Comment by bondarchuk | Hacker News Reader

Comment by bondarchuk | Hacker News Reader

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But what can we do? It just feels like the thought that we could easily abolish advertising in public spaces, if we wanted, doesn't even occur to anyone. Some considerations:

- Governments (state as well as municipality) like having some inescapable public ad space, because they use it too, for announcements and such. Solution: decouple commercial advertising and government announcements.

- "But how will people find out about new products?" - yes, I've heard people say this without any irony, maybe nowadays we can respond that people are on their phones all the time so they can still see ads there. Some opt-in advertising solution (like jokoon is describing) could be an alternative as well.

- "What about store signage and shop windows?" - I think these shouldn't be included in an outdoor advertising ban, however advertisers are sure to try and muddy the waters here to get small businesses on their side, so it would be wise to emphasize this from the start.

- "I like ads, some of them look nice" - replace billboards with trees, art, the sky...

- "What about the revenue the city gets from advertising space?" - The most hairy and perhaps most important point. I would like to make explicit all the implicit exchanges of value involved in advertising, but it might be too abstract for the average Joe. Someone pays the city to show me something. That means the ability to show it to me is worth more to them than what they pay the city. It also means that at the end of the day, the money is somehow coming from me, and this amount could be larger than what the city gets out of it, even. Therefore I would actually save money if the city abolished advertising and just raised taxes a little. Of course there is the false consciousness that many people have, "I don't get influenced by ads".

- Negative psychological effects of advertising, the basic human right to not have to look at something designed to manipulate you. I feel this on a deep level but you quickly start sounding like a crazy person if you explain it to someone who doesn't really get this. Maybe an alternative would be to refer to objective studies relating advertising and wellbeing.

Tax it.

Banning one form of advertising simply raises the value of the unbanned forms. The problem with advertising is that there is so much of it. That is because it is cheap for the value that the purchaser receives. If we tax all forms of advertising, it will become more expensive, and less advertising will be purchased.

It would be better to tax it by volume (i.e. per billboard, magazine page or banner ad) than by dollar since this would encourage better targeting. However, people would likely find a way to work around the easiest ways to define advertising volume, so it really would be best to start with a tax on advertising revenue just to raise the effective price.

Think of ads like ammunition. If a bullet is 10 cents, it pays to spray and pray. But if a bullet is 10 dollars, it pays to make sure you hit your target. We have too many advertisers spraying and praying. Their ammo is too cheap.

I don't want targeted advertising. I don't want to be the target that someone paid to make sure to hit. I just want no advertising.

>Banning one form of advertising simply raises the value of the unbanned forms.

For me personally it is most important to ban the forms of advertising that are inescapable, i.e. in public spaces. Indeed it would raise the value of advertising on radio/tv/internet, but those are much easier to ignore. But the only way to ignore outdoor advertising is just don't go outside, which is a bit much.

A tax on advertising revenue is not a bad idea though, it might be a good incentive to find other revenue streams for many types of businesses.

The government has multiple tools in its arsenal.

It can tax. It can regulate. It can grant or deny rights. It can criminalise.

Taxation will reduce overall amounts of advertising. Taxes raise costs. Quantities of price-elastic goods or activities decrease if taxed. Ergo: an advertising tax results in less advertising.

Individually targeted advertising is regulable through both practice and rights. Government can require or restrict technology. Government can give rights (of privacy, of control over personal information), or remove them (the ability of third parties to exchange, sell, or otherwise utilise personal information other than at the express direction of the subject of that information, say).

Government can criminalise violations.

Government can make claims for redress in the case of business disputes over personal information or targeted advertising null and void. This would make any substantial business activity predicated on these activities far more risky: contracts would have no legal standing, the contract itself would be evidence of criminal activity, and any significant retention or exchange of personal information directly or by derivative would be both outside any legal protection and criminal.

The "this amount could be larger than what the city gets out of it" reminded me about a suggestion that the biggest beneficiary of the online ads are the data carriers: downloading that 6 MB video ad on your generally not-unlimited mobile data plan costs money.

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