not have enough bits of information to individually identify someone, but in combination with other information (such as an IP address), it might.

...

> A flock might reveal sensitive information. As a first mitigation, the browser should remove sensitive categories from its data collection. But this does not mean sensitive information can’t be leaked. Some people are sensitive to categories that others are not, and there is no globally accepted notion of sensitive categories.

...

> This API democratizes access to some information about an individual’s general browsing history (and thus, general interests) to any site that opts into the header. This is in contrast to today’s world, in which cookies or other tracking techniques may be used to collate someone’s browsing activity across many sites.

> Sites that know a person’s PII (e.g., when people sign in using their email address) could record and reveal their flock. This means that information about an individual's interests may eventually become public. This is not ideal, but still better than today’s situation in which PII can be joined to exact browsing history obtained via third-party cookies.

> Or is their goal actually something more like: "I don't want advertisers tracking me", and not seeing relevant ads is just a side-effect of that?

I think this is a distinction without a difference. If you're seeing relevant ads consistently, the only way that's possible is if something is tracking your behaviour and/or interests.

The goal is to not have every of the 130+ adchoices companies[0] and the countless other adtech companies from knowing every website you've visited.

The issue is that [at least in theory] seeing less relevant ads means you're less likely to click ads, meaning the average CPM for a website goes down leading to less revenue and a higher chance that the company runs out of money for the things they do or even for the cost of operating the servers.

0: https://youradchoices.com/participating

> Is "I don't want to see relevant ads" really the user's ultimate goal?

"I don't want to see ads, period" is my goal, and that of many other users. I don't want the distraction, mental pollution, bandwidth usage, loading delays...

> I don't want the distraction, mental pollution, bandwidth usage, loading delays...

This argument concerns me, it's not like ads can take over your mind. I understand your position, but I'm of the opinion that it's not nearly as distracting as you seem to think. If a banner ad is there, great. It's not hurting me, it's sustaining the web, and if it is relevant, I might click on it.

My only gripe is pop-up ads, extreme overuse of banners, auto playing videos and performance. Oh my, performance. No wonder Google's had to make V8 fast, and it's still not nearly enough. If there was only one/two ads on screen at any time, I think that'd be a decent balance.

> This argument concerns me, it's not like ads can take over your mind.

Advertising's main goal is to take over your mind.

They want you to think of something and immediately put a brand on it, to spend your money on them above anything else, to think you need something that you don't, to feel inadequate for not having something and a lot more.

The fact you (and many others) think ads aren't that bad means you've conformed to what they want. To think that "it has to be this way and it's not that bad"

> Advertising's main goal is to take over your mind.

If it is, then it's doing an awful job. At the end of the day, I am responsible for me own actions, not banner ads.

That being said there are some ads that I do find disgusting which I refuse to let touch my computer, Taboola ads spring to mind. Just because I don't mind the concept doesn't mean I don't think there are huge issues with the ad industry, especially around ethics.

> The fact you (and many others) think ads aren't that bad means you've conformed to what they want.

So because I (and many others) don't agree with you, I've been warped by the ad industry? Who are "they"?

If ads had as low ROI as you've convinced yourself they do, advertising wouldn't be the behemoth of an industry that it is.

FWIW, they could just be really effective at marketing... the effectiveness of ads. And nothing else. There are days when I wonder if adtech really works, given that most of the "proof" I've seen amounts to "it positively correlates... except when it doesn't".

I never said they had low ROI, just that ultimately I am responsible for what I buy, regardless of how many ads I've seen. If I see an advert for something I'm already interested in, it's an extra datapoint to take into account if I ever purchase something. I don't consider this a takeover of the mind, that's just blatant hyperbole. If I like the product I'm getting, does it matter if I found them through ads?

Having worked a little bit with people in the ad industry (advertisers not publishers and I stress very limited work) they don't care if 90% is a 'waste' - because of the bidding system, that waste along with other things like click fraud is priced in. This only works if you can measure it.

Without tracking, digital ads would be worth less even if ROI was 10% higher (which I'm still sceptical of).

Either you're being naive or maybe a zen monk?

I know my tastes and try my best to not be influenced by marketing, but I wouldn't dare say "I was never influenced by an ad".

The very things you want or want to avoid are many times dictated by marketing. Maybe you hate those super advertised brands and choose to not buy from them, but the very fact that you do that means they influenced you.

