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Comment by chez17 | Hacker News Reader

Do you think Google ads are invasive or annoying? No sound ever, a limited amount of times they can be placed on the site, and they are obviously ads (unlike the "Download Now!" ads on download sites). Perhaps there was more to the transaction than money. You are jumping straight to a conspiracy that you have no proof of. Like the OP, I don't use ad block software because I, as an adult, know what it's like to pay bills and feed myself and I don't mind people who provide me with free services paying their bills and feeding themselves.

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Not that the '"Download Now!" ads on download sites' ARE published by google. Google text ads are just one part of Google's inventory.

The scammy fake-Download links on this famous page, for example, are provided by Google AdChoices

http://www.alternative.to/Google_Reader,29653017#nav-7647923...

I am using AdBlock with whitelist enabled, and I don't see any scammy ads on this page. So whatever Google and AdBlock agreed on, it does not include those scammy ads.

I'm not using any adblocker and I see no scammy ads either.

Has there been any work done from an information-theoretic perspective on the effect of sponsored information added to a page of search results? There's gotta be an academic paper on this somewhere...

I'm particularly interested in the implicit information conveyed by the mere position of a search result on the page, and how that compares to the implicit information contained by the presence of sponsored content. I would think that sponsored content would on average contain maybe half the amount of information as an organic result, since the presence of the ad is partially a function of its relevance but also a function of the amount paid for its placement, whereas organic result position is a purely a function of relevance.

Then again, perhaps the amount paid could also be considered an implicit source of information on the content being offered, but that seems less reliable.

Having to pay bills and feed yourself is not a justification to do anything or to compel someone to do something.

It certainly isn't a justification to coerce people and even less so to demand that people allow themselves to be coerced.

it doesn't have much with "being adult" so "copping with the crap". It has to do with:

- morals. I don't think unsolicited ads are moral. I'd rather pay. But I generally don't get that choice without an adblocker.

- More choice and ethics. Again. I'm the one to decide what I want to see, not adblock people using a revenue model where they're in a position to force companies to pay them to be on a whitelist. That's extorsion.

And.. I'm pretty sure you get revenue from adverts.

Are text ads on Bing and Yahoo searches invasive and annoying? The article appears to say they're still blocked by default while Google's are not.

That hardly seems relevant. The fact that they do not unblock every ad you consider not to be invasive and annoying is unsurprising. They entered into an arrangement with Google where Google agreed to meet certain standards and be vetted; Bing and Yahoo have not.

That is very relevant here.

chez17's comment implied that the whitelist applies to non-invasive and non-annoying ads, while there are a number of new qualifiers here, including a payment which you have omitted from your post.

>They entered into an arrangement with Google where Google agreed to meet certain standards and be vetted; Bing and Yahoo have not.

..and perhaps most importantly, have paid for it.

The whitelist standard is not just about non-intrusive ads as the title of the setting implies to users, it's about a payment too.

> chez17's comment implied that the whitelist applies to non-invasive and non-annoying ads, while there are a number of new qualifiers here, including a payment which you have omitted from your post.

Because it is not relevant. What you said here is true, but no bearing on the thing chez17 and I are walking about (that the ads are not invasive or annoying). I don't have anything against them making money. As long as they are not letting through bad ads, why would I object to them profiting?

> ..and perhaps most importantly, have paid for it.

> The whitelist standard is not just about non-intrusive ads as the title of the setting implies to users, it's about a payment too.

And the relevance is…? Nobody said the transaction did not involve money. A whitelist can only include unobtrusive ads and also charge money for inclusion — those ideas are not at odds. The statement "they are charging money" is 100% compatible with "they are only whitelisting non-invasive and non-annoying ads."

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