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Comment by folkrav | Hacker News Reader

While I agree with the sentiment, the world of Internet advertising just doesn't run like that at this point. The current advertisers all look like they're in the RF equipment supplier, which is probably, all things considered, what we'd probably call a niche. I would totally prefer things to be that way, but having compared to major ad networks, in the eyes of advertisers, doing things this way mostly mean throwing away that sweet sweet analytics data and some control. There's just very little incentive for most businesses past a certain scale looking to advertise to do things this way.

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It's a niche website, and they're advertising for people who are interested in that niche. I do hands-on work with RF sometimes, and I learned of at least two new-to-me companies with products that relate to the space I operate in while just poking around the website for a few minutes.

This isn't stuff that I want to buy for me to putter around with at home. It is instead stuff that I can use to solve problems for clients; things that be quoted as a part of a larger-scale job.

Like the advertising that supported the trade rags of yore, there's definite function to this very deliberate style of ad placement that probably isn't worth trading for that sweet sweet analytics and some control.

These weren't random ads for dick pills, Raycon headphones, or NordVPN. It is instead all highly-targeted and industry-specific.

It's remarkable in that I saw the advertising at all since I've been blocking ads on the web for as long as we've had a web to advertise on.

But I did see these ads. I noted some of them. None were garish or distracting. I took no action to block them.

If he's trying to offer ad placement for companies who want to inform people like me of the stuff they sell, and I think that he is, then: His method completely nails it.

I don't disagree at all, and as I said, I'd love for this approach to still be more of a thing. My point was more that it's taking an ever shrinking proportion of the advertising pie, cause your typical marketing people are more interested in targeting to as large a targetable audience as they can, meaning these smaller sites aren't even on their radar. They speak in hit and conversion rates. For niche markets however, as you said, there's visibly still an audience, so hat off to him for still offering that kind of space.

But that's always been the case. Do you think Vogue advertisers were ever the same as Byte magazines or whatever?

> the world of Internet advertising just doesn't run like that at this point.

They're doing it though.

> the world of Internet advertising just doesn't run like that at this point

It has always worked this way:

1. if you can sell the ads yourself, you get better rates and better, relevant advertisers.

2. if you can’t sell ads yourself, you use ad networks and send your audience the worst of the internet.

All the major pubs do this. It’s impressive that a smaller outlet does it.

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