Your point is partially valid, but there is a different facet to this situation.
By the fact that you read/. and constructed a succinct, well written counter point, I assume intelligence on your part.
You thus represent a very appealing target market. Let's call this market the "geek" market for the time being. We have many challenges addressing this market, since I know that the geek market often opts out of ads. I also am aware that they often turn ads off. But nonetheless, you represent an intelligent consumer group that is the target of a lot of advertising. It's not just for "mindless people". Take a look at the ads at the top of this page, unless you've blocked them. The nice thing about these ads is that they are relevant to the/. community.
I discovered thinkgeek from a banner ad on slashdot, and now go there regularly to peruse the handheld gps units, among other items. This was useful and relatively unobtrusive, and aimed at an intelligent community. I think this is a great example of positive advertising.
In summary, not all advertising is manipulation. David Ogilvy once made a famous (if not somewhat sexist by today's standards) quote: "The consumer isn't a moron. She is your wife." His sincere point was that you should treat the consumer with respect.
The cluetrain manifesto lists a lot of advertisers as signatories. Not all advertisers disrespect consumers. I am both an advertiser and a consumer. I try to create advertising that I wouldn't mind seeing.
And finally, keep in mind that overt manipulation via the click through isn't the only goal. Branding is as much a goal as traffic for many advertisers.
We monitor not only click through rates (which is a pretty crude measurement tool for campaign for success, actually) as well as conversion rates.
A conversion is defined differently for different destination sites. For example, if the destination is an e-commerce site then the conversion might be a purchase, though usually we measure different degrees of activity (click through, browsing, e-mail alert sign up, purchase, etc.)
So if someone clicks through accidentally, and then they pretty much immediately leave the destination page, they don't count for much. If they click through and actually hang around for a while, then we measure them.
Exactly. I made a longer post below on this, but I can guarantee you that unless we have more information on users (and can thus eliminate annoying ads) we will see a lot more of these ads.
I run the internet department at an large asian ad agency, and we develop ads in what I consider to be a user-friendly manner.
We do produce campaigns with popup ads, particularly since these ads get a much higher response that banners. However, I refuse to bombard users like x10. We place these ads only on sites on which there is a strong correlation between user interest and the product/service being offered.
Most importantly, we use cookies to identify whether or not you have already seen the ad. If the ad has been served to you once, we stop and serve it again only after several days have passed, and you will see this ad a maximum number of times (3-5 over a couple weeks). We achieve very high success rates with this, and I am confident that we aren't annoying too many people. (hmmm... cookies do have a good side).
And before I get any knee jerk reaction to pop ups in general, please remember that ads pay for content. Need I remind us all of Suck, Feed, and Automatic Media?
We can all agree that x10 and similar annoying, "mass" internet advertising sucks.
Pay-for content is not the alternative. Subscription based content is not currently a successful online business model. The WSJ, Playboy, and a handful of others are the few exceptions. If/. started charging tomorrow for access, you'd see a very, very sharp drop in traffic. When I say 'sharp drop' I mean that traffic would essentially dry up. When micropayment infrastructure 'happens', this could change, but for the time being, ads are the only real alternative (if the content producers want to eat, feed their children, dogs, katz, etc.)
What is annoying about these ads is that they are ignorant of who you are, what you are interested in, and how many times you've seen the ad.
If you go to the record store, and the clerk says:
Hey dude! That new Offspring album just came out.
But you don't like Offspring, so you say:
Dude! I don't even LIKE Offspring. But you can give me that new Outkast CD.>
Unless your clerk is totally, totally stoned, or, alternatively, a complete moron (or works at Tower records, which is essentially the same thing), he will probably remember that you don't like the Offspring in the future and won't pester you with offers for "pretty fly for a white guy" singles. He also will not wander around the store offering you all the other Outkast CDs, since that would be annoying and counter-productive to making a sale (though he might introduce a new group similar to Outkast since you'd likely be interested).
My analogy is clear, I hope. The real problem is that these popup ads, indeed all online ads, are less intelligent that you're average record store clear (but, it must be said, more intelligent that tower records' clerks and the current US president).
So how do we make these ads more intelligent?
Easy. Let them track you. Make a nym if want, whatever. But face the fact that if you want 'free' content, you are going to have to accept advertising and will have to allow tracking unless you want to continue to receive annoying, irrelevant advertising.
And don't think that you can just keep on blocking these ads. If blocking becomes widespread, which it seems to be (particularly among attractive niche target markets like slashdot readers), the online ad industry will just find new, more intrusive ways of getting eyeballs and clicks.
While the class this guy is offering looks like yet-another-get-rich-quick scheme, don't dismiss adult content online. It's a real money maker.
