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Study: Ad-Free Internet Would Cost Everyone $230-a-Year
Several readers sent word of research into the cost of internet content without ads. They looked at the amount of money spent on internet advertising last year in the U.K., and compared it to the number of U.K. internet users. On average, each user would have to pay about £140 ($230) to make up for the lost revenue of an ad-free internet. In a survey, 98% of consumers said they wouldn't be willing to pay that much for the ability to browse without advertisements.
However, while most consumers regard ads as a necessary trade-off to keep the internet free, they will go to great lengths to avoid advertising they do not wish to see. Of those surveyed, 63 per cent said they skip online video ads 'as quickly as possible' – a figure that rises to 75 per cent for 16-24 year olds. Over a quarter of all respondents said they mute their sound and one in five scroll away from the video. 16 per cent use ad blocking software and 16 per cent open a new browser window or tab.
...OK...where do I sign up?
Considering that cable modems are $50 a month for capped services. Another 30% higher is nothing.
Considering that more viruses are transmitted by ads now than on their own it gets even scarier. Adblock and no script do more to keep viruses out of your stuff than antivirus.
i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
A large portion of that ad revenue is going to sites that don't really provide any kind of value, but are spammy SEO deals. The best part of an internet with no advertising revenue (or at least a lot less of it) would be precisely that all these content farms would not be able to replace that revenue, and would hopefully go away.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
A good study would provide a description of what the internet would look like without ads. My intuition is that I'd be just fine with the only content available being content that did not seek a revenue stream. I thought the internet was better back then anyway.
It's also a pointless study because it's never going to happen. I'd guess the only reason it was done is to support the idea that ad blockers and no script are "bad". Oh wait it was conducted by an ad platform.
Samsung took back my unlocked bootloader because Google wants me to rent movies. They're both evil.
Perhaps the internet reverting to a state where there were less grumpy cat videos, or viral ice bucket challenges, wouldn't be such a terrible thing.
Actually, I would be entirely happy to pay $230/year for ad-free Internet; meaning that I would continue to have access to all the sites that I want, but those sites would be directly supported by my yearly subscription, and so they wouldn't need to display ads or be otherwise beholden to advertisers. I'm sure a great many people would be willing to do so.
The problem is that such a state of affairs is impossible. If people actually started paying for subscriptions, the ads would disappear only temporarily. Eventually companies would realize "Sure, they're paying subscription fees, but if I just put a little unobtrusive link to 'related products' in the sidebar, no on will complain. And, yeah, sure, I'll get a little extra money on the side for displaying links to specific (paying) partners..." Soon enough, the ads are back (in some form or other), and we're now paying for the content twice. (We've seen this happen many times before; e.g. subscription cable-TV was supposed to be ad-free. More recently I've noticed that digital downloads from iTunes or Google Play have ads for other shows added to the beginning.) Moreover, oftentimes 'ad-free' really just means the ads are less obvious but more insidious (product placement, 'trusted' reviewers being bribed to give positive reviews, etc.).
The simple fact is that we cannot ever trust companies to actually honor the social contract of subscription models. Since they cannot stick to the rules, the only option is for end-users endure the constant ads, since at least in this case we don't have to pay subscription costs.
My biggest problem with ads is they are designed to steal your attention from the content. I've mentioned this numerous times whenever a website starts crying about Adblocking. If you want me to read your content, don't put full motion video ads on the side right next to the content I'm trying to read. Don't make 2/3rds of the page giant clickable area to redirect me to your sponsor. I'm not visiting your site to see the ads, I'm there for the content that you put so much work into. Ads are typically designed to steal your attention and be obtrusive. Slashdot's ads are pretty much safe, even though I even have the option to disable ads here.
I don't recall who it was but one big site posted a editorial on why they think Adblock is bullshit. It was the same day they had full page sponsorship and basically clicking anywhere that had empty space would direct you to that sponsor and they had every kind of obnoxious ad possible on the site at the same time. If everybody was sensible about ads then I wouldn't use an adblock, I do have the option enabled to allow unobtrusive ads so at least I'm not that big of a dirtbag.
Basically the internet is turning into Idiocracy more and more every day. Animated ads all around and some times with in the content you're trying to read. NOW GO AWAY IM BAITIN.
Even if you had the option to pay this, there would still be ads, because greed cannot be satisfied. See: cable TV.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
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2) it did not take into account the costs associated with the malware distributed by the various ad platforms.
