Slashdot Mirror
A Peek Into the Business Side of Online Publishing (Video)
Mark Westlake is the Chief Revenue Office for TechMediaNetwork. Slashdot has often taken a mediawatch role, especially when it comes to technology coverage -- which is what TechMediaNetork does for a living. As Chief Revenue Office, Mark is in charge of making sure enough money comes in to pay writers and editors, pay for bandwidth and servers, and hopefully have enough revenue over and above expenses to show a profit. We've interviewed editors and writers, and plenty of writers' work gets linked from Slashdot, but we pay little or no (mostly no) attention to the business side of the publishing business. Like it or not, if we are going to have online news someone has to sell the ads and make decisions about whether to set up a paywall or not. That's Mark's job. Like him or not, he does a job somebody has to do, and has been doing it for 30 years. He knows he's talking to a potentially hostile audience here, but he accepts that. As he says, near the end of the video, "...you can't please everybody, right?"
How can we turn off the pop ups about the new mobile site? I don't really give a shit since the "new" mobile site looks like ass. The constant pop ups at every page load is fucking annoying.
Spoken like a salesman.
I read the interview, it wasn't bad.
tldr
Basic idea was that the more sought after the content and the more restricted the content is, the more it is worth.
Don't know something? Look it up. Still don't know? Then ask.
That does bring up an interesting question.
How much should goat.cx charge for advertising?
I'm sure there have been millions of page views, but the average page linger time has gotta be one second or less.
Don't know something? Look it up. Still don't know? Then ask.
Really. I think it's quite a change in posture what I have thought slashdot has been as I've followed it over 14 years. I understand there is a need for money too, but if that gets done I'm going say goodbye and thanks for all the fish past years.
It's just the opportunity we've been waiting for, to start our own *new* Slashdot, with hookers and blackjack!
Strange things are afoot at the Circle-K.
And if there's anything the internet is good for, it's "restricting content", so that something you don't want getting out there doesn't get out there. Yup.
Why do I have to care your business model isn't designed to make as much money as you think you should make? My heart bleeds for him like it does for horse carriage makers, walkmans, news papers or any other business model that has been replaced by technology and access to the internet.
I don't care where I get my news, hell as long as someone can post on any site "so and so happened today" and maybe show some photos of the even I'm good for news.
by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
So, you’ve got to balance, I guess you could say church and state, you got to balance that user experience, so that, in our case, we try to do one for 24 hours, no more, if it’s a real intrusive ad, and then we measure, you measure.
Well, I will try to torture Mark Westlake for 24 hours if it REALLY hurts.
My god... and the "none of our readers will be using adblockers" crap further down... WHY DO YOU THINK ANYONE WITH A BRAIN RUNS AN AD BLOCKER?
Because it is the only way to keep some fucking sanity! READ the quote again. For 24 hours... what is MISSING is per what? He tries to run a really intrusive ad only 24 hours per day? Wow, well that is protecting the user experience alright, if said user experience is absolute horror.
Not this guy does NOT state that they only test a potential new ad for how intrusive it is for 24 hours max and then measure the response to this new idea and then decide for or against using it again. That is NOT what he is saying. He is saying that if a really intrusive ad comes his way, he will run it BUT only for 24 hours because he knows that if he does it longer EVERYONE will leave. He does not limit how many DIFFERENT really intrusive ads he runs, just that any singular REALLY intrusive ad gets run for a maximum of 24 hours so that for a news site, EVERYONE who visits will have seen it... nice guy eh?
I first looked into ad blocking when the ISP I was using at the time ran a banner add that was a blinking nightmare for a service I was already using (UPC Cable) it was REALLY annoying and so I searched in how to block it proxy level so it would work on all my computers and browsers. I never went back but I do routinely update it to catch the new ads.
The reason is simple, give an advertising the finger and they will rape your children and sell their organs. It is NEVER enough for advertisers, the ads will always be more in your face, more jarring, more of them and getting more and more in the way of the content. TV ads are a prime example. Nobody really minded "this program brought to you by" messages. And interupting a 1 hour program three times gives those of us with bladder issues time to relieve themselves. And 4 times an hour, well why not. And 5 times an hour helps those with really bad bladders. And overlying ads over the closing credits hurts nobody. And overlaying ads over the actual program itself... FUCK IT! ENOUGH! NO MORE!