Estimates of the adult content industry online revenue are often overstated, but there is indeed money to be made. With a little bit of brand and consistent content, you've got a pretty stable audience, and one that is willing to pay regularly for access to this material.
This is more than can be said for most content sites that instead must 'rely' on revenue from advertising (a revenue stream which has turned out to be a bit unreliable). When a micropayment infrastructure is widespread enough to change that, then we may see things change, but for the time being most of us aren't willing to pay for Slashdot, or any other (non-adult) content site.
Say what you will about the "morality" of this content--it's making money where others aren't.
IBM's current target market for Linux products and services is clearly still IT professionals.
Question: Will we ever see IBM expand this target market to end-users?
It's nice that IBM is pushing Linux (though clearly you aren't doing this simply because it's a nice thing to do), but I'm sure a lot of us would like to see big blue get behind a drive to get Linux rolled out en masse on workstations. That's what could make a real difference...
Re:Videogame revenue is far less than movie revenu
on
Review: Tomb Raider
·
· Score: 1
Salon has a good article debunking the game industry revenue claims vs. the movie industry (and speaking of Lara Croft, the Salon article also details the T&A demos at E3).
I don't doubt that the video game industry will eventually outpace the the movie industry in terms of revenue, but by that time the difference won't be games vs. movies, it will be interactive media vs. non-interactive (legacy) media.
I recently bought a Pioneer 737. Great player, but it was regioned. In Thailand you can get the unit de-regioned right in the store for about $20, which I did;) The 737 player is on the RCE compatible list, but I'll have to wait to see if my hacked model plays the new discs.
We all know that the DVD protection system was a Bad Idea from the beginning, but I have to admire that someone came up with a semi-clever solution. Again, though, this is a bandaid on a gaping wound.
We have to ask: What are the logical consequences of RCE discs?
Higher rate of piracy for DVD discs (incuding RCE discs)
New model players that can handle RCE and multiregion/noregion.
I don't buy pirated DVDs right now, but only because they lack some of the extra features on the original discs, and the menus are sometimes "hand made". If quality of the hacked discs improves, though, I'll gladly pick them up instead of an RCE release.
Correct. Amex does give away readers. Have you ever used one? Personally, I wouldn't like to add this to the list of things I carry with my laptop. Additionally, built in smart card readers could be very useful for card based user authentication, etc.
Would you like to carry a credit card swipe terminal around?
And as far as price, being "essentially a transciever (sic)" does not to correlate to low production cost.
Also, when you reference transceivers, you are referring to contactless smart cards. These are a more recent development than older generation smart cards and haven't been deployed as widely.
Amex lists costs for their readers at US$25. Third party external readers are available from this price up to US$100.00. Still a significant subsidy.
Maybe not cheap, but I just saw a tosh laptop (distributed in Asia for sure, i don't know about the rest of the world) that has a smart card reader built in, and that couldn't be done at much expense (cost of that machine wasn't higher than others with same config.). Could accept, for example, Amex Blue for online purchases, with no additional hardware.
Slashdot Mirror
By the fact that you read /. and constructed a succinct, well written counter point, I assume intelligence on your part.
You thus represent a very appealing target market. Let's call this market the "geek" market for the time being. We have many challenges addressing this market, since I know that the geek market often opts out of ads. I also am aware that they often turn ads off. But nonetheless, you represent an intelligent consumer group that is the target of a lot of advertising. It's not just for "mindless people". Take a look at the ads at the top of this page, unless you've blocked them. The nice thing about these ads is that they are relevant to the /. community.
I discovered thinkgeek from a banner ad on slashdot, and now go there regularly to peruse the handheld gps units, among other items. This was useful and relatively unobtrusive, and aimed at an intelligent community. I think this is a great example of positive advertising.
In summary, not all advertising is manipulation. David Ogilvy once made a famous (if not somewhat sexist by today's standards) quote: "The consumer isn't a moron. She is your wife." His sincere point was that you should treat the consumer with respect.
The cluetrain manifesto lists a lot of advertisers as signatories. Not all advertisers disrespect consumers. I am both an advertiser and a consumer. I try to create advertising that I wouldn't mind seeing.
And finally, keep in mind that overt manipulation via the click through isn't the only goal. Branding is as much a goal as traffic for many advertisers.
We monitor not only click through rates (which is a pretty crude measurement tool for campaign for success, actually) as well as conversion rates.
A conversion is defined differently for different destination sites. For example, if the destination is an e-commerce site then the conversion might be a purchase, though usually we measure different degrees of activity (click through, browsing, e-mail alert sign up, purchase, etc.)
So if someone clicks through accidentally, and then they pretty much immediately leave the destination page, they don't count for much. If they click through and actually hang around for a while, then we measure them.