People already pay for their internet connection, bandwith, web hosting, etc. Maybe the Telegraph could not exist on the web without ads, but that does not mean the internet could not exist. This person seems to belive that the internet exists only because of commercial content producers.
it's the surveillance I don't like. In theory this surveillance is supposed to get me relevant ads but it just creeps me out with it's persistence. I don't really need relevant ads ever. What I actually like is being exposed to lots of different ads. It gives me a sense of what the world is up to in a way. SO I don't mind the ads. It's not like TV ads that I have to wait through. they are just off to the side. What I don't want therefore is the surveillance. it has negative value to me. I don't want targeted ads.
If I could be sure I could be surveillance free I'd pay $230. But I don't see how that is possible. How would I know? where does one draw the line-- things like cookies for sessions and autologin on returning to a site and resuming my netflix movie where I left off are useful. What about amazon auto suggest? I once bought a book on amazon about sexual practices in different cultures and for months I had autosuggests for dildos and some amazingly raunchy bondage movies that I had no idea amazon carried. My sense of embarrassment prevented me from using amazon when other people were in the room. I think however this is not really the surveillance I am worried about. I can easily not use amazon and certainly in the future I always now check the "people who bought this also bought..." before I purchase some item that will trigger things I don't want it suggesting to me. SO that's containable.
But that experience makes me wonder what that little search did for my google profile. Am I now pegged as a dog fucker on google because the key terms I used for a scholarly search had other meanings? I know that google pricks up it's ears when a search leads down a path to a purchase.
You might ask why do I care. I just do, and that's normal. were trained in caring about appearances when were on the playground.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
You know, there was a day, not so long ago, when the internet worked just fine and had very few ads. The ads aren't paying for "the internet". They're paying for people to "work the internet" full time, and it's not very clear how much value they're adding. I'm sure there'd be a loss if we found an effective way of stopping ads, but I don't think it'd be that great for the parts of the internet that make the ISP fee worthwhile. Every loser with a blog and a webcam now loads his page with as many ads as he thinks he can shove down at you, ideally before you see that hte content wasn't what you thought it was, was inane, or was otherwise useless.
20 years ago you could come online and find useful information. Now even the mighty google takes some working over to get through the corporate cruft, click baiting and paid advertisements to get what you came looking for. Even if you could pay to have the ads shut off, you're basically paying ransom to a criminal who holds all the cards.
I remember when Cable TV was ad free because I paid extra for it...now 25-30% of a shows time is dedicated to advertisements, and I get to pay to watch them.
Yea, all of the spam would just go away. And I wouldn't have any more spam show up in my email, right?
And all of that drive-by malware installing stuff would just go away and people would start being ice to each other, right?
Of course, all of our interactivity would still be there. And we could still have e-comerce on the web, we could still use sites like Amazon rather than having to drive miles to get to a limited selection and pay higher prices at a local "friendly" bookstore. But somehow there would be no advertising. And people would just automatically know where all of the new e-comerce sites were. And there would be no one who wanted to steal your identity and your credit card info and drain your bank account. And best of all, no one would ever see a bunch of fools saying "ad free Internet for $230 a year sounds good to me, where do I sign up?" and try to take advantage of that.
We don't even have ad-free PBS television any more, but some people want to believe they could get ad-free Internet so much that they would OK an additional yearly charge?
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You're not going to get ad-free Internet. But if you really care about it at all you can get greatly ad-reduced Internet. And it doesn't involve a yearly fee, just a small expenditure of effort. Block the major ad sources in your Hosts file (or, even better for the more advanced user, set up a network wide block in your router). But be aware, this has the side effect of making your browsing a lot faster, since you cut out a lot of unwanted traffic.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
Advertising is pissing on your brain through your eye sockets.
Bring on the advertising-free web. The signal-to-noise ratio will improve tremendously.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Just $20 a month? And that's from someone biased towards it?
Anyway, now let's see a study of how much advertising has cost each of us from:
- clicking, scrolling, and squinting for the actual content
- giving up, quitting, clicking back, and missing something
- buying, setting up, and using antivirus and adblocking software
- buying some of the frivolous things advertised, after at last being worn down by it, even a bit
- waiting for the page to load
- waiting for computer to run at all, given the heavy load some of our protective software puts on our computers