$100B "Internet Idiot" Industry Set To Explode | Hacker News Reader

$100B "Internet Idiot" Industry Set To Explode

tekpopuli.com

23 pointsjackjack100021 comments

"...the idiocy of millions who don’t understand that those blue-underlined words on the right of search results are NOT, in fact, search results at all."

Wrong.

If you're researching a paper, then the sponsored search results might not be your best bet. But if you're searching for a product you need, I would argue that the sponsored search results might be even more accurate.

Sponsored search results cost people money. Those people are not throwing their money away. There is a reason why they are paying to appear on that particular keyword. They have something you need. They are willing solve to your need for a price.

You're not an idiot if you need a new pair of shoes, click on a sponsored result for Zappos, and find what you want.

You're right, sponsored results aren't just for idiots. But the article makes a valid point too. A substantial fraction (maybe majority) of web-users are probably not tech-savvy enough to know the difference between free and paid links.

Agreed- remember the release of AOL search data two years ago? That may not be a representative sample, but a large number of those users seemed to have no idea what a search engine's basic function even was.

Bah, I disagree. Not giving the average user enough credit. Bit pretentious imho. Now... whether he average user cares? If it looks representative of your search, who cares if it's paid or not?

Goldsmith has a point. The following excerpts are from the AOL search logs. One user, sequence of search as listed. Judge for yourself:

geeks do you know where mal&spware-viruses are hard drive or memory

anybody know where malware and spyware live in my laptop

geeks do you know where mal&spware-viruses are hard drive or memory

mal&spware-viruses are they in hard drive or memory

mal&spware-viruses are they in harddrive or memory

support error doctor

chase user account information

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free shiping sites for 40 to 80 gb dell laptop cpu harddrives

sites with free shiping that have;40gb tiwan cpu hard drive for c600 dell laptop

how to jump cpu to erase everything

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cpu how to erase everything and start empty ibm travelstar cpu

how to erase everything and start empty where to get internal cpu replscement disk

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who stocks internal parts for travelstar cpus

actual individual internal parts for travelstar cpu

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dellc600 remanufactured travelstar cpu

dell c600 remanufactured travelstar cpu

remanufactured hard drives with trade in core

remanufactured hard drives

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what name has the omand intererter

what name has the comand intererter

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virus infection remove with send me a cleaner please i will be forced to camcil

aol's-free virus infection remove with send me a cleaner please i will be forced to camcil

mal spy viruses where are they harddrive or memory

stored mail spy viruses where are they hiding

stored mal spy viruses wher are they hiding

if i replade harddrive wil i loose all stored mal spy viruses

new hard drive or memory to rid all virus bugs patches

new harddrive or memory to rid all virus bugs patches

support erorrordoctor.com

anybody know where malware and spyware live in my laptop

suppor errordoctor

support error doctor

aol don't you have a -free virus infection remove disk for colateral damage during sign-up

aol's-free virus infection remove with send me a cleaner please i will be forced to camcil

aol dosn't have a site for damage to computers during sign up

computer animated cartoon sex pictures

No, the article doesn't make a valid point.

It relies on the bogus assumption people should distinguish sponsored from "earned" search results.

Objectively, the value of a search result does NOT depend on whether it was sponsored or "earned". Subjectively, some people do care, but they're economically irrational so it's unclear why one would fault people who don't care.

This self delusion comes from the fact that acknowledging that the Internet is largely made up of simpletons who do not know what a web application is, will never really understand Twitter, and who continue to use Hotmail happily, and who use Yahoo as their "homepage", puts them at risk of catatonic stupifaction and massive permanent brain damage.

This is amazingly condescending... It completely misses the point of figuring out what people want and assumes everyone is doing nothing better with their time.

For example: I understand twitter just fine and couldn't care much less about it.

Agreed. I understand Twitter, it's inherently useless to me and I'll likely never use it.

