this post was submitted on 14 Jan 2024
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A couple of five second ads doesn't bother me at all.
I'm from a generation that had no pause or fast forward on the TV before the internet. Every fifteen minutes or so you'd have near enough five minutes of ads. YouTube ads are nothing by comparison.
$10 a month isn't a huge amount, but it's $120 saved by the end of the year that I'd rather spend on something else.
I’m from a generation that had state television where there were no ads at all. I liked it that way.
Exactly. Starting from the premise that these services deserve the revenue from ads is completely wrong. As advertising has grown, so has corporate greed in extracting more value from users while providing a worse service.
Starting from the premise that we owe corporations the opportunity to subject us to mental abuse for any reason is the problem. Let's not forget what ads are and how they work.
I agree with you for the most part, but at the same time people need a way to find the things they want. There are lots of products and services that genuinely make life better, but without advertising you may never even know what you're missing.
That position is completely in the distance behind where we are now, with the pure exploitation and manipulative marketing, but it's still a valid point.
That's valid.
Thank you.
My rule of thumb has always been, since I was a child: if it's advertised on TV, it probably isn't that good.
TV advertising is expensive. The business needs to pay for that advertising, and they also expect to profit from it. Thus, the customers have to pay for the advertising, the profits to the business for the advertising, as well as the product, and the profits to the business for the product. So, in general, if it's advertised on TV it's probably not worth what they want you to pay.
Recently there's been an online therapy service that has grown massively called Better Health. It sounds really good, and content producers I like have apparently thought the same and started advertising it themselves - Behind the Bastards host Robert Evans actually voices an ad for them on his own podcast. However, I've also recently seen advertisements for their service on TV. Now, I'm wary, and I'm just waiting for what I think will be the inevitable controversy over their service.
So yeah, advertising has some valid purpose, but it's also basically complete and totally open warfare. Marketing executives are probably worse than estate agents at this point. At the same time, a person just promoting their idea might not be so villainous - at least right now, who knows what they'll do later?
I'm from that generation too and as soon as I moved out of my folks' house I never subscribed to cable or watched broadcast TV because that constant onslaught of advertising was offensive and I didn't want it in my home.
Me too, but using ublock for a while it's easy and quick to become intolerant of ads.
I do understand the appeal but I also quite like a lot of the smaller content creators and I think they deserve to get paid.
Pirating from a corporation that makes several millions in profits is one thing, I'm not going to pick the pockets of my fellow man.
I'm from a country where we barely had ads on TV back in the day, and even now it's nowhere near as bad as on American TV. I've tried watching US channels online and it's feels like nothing but an insult. YouTube is bad enough for me.