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Comment by jrockway | Hacker News Reader

Why? To create unnecessary Internet controversy?

The fact of the matter is: I'm happy getting Google search for free, and I've been a loyal paid subscriber to the Times since I've moved to New York. The business model of ads seems to work, otherwise there would be no Google or New York Times to complain about.

Furthermore, the comment I replied to has nothing to do with the article. Web pages and Chrome extensions are totally different things. Web pages present you with what the content creator wants you to see. Chrome extensions as documented in this article change that out from under you without telling you. Do you see the difference?

(Compare that to an extension like AdBlock, which makes clear that it removes ads from pages you visit, so if you install it, you won't wonder why you aren't seeing ads anymore.)

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>The business model of ads seems to work, otherwise there would be no Google or New York Times to complain about.

Traditionally (i.e. in the print version) the ads in an edition of the NYT did not contain malware that was going to infect my computer and install toolbars and key loggers.

Google ads point to sites that contain malware. If you want people to stop criticising Google ads then maybe you should drop whatever Google+ stuff your boss thinks you are working on right now and fix the fact that searches for 'Firefox' return ads that point to sites containing malware downloads.

Screenshot: http://i.imgur.com/jX5Lt9F.png

One of those sites even has a page offering a malware infested Chrome download (although I couldn't get it to show in an ad), so maybe that will motivate you to act. (googlechrome.xtremedownload.com‎).

A brief search seems to suggest that those sites bundle the apps with toolbars and unwanted browser extensions that do things like inject ads into pages and so on. Potentially they are doing even worse things.

>Web pages present you with what the content creator wants you to see. Chrome extensions as documented in this article change that out from under you without telling you. Do you see the difference?

The difference seems fairly unimportant when the content creator (in this case Google) is happy to serve me ads that are just as malicious as these malware browser extensions.

Now we've completely derailed the discussion.

(Compare that to an extension like AdBlock, which makes clear that it removes ads from pages you visit, so if you install it, you won't wonder why you aren't seeing ads anymore.)

Why would anyone ever want to see ads?

I have always found them to be utterly useless, in terms of whatever they may be peddling, whenever I have had the unwanted irritation of them showing up on my browser (yeah, yeah, your website, your rules; but also my browser, my rules).

The worst idea in this respect is the Subscription+Ads model, which in my book is like adding insult to the injury. No, you may not have my money only to cram ads down my throat, thank you very much. There are plenty of ways I can consume my news on the web, without stupid advertisements, and I'll keep doing that. If you don't like that, you can take your oh-so-precious content and shove it.

Not only are they useless, they cost me money as a customer. Every company paying for ads, needs to earn a greater margin to cover the cost of ads. If the entire ad market collapsed and products instead needed to compete on price, quality and overall value delivered to the customer, we would all be better off. Advertising allows firms to compete in a vector which provides me no benefits.

I would love it if we had a law that said once a product achieves more than something like 10% market share, it could no longer be advertised. Advertising for new unknown products makes sense. Once I know about a product, advertising just serves to divert resources from making the product better and to generate noise that dilutes the message from new products of which I might not be aware.

One of the biggest problems in this country and all countries are people who live their live accepting what they are told, instead of seeking out an answer to their questions and doubts on their own. People accept information from Fox, CNN, NY Times, NY Post, radio, advertisements, etc. at face value. Culturally, we would all be better off with an attitude like those who read and write the reviews for products on Amazon. I and every other customer get 1000x the value from Amazon reviews than I get from advertising. It has saved me from buying many many dud products and helped me discover the products that provide the best value. Plus, there is only so much any manufacturer can do to game those reviews since it is eventually self-correcting (i.e. pay for good reviews increases sales among the misled, who later show up and post most honest reviews that will be less favorable or downright negative)

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