By the way I'm really glad that Slashdot is sticking it to the man. In the report Iran is actually the champion on freedom censorship not Bahrain (lower score, higher freedom). If you can't beat them, confuse them.
You forget that AdBlock only has a marginal rate of use among common users.
That being said, this platform will have its inherent limitations. Chief among them the fact that you can only advertise to FB users and second due to the fact that the landing page must be developed on a FB page. The first is not really a problem (the user base is huge), but with the second you can expect a lower conversion rate than with Google because the users will have to go through one additional hop and the exit points abound.
I guess it depends on how you use the service. Personally, I never bothered to open an account there, but I'm subscribed to several bookmark RSS feeds, such as this one belonging to the Open Society Institute (aka Soros Foundation).
Ironically enough, you answered your own question. 140 liters is a number I simply picked from thin air. I googled a bit and found out that a typical bathtub actually has roughly double this capacity.
Numbers and parameters don't say anything without a context. People buy stuff because they need to fulfill a need, at least in theory. Spelling out what needs a particular product solves is simply more efficient.
And by the way, this translation act also has some tangible consumer benefits. Let's presume that you do buy the damn bathtub, advertised only through its capacity and you get it delivered. You can't blame the company for anything since the product is exactly as advertised, although it doesn't fulfill your needs. If on the other hand, it advertises the benefits as well, you can now legitimately claim that the company misled you. See the mechanism?
I think you forgot the "stuff that matters" part. I don't know about you, but a story about a real case scenario involving nuclear warfare seems pretty worthy of attention.
Ad revenue doesn't really have to mean loss of privacy, especially in Wikipedia's case. You could easily sell ads for each individual page. Some of them (like those which are history related) won't have any ads at all, while others (like those technical/networking terms) will probably be very competitive. Put in place a bidding system and an ad scoring system and it could actually work.
This is one of the most insightful comments I've read here in a while.
Another side of the equation is the shift towards a post-scarcity economy. Of course, this is only partial, there are still people dying of hunger after all, but in the long run, the human economy will shift more and more towards artificial needs creation and artificial barriers to simulate scarcity. This type of economy, already visible in the software world, will reach critical mass when rapid prototyping units (3D faxes) will become wide spread. That's my prediction anyway.
The problem is that breeder reactors (at least the early models) can be used to obtain weapon grade plutonium. They are also much, much more expensive than traditional ones.
Now with the constant rise in price for nuclear fuel and of course the development of better designs, breeder reactors will most likely become a reality. Of course, that assumes some responsible politicians will avoid knee jerk reactions and that's a big assumption.
The latest evidence seems to point out that China might be behind the Stuxnet worm, as an expedient way of sabotaging a nuclear power without the diplomatic drama.
Of course, this is all highly circumstantial. We'll probably never know with absolute certainty.
Here's a rather insightful analysis on this hypothesis.
What's with the AC posting? Is this the/. variant of screaming and then covering your ears?
Anyway, from what I've read you're definitely on the left of the political spectrum. That's fine. However, coming from a country which suffered through roughly 50 years of "glorious" communism, excuse me if I tend to lean more towards the libertarian side.
Now to the "mind your own business" part. Indeed we are interconnected and other's people decisions affect our lives. This is precisely why a bit of selfishness is healthy. I like to be as independent as possible and leave the same freedom to others. And no, Stalin, Hitler or Pol Pot were genuinely thinking that they were doing the right thing. The masses propelled them powered by an idea of a Great Absolute Truth. If people wouldn't fall for that crap, dictatorships everywhere would crumble.
As for mindfuckery: persuasion deals with rational arguments, while manipulation deals with irrational ones (social conditioning,irrational fears and so on). The third item in the list is propaganda, but that doesn't really concern us. This is a distinction made by social scientists, not advertisers.
On to "ethical". Basically, my job consists of translating a product's features into product benefits. To give you an example let's take this sentence: "This new bathtub has a capacity of 120 liters". That's a feature. Now let me play with it: "With this bathtub, you can finally have those long, relaxing baths in virgin blood without splashing the floor like in a Lovecraftian novel.". This instantly prequalifies the leads and offers them a reason to buy the damn bathtub. Where's the unethical part?
Oh FFS, get off your high horse. To switch to an hominem attack, how exactly are YOU a hero? If you have the courage of your convictions, tell me how did you make this world a better place.