The whole argument in the piece is invalid. People are using Twitter and Facebook to reduce the amount of time they spend with people whilst trying to stay in contact with people. My girlfriend uses it and I want to block the damn thing because she'll spend an hour on that 'keeping in touch' instead of us going out for a meal with the people we're trying to keep in touch with.

People went from keeping blogs to using twitter and now instead of making a post or two they'll make a couple of microposts. It's completely, inherently moronic. I contend that people using these completely unneeded services are far dumber than the people clicking google ads.

I have little doubt there are people who've spent months worth of time on Facebook when they could have used that time to actually be with family and friends. Or shit, they could have worked the time they wasted and went on a nice vacation to Paris.

I'm an idiot in more ways than I'm savvy.

Cyclists and motorcyclists think I'm an idiot for driving my car (I'm a "cager") instead of riding to work and getting fit/saving the planet/saving money/not wearing lycra or leather.

And I'm an idiot to the car salesman whose lot I walk onto, knowing very little about cars or vehicle finance or insurance, and I walk out stitched up with a new car loaded with aftermarket products, extended warranty and on high-interest finance.

I'm an idiot to the people who care about fashion because I'm pasty and overweight and I buy what mainstream shops put in front of me.

I'm an idiot to the finance industry for having stacks of debt and no appreciating assets to speak of.

There's a million idiot industries where those in the know make money from the idiots who want to focus their attention on Something Else. The more scrupulous are really just adding value for a fee (say Google, Amazon), and there are those less ethical (e.g. spammers) who take the money of those who can't, don't want to, or are too lazy to learn the ins and outs.

As sarcastic as the article is, it's correct that there's tons of money to be made from these people who don't know or care how the internet works, as long as they get what they want.

Exploiting people's decision making through tricks or noise is nothing internet specific. Grocery store marketers have their equations to induce purchases on the shelf by using colors, gimmicks, etc - just like spam kings. Consumer brands place their names in movies, tv shows and songs and sneak into peoples buying habits as a virtue of repetition and numbers - much like the numbers that bring domain squatters their traffic. And, of course, our political leaders are elected by poisoning our attention space with commercials full of falsehoods aimed at changing people's sentiment illogically.

Welcome to our age of idiot capitalism. This is the era where we all get to put up with the information noise created by formulaic entrepreneurs who are seeking to exploit the collective idiot among us.

Link should be http://www.tekpopuli.com/2008/09/24/100b-internet-idiot-indu...

Thanks. Is there any way to change this once I've submitted it?

There's an edit button, but it goes away after a while.

Unlike Herpes. Ah well. :P

There are a number of editors who can edit URLs after posting.

The story itelf appears to have exploded.

For some reason, the link had a trailing backslash. It works better without it:

http://www.tekpopuli.com/2008/09/24/100b-internet-idiot-indu...

Idiots.

I second ahpeeyam's point. "...as long as they are getting what they want..."

In my surrounding I meet a lot of people everyday who dont even know youtube. Why consider youtube, the address bar... They are clueless as to what to type in. All they know is www.google.com for info. When they search they are happy to find the info they need whether its the link on the right(ads) or left.

Most common search keywords have quality advertisers. Now that most ads are of quality the user wouldnt mind clicking on them. We shouldnt be forgetting the fact that these ad matches are displayed according to keywords. When you search for "xyz tv", you might get a CNET review for it in your search results and an ad reading "buy xyz tv at $250". Now the action is dependent on the user. He might either read the review or buy it from the ad link or might even buy it from a search result page that read "at 50% discount" which might be an even better price.

The real question is, what's the business model for teaching people Internet literacy? And can that even be done?

You guys seem to have been missing his point which is rather simple. Most people, unlike us, do not know how the internet works, are rather new to the internet, maybe have not even heard of digg and are stupid, as far as the internet is concerned.

No wonder that market is growing, new people are coming and porbably always will. That I suppose is what the "make a million by tomorrow" market relies on, also spam as he mentioned etc.

His point kind of seems to be, make money off the ignorant as there are many of them.

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