Exactly. I made a longer post below on this, but I can guarantee you that unless we have more information on users (and can thus eliminate annoying ads) we will see a lot more of these ads.
I run the internet department at an large asian ad agency, and we develop ads in what I consider to be a user-friendly manner.
We do produce campaigns with popup ads, particularly since these ads get a much higher response that banners. However, I refuse to bombard users like x10. We place these ads only on sites on which there is a strong correlation between user interest and the product/service being offered.
Most importantly, we use cookies to identify whether or not you have already seen the ad. If the ad has been served to you once, we stop and serve it again only after several days have passed, and you will see this ad a maximum number of times (3-5 over a couple weeks). We achieve very high success rates with this, and I am confident that we aren't annoying too many people. (hmmm... cookies do have a good side).
And before I get any knee jerk reaction to pop ups in general, please remember that ads pay for content. Need I remind us all of Suck, Feed, and Automatic Media?
We can all agree that x10 and similar annoying, "mass" internet advertising sucks.
Pay-for content is not the alternative. Subscription based content is not currently a successful online business model. The WSJ, Playboy, and a handful of others are the few exceptions. If /. started charging tomorrow for access, you'd see a very, very sharp drop in traffic. When I say 'sharp drop' I mean that traffic would essentially dry up. When micropayment infrastructure 'happens', this could change, but for the time being, ads are the only real alternative (if the content producers want to eat, feed their children, dogs, katz, etc.)
What is annoying about these ads is that they are ignorant of who you are, what you are interested in, and how many times you've seen the ad.
If you go to the record store, and the clerk says:
But you don't like Offspring, so you say:
Unless your clerk is totally, totally stoned, or, alternatively, a complete moron (or works at Tower records, which is essentially the same thing), he will probably remember that you don't like the Offspring in the future and won't pester you with offers for "pretty fly for a white guy" singles. He also will not wander around the store offering you all the other Outkast CDs, since that would be annoying and counter-productive to making a sale (though he might introduce a new group similar to Outkast since you'd likely be interested).
My analogy is clear, I hope. The real problem is that these popup ads, indeed all online ads, are less intelligent that you're average record store clear (but, it must be said, more intelligent that tower records' clerks and the current US president).
So how do we make these ads more intelligent?
Easy. Let them track you. Make a nym if want, whatever. But face the fact that if you want 'free' content, you are going to have to accept advertising and will have to allow tracking unless you want to continue to receive annoying, irrelevant advertising.
And don't think that you can just keep on blocking these ads. If blocking becomes widespread, which it seems to be (particularly among attractive niche target markets like slashdot readers), the online ad industry will just find new, more intrusive ways of getting eyeballs and clicks.
While the class this guy is offering looks like yet-another-get-rich-quick scheme, don't dismiss adult content online. It's a real money maker.
Estimates of the adult content industry online revenue are often overstated, but there is indeed money to be made. With a little bit of brand and consistent content, you've got a pretty stable audience, and one that is willing to pay regularly for access to this material.
This is more than can be said for most content sites that instead must 'rely' on revenue from advertising (a revenue stream which has turned out to be a bit unreliable). When a micropayment infrastructure is widespread enough to change that, then we may see things change, but for the time being most of us aren't willing to pay for Slashdot, or any other (non-adult) content site.
Say what you will about the "morality" of this content--it's making money where others aren't.
Question: Will we ever see IBM expand this target market to end-users?
It's nice that IBM is pushing Linux (though clearly you aren't doing this simply because it's a nice thing to do), but I'm sure a lot of us would like to see big blue get behind a drive to get Linux rolled out en masse on workstations. That's what could make a real difference...
I don't doubt that the video game industry will eventually outpace the the movie industry in terms of revenue, but by that time the difference won't be games vs. movies, it will be interactive media vs. non-interactive (legacy) media.
We all know that the DVD protection system was a Bad Idea from the beginning, but I have to admire that someone came up with a semi-clever solution. Again, though, this is a bandaid on a gaping wound.
We have to ask: What are the logical consequences of RCE discs?
I don't buy pirated DVDs right now, but only because they lack some of the extra features on the original discs, and the menus are sometimes "hand made". If quality of the hacked discs improves, though, I'll gladly pick them up instead of an RCE release.
Would you like to carry a credit card swipe terminal around?
And as far as price, being "essentially a transciever (sic)" does not to correlate to low production cost.
Also, when you reference transceivers, you are referring to contactless smart cards. These are a more recent development than older generation smart cards and haven't been deployed as widely.
Amex lists costs for their readers at US$25. Third party external readers are available from this price up to US$100.00. Still a significant subsidy.
And there _have_ been successful smart card hacks. Not breaking into a smart card, but interesting nonetheless.