Speaking of compromise though, that was actually a fairly insightful observation. I am indeed a moderatist, in the Norberto Bobbio acception. I believe that virtually every catastrophic clusterfuck in human history has been caused by people claiming to hold the absolute truth. If everyone would just mind his damn business, we'd all be better off.
But I digress. The techniques you highlight are mostly employed in direct response marketing, a very US centric approach. Personally I avoid using such tricks. Not because I'm the "good guy", but because they are self defeating. In the long run, a business will make most of its money through repeat customers. Deceiving them is the quickest way to shoot yourself in the foot. Ethical behavior in marketing is actually the pragmatic approach and before you jump, yes, there is such a thing.
The problem is that good marketing does the job and goes virtually unnoticed while the crappy type, well, you've just described it.
What people perceive as marketing is actually only a fraction of what the field truly encompasses.
Take this very site for instance: I can detect at least 7 marketing techniques used right now. They work as intended, yet they don't seem conspicuous at all.
As for the good guy / bad guy thing, I'm no saint. I just prefer to focus on methods that work. The truth is that this entire shitstorm in advertising is not caused by a sudden explosion in the number of marketers, but rather by the lack of professional ones.
This entire internet revolution led to such a high demand for marketing services that most online entrepreneurs employ the DIY route. This, as you very well noted, has some absolutely horrifying results.
Now let me guess, this is your idea of a rational argument.
Alright, let's switch to troll mod.
I'm smart and creative enough to realize that the world has no heroes, only people who refuse to adapt to the world and try to make the world adapt to them.
I am one of those people. At one point I had to make a choice between a life of virtual slavery as a cubicle hamster and a risky, independent life as a freelancer. I chose the latter.
If that makes me a subhuman sociopathic manipulator then I accept this badge with pride.
And speaking of manipulation, marketers don't deal with that. It's called persuasion and it's a very different beast. I could try to explain the difference, but that would require you to think and not spew preconceived garbage. Kind of an useless effort, you must agree.
Now crawl back under that rock, you poor, unhappy soul.
Quite correct. But even non-commercial sites need visitors. Or do you think that only Walmart and Amazon employ this "highly controversial" tool called marketing?
Doesn't really work like that. I have to torture a few kittens and take a relaxing bath in virgin blood before I can get any decent sleep. It's why I find/. so attractive.
Right... Care to elaborate more or is this just your way of godwinning an argument?
Of course things have. What specifically are you talking about?
I don't know... maybe the explosion of the frigging Internet? You might not be aware of it, but once an online presence is built, people don't exactly tend to flock to it. It's more like building a mall in the middle of the desert: The land is dirt cheap, but you will have problems finding customers. Marketing is a vital tool in this regard.
Why, thank you. I'm afraid your spelling and grammar don't impress me.
FTFY
Fruity Loops sucks. Give me some credit.
Credit must be earned. So far, you've failed spectacularly in this regard.
Ah, now that you've put it so eloquently I see how my comment was in error - I'm retarded. I see. You explain yourself well and in doing so bring enlightenment and a greater level of mutual understanding between the two of us.
If you act like an asshole, don't be surprised when you get kicked. You want a reasonable argument? Act like it.
Well, whatever. I won't maintain that you should kill yourself - though you could consider a change of career - but judging by your lack of actual response (other than angry blustering and the classic tactic of trying to discredit your rival without actually bringing anything useful to the discussion - you really do work in marketing!) it seems I hit a nerve...
A nerve you've hit. You directly attacked the integrity of myself and my profession.I know that to some people this might not mean much, but to me it does.
As for your "useful" advice, I've helped more people in my position of marketer than you could possibly imagine. I'm proud of my profession and I won't hesitate to defend it from douchebags who think they know it all.
P.S. Wise move in switching to AC posting. There's no better way to highlight the conviction of your beliefs.
Slashdot Mirror
By the way I'm really glad that Slashdot is sticking it to the man. In the report Iran is actually the champion on freedom censorship not Bahrain (lower score, higher freedom). If you can't beat them, confuse them.
Source
Well... so are the sites themselves, both the .com and the .net variants.
I smell a bit of FUD spreading.
You forget that AdBlock only has a marginal rate of use among common users.