Someone made a nice graph of the DVD experience for pirates vs saps who buy their DVD's in the shops. http://thenextweb.com/shareables/2010/02/19/experience-dvd-pirate-vs-paying-customer/
Much the same can be said for the web browsing experience of those with and without an adblocker. Occasionaly I have to use a non-blocked browser and ARGH! The HORROR, the SLOWNESS, the virusses served by unchecked 3rd party ad servers.
The STUPIDITY of advertisers is such they are their own worst enemy. So... you want to serve me a video ad before I can see the video I want... okay... I am slightly irritated and will associate that irritation with the product you are about to show me but hey, irritation is good in trying to get me to buy something... then I wait for it to load... slowly and the ad is TOTALLY irrelevant to me (some car ad for a SUV that is only available in the US, I don't drive cars, don't like SUV's and am in the EU). Then the real video refuses to load, I reload the page. Same ad again. NOT GOING TO BUY! Want to watch another video, same ad. Another video. Same ad. Week later another video. Same ad... I NOW LOATH THAT CAR AND BRAND WITH A FIERCENESS MOST PEOPLE RESERVE FOR... well other ads to be honest. Dog poo on the sidewalk you just stepped in when you took off your shoe to remove a piece of glass that just boar straight into your big toe you just stumped against something? HAS GOT NOTHING ON THAT CAR AD!
So... I block and... life is wonderful, I get
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
"You need to have the Adobe Flash Player to view this content."
Godamnit Slashdot, we're almost in 2013 and you're still pushing that has-been technology dinosaur from the 1990's.
Get free satoshi (Bitcoin) and Dogecoins
So...that's an excuse to not even attempt to make ANYONE happy? Marky-Mark... that's why we hate people like you. It's not the idea of making a profit we hate, it's the idea of wringing every last cent out at any cost - no matter how despicable or ethically challenged your methods prove to be - in the race for *just that much MORE* profit from something. People watch ads because they don't get in the way, or they are fun. The harder you force the issue, the more people will leave or avoid your site(s).
We need to use online information to move more of our economy in the 21st century to beyond money (towards high-tech subsistence with gardening robots and solar panels, a bigger gift-economy with online exchange of ideas, and better internet-empowered participatory planning at all levels of government), and to soften the money-focused parts with a "basic income" (perhaps 1/2 of the GDP evenly distributed).
See as just one example, from around 1986 (an example the web makes possible through online publishing) about why the deeper logic behind such an article is failing:
"G. A. Cohen - Against Capitalism" (***)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yA9WPQeow9c
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oD1YEzd6QzQ
We need to make this social transition because our technologies have become too powerful to do things in ironically stupid uncompassionate ways anymore (based on scarcity assumptions), since WWII and other events since have shown how easy it is to institutionalize the systematic destruction of large numbers of human beings using the tools of abundance (one of which is communication systems and another being transport systems). See Marshall Brain's book "Manna" for examples of two ways forward, one awful and one hopefully better:
http://marshallbrain.com/manna1.htm
Or read James P. Hogans' Voyage From Yesteryear.
http://www.jamesphogan.com/books/info.php?titleID=29&cmd=summary
------
(***) Some criticism of Cohen: Cohen misses that hunter/gatherers had more spare time and freedom than agriculturalists (even if they had different difficulties). He also misses that "artificial scarcity" comes from more than advertising to increase demand -- artificial scarcity comes from rent-seeking through state-enforced monopolies (like patents, copyrights, overly broad trademarks, and so on) and by laws that direct corporate welfare through subsidies (like to the beef, dairy, and corn industries) or ignoring negative externalities (like pollution from coal) or systemic risks (like from financial or nuclear meltdowns). And being in the UK then, he ignores how the "war is a racket" that now so dominates US political expenditures now. His later writing is interesting because he begins to focus on the need for *moral* transformation in our society (more akin to getting non-land owners and women the right to vote, or abolishing slavery).
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.