Marketing is evil and influences everyone's lives. The fact that you tell yourself that "I still have a choice" doesn't make it any better. No matter how you put it, the bottom line is: marketing's only goal is to influence people's minds. Long gone are the days where marketing was simply a way to give awareness to a product.

Oh, but they can. And they do: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mere-exposure_effect

Advertisers sure spend a lot of money on ads for then to not have any influence on a person's mind. Actually ads are designed to exploit the mind.

> Is "I don't want to see relevant ads" really the user's ultimate goal?

I don't think ads are appropriate even when they are relevant to the page I am reading or the search I am performing. When I want to buy something I need to see trusted reviews and discussions. Then I buy.

I don't trust self interested messages trying to make me spend on what THEY want to sell. I want to make sure I am making the most informed decision, and that requires searching for relevant forums, discussions or reviews.

On the other hand I want to keep irrelevant information from entering my brain. My brain is my own, I don't share it with ad companies. I see massive tracking of my interests perverse, and the danger of being influenced against my interests disgusting.

That's why I can't listen to radio or TV and always use ad blocking while online. I almost never browse on my phone where ad blocking is missing.

Maybe I am hypersensitive because I got to live for my first 14 years of my childhood under communism, where thought policing was the rule. I fundamentally distrust the state and any agency that wants to make me do something I didn't initiate on my own.

> Maybe I am hypersensitive because I got to live for my first 14 years of my childhood under communism, where thought policing was the rule. I fundamentally distrust the state and any agency that wants to make me do something I didn't initiate on my own.

So you distrust all people whose interests aren't exactly aligned with your own, for fear that they might want to convince you to try some new thing? You avoid going out side for fear of seeing a billboard, make purchases randomly in stores, ignoring any branding, etc? If someone mentions a neat hobby or a food you haven't tried before, you run the other way and vow never to attempt that experience?

I think he's talking about the freedoms that ads take away. You don't ask to see the ad or the category of products it advertises, but someone found a way to show it to you anyway through some deliberate automated system, trying to steal your attention from something you are actually focused on doing at the moment and focus it on something else, distracting you and wasting energy and time.

> If someone mentions a neat hobby or a food you haven't tried before, you run the other way and vow never to attempt that experience?

They important keyword here is 'someone' and not a huge corporation or state actor. I would open myself to people, especially if they don't have anything to gain from influencing me and are purely passioned about the subject they engaged in. Much of what is good on the internet comes from such people doing what they love for the sake of their passion/hobby (such as Wikipedia, parts of YouTube, Arxiv, HN and specific subreddits).

I agree that that is the crux of the matter, but I'm not sure that the two sides are irreconcilable.

Google and site owners want to do targeted ads. I'm not sure that users hate targeted ads specifically. I, for one, am not a site owner myself, but I'm sympathetic enough to their need for revenue that I'm OK with targeted ads.

I hate stuff like auto-play video (and am thrilled that Firefox has well and truly conquered that issue) and I'm pissed that many companies sell or leak my data but I'm not looking to reject targeted ads outright.

YouTube autoplays just fine in firefox. What did you mean?

And that's exactly the problem.. it used to be very hard to block just a few weeks ago.

Sorry, what do you mean? How can I block autoplaying yt vids in firefox?

I use "Enhacer for Youtube" extension.

Yes, these kind of extensions just used to take advantage of the existing properties.

You could get to it through about:config (so.. a little difficult for the common user to reach)

media.autoplay.enabled

media.autoplay.allow-muted

They then changed to

media.autoplay.default

media.autoplay.block-webaudio

media.autoplay.enabled.user-gestures-needed

And removed the previous parameters, which caused the videos to start playing automatically again, until you would configure the new properties (again, only though about:config).

Finally, they're now providing a menu option for achieving the same, which deserves to be applauded.

Yes, I have allowed autoplay on the video sites, but it is now click-to-enable on all those others sites that are just using it for ads.

Go to about:config in Firefox, and change "media.autoplay.allow-muted" to false.

Chrome has shut down auto-play on any video with sound (excepting video specific sites) and they have a flag "Autoplay policy" which was partially successful, but not as effective as the blocking in Firefox.

> Firefox has well and truly conquered that issue

Don't worry, advertisers will catch up soon, and just bundle ads with JS-based H.264 decoder that renders to <canvas>.

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