That being said, this platform will have its inherent limitations. Chief among them the fact that you can only advertise to FB users and second due to the fact that the landing page must be developed on a FB page. The first is not really a problem (the user base is huge), but with the second you can expect a lower conversion rate than with Google because the users will have to go through one additional hop and the exit points abound.
Will be interesting to watch either way.
Erm... No, I really don't.
That's sheer nonsense. I have yet to find a single ad on Delicious. On second thought, this is perhaps why Yahoo made this business decision.
I guess it depends on how you use the service. Personally, I never bothered to open an account there, but I'm subscribed to several bookmark RSS feeds, such as this one belonging to the Open Society Institute (aka Soros Foundation).
Ironically enough, you answered your own question. 140 liters is a number I simply picked from thin air. I googled a bit and found out that a typical bathtub actually has roughly double this capacity.
Numbers and parameters don't say anything without a context. People buy stuff because they need to fulfill a need, at least in theory. Spelling out what needs a particular product solves is simply more efficient.
And by the way, this translation act also has some tangible consumer benefits. Let's presume that you do buy the damn bathtub, advertised only through its capacity and you get it delivered. You can't blame the company for anything since the product is exactly as advertised, although it doesn't fulfill your needs. If on the other hand, it advertises the benefits as well, you can now legitimately claim that the company misled you. See the mechanism?
I think you forgot the "stuff that matters" part. I don't know about you, but a story about a real case scenario involving nuclear warfare seems pretty worthy of attention.
You should try republic vs tyranny. Some odd correlation there.
Ad revenue doesn't really have to mean loss of privacy, especially in Wikipedia's case. You could easily sell ads for each individual page. Some of them (like those which are history related) won't have any ads at all, while others (like those technical/networking terms) will probably be very competitive. Put in place a bidding system and an ad scoring system and it could actually work.
I know the quote from my high school organic chemistry teacher.
He's best known for the periodic table, but he was also a pioneer in petro-chemistry.
This is one of the most insightful comments I've read here in a while.
Another side of the equation is the shift towards a post-scarcity economy. Of course, this is only partial, there are still people dying of hunger after all, but in the long run, the human economy will shift more and more towards artificial needs creation and artificial barriers to simulate scarcity. This type of economy, already visible in the software world, will reach critical mass when rapid prototyping units (3D faxes) will become wide spread. That's my prediction anyway.
... after studying the chemical composition of oil: "This stuff is way too valuable to simply burn it".
The problem is that breeder reactors (at least the early models) can be used to obtain weapon grade plutonium. They are also much, much more expensive than traditional ones.
Now with the constant rise in price for nuclear fuel and of course the development of better designs, breeder reactors will most likely become a reality. Of course, that assumes some responsible politicians will avoid knee jerk reactions and that's a big assumption.
The latest evidence seems to point out that China might be behind the Stuxnet worm, as an expedient way of sabotaging a nuclear power without the diplomatic drama.
Of course, this is all highly circumstantial. We'll probably never know with absolute certainty.
Here's a rather insightful analysis on this hypothesis.
But... but... think about the children.
What's with the AC posting? Is this the /. variant of screaming and then covering your ears?
Anyway, from what I've read you're definitely on the left of the political spectrum. That's fine. However, coming from a country which suffered through roughly 50 years of "glorious" communism, excuse me if I tend to lean more towards the libertarian side.
Now to the "mind your own business" part. Indeed we are interconnected and other's people decisions affect our lives. This is precisely why a bit of selfishness is healthy. I like to be as independent as possible and leave the same freedom to others. And no, Stalin, Hitler or Pol Pot were genuinely thinking that they were doing the right thing. The masses propelled them powered by an idea of a Great Absolute Truth. If people wouldn't fall for that crap, dictatorships everywhere would crumble.
As for mindfuckery: persuasion deals with rational arguments, while manipulation deals with irrational ones (social conditioning,irrational fears and so on). The third item in the list is propaganda, but that doesn't really concern us. This is a distinction made by social scientists, not advertisers.
On to "ethical". Basically, my job consists of translating a product's features into product benefits. To give you an example let's take this sentence: "This new bathtub has a capacity of 120 liters". That's a feature. Now let me play with it: "With this bathtub, you can finally have those long, relaxing baths in virgin blood without splashing the floor like in a Lovecraftian novel.". This instantly prequalifies the leads and offers them a reason to buy the damn bathtub. Where's the unethical part?
Oh FFS, get off your high horse. To switch to an hominem attack, how exactly are YOU a hero? If you have the courage of your convictions, tell me how did you make this world a better place.
Speaking of compromise though, that was actually a fairly insightful observation. I am indeed a moderatist, in the Norberto Bobbio acception. I believe that virtually every catastrophic clusterfuck in human history has been caused by people claiming to hold the absolute truth. If everyone would just mind his damn business, we'd all be better off.
But I digress. The techniques you highlight are mostly employed in direct response marketing, a very US centric approach. Personally I avoid using such tricks. Not because I'm the "good guy", but because they are self defeating. In the long run, a business will make most of its money through repeat customers. Deceiving them is the quickest way to shoot yourself in the foot. Ethical behavior in marketing is actually the pragmatic approach and before you jump, yes, there is such a thing.
The problem is that good marketing does the job and goes virtually unnoticed while the crappy type, well, you've just described it.
What people perceive as marketing is actually only a fraction of what the field truly encompasses.
Take this very site for instance: I can detect at least 7 marketing techniques used right now. They work as intended, yet they don't seem conspicuous at all.
As for the good guy / bad guy thing, I'm no saint. I just prefer to focus on methods that work. The truth is that this entire shitstorm in advertising is not caused by a sudden explosion in the number of marketers, but rather by the lack of professional ones.
This entire internet revolution led to such a high demand for marketing services that most online entrepreneurs employ the DIY route. This, as you very well noted, has some absolutely horrifying results.
Now let me guess, this is your idea of a rational argument.
Alright, let's switch to troll mod.
I'm smart and creative enough to realize that the world has no heroes, only people who refuse to adapt to the world and try to make the world adapt to them.
I am one of those people. At one point I had to make a choice between a life of virtual slavery as a cubicle hamster and a risky, independent life as a freelancer. I chose the latter.
If that makes me a subhuman sociopathic manipulator then I accept this badge with pride.
And speaking of manipulation, marketers don't deal with that. It's called persuasion and it's a very different beast. I could try to explain the difference, but that would require you to think and not spew preconceived garbage. Kind of an useless effort, you must agree.
Now crawl back under that rock, you poor, unhappy soul.
Nearly everyone employs the highly controversial tool called "the toilet," but few over the age of two are particularly proud of what they do with it.
Should I understand that you have a bias against plumbers?
Quite correct. But even non-commercial sites need visitors. Or do you think that only Walmart and Amazon employ this "highly controversial" tool called marketing?
Doesn't really work like that. I have to torture a few kittens and take a relaxing bath in virgin blood before I can get any decent sleep. It's why I find /. so attractive.
Thank you. It all makes much more sense now.
Not necessarily, but he has a point.
Right... Care to elaborate more or is this just your way of godwinning an argument?
Of course things have. What specifically are you talking about?
I don't know... maybe the explosion of the frigging Internet? You might not be aware of it, but once an online presence is built, people don't exactly tend to flock to it. It's more like building a mall in the middle of the desert: The land is dirt cheap, but you will have problems finding customers. Marketing is a vital tool in this regard.
Why, thank you. I'm afraid your spelling and grammar don't impress me.
FTFY
Fruity Loops sucks. Give me some credit.
Credit must be earned. So far, you've failed spectacularly in this regard.
Ah, now that you've put it so eloquently I see how my comment was in error - I'm retarded. I see. You explain yourself well and in doing so bring enlightenment and a greater level of mutual understanding between the two of us.
If you act like an asshole, don't be surprised when you get kicked. You want a reasonable argument? Act like it.
Well, whatever. I won't maintain that you should kill yourself - though you could consider a change of career - but judging by your lack of actual response (other than angry blustering and the classic tactic of trying to discredit your rival without actually bringing anything useful to the discussion - you really do work in marketing!) it seems I hit a nerve...
A nerve you've hit. You directly attacked the integrity of myself and my profession.I know that to some people this might not mean much, but to me it does.
As for your "useful" advice, I've helped more people in my position of marketer than you could possibly imagine. I'm proud of my profession and I won't hesitate to defend it from douchebags who think they know it all.
P.S. Wise move in switching to AC posting. There's no better way to highlight the conviction of your beliefs.