[aluhut]

> I don't see why I couldn't do the same with Facebook.

Because it very likely won't be there anymore. Your grandparents had full control over their photo albums. You have nothing.

> Op dates users freely gave away their data, but now advertisers are stealing it? The same sentence can be said about the internet as a whole - but most people believe the benefits are worth it

Most people don't grasp the _extend_ of what they give to the advertisers. Not even in the slightest way. They still think that as long as they don't fill out a questionnaire, "they" won't know. Or what I give to Facebook, stays with Facebook and so on.

> Lots of people believe that to be true, but I don't think you can just call advertisers "the devil" without an explanation.

Their sneaky methods, lack of information and the whole attention stealing industry it is, is bad. Just the basic normal ad on the street is already exploiting us. The digital versions are even able to infect our tools. It's an uncontrolled mess. An anarchy of people who don't give a damn because they can. We'll never know the full extend of misuse happening with our data on daily bases. I don't see a reason to trust them. Do you?

[gaius]

Most people don't grasp the _extend_ of what they give to the advertisers. Not even in the slightest way. They still think that as long as they don't fill out a questionnaire, "they" won't know.

Right, it's like if you think about searching for some controversial thing and get as far as typing it into the search bar then think I don't want this in my permanent record and close the tab. Too late, every keystroke was already sent as you were typing! Surprise! Or an angry message that you think better of sending, the recipient might not have it, but it's still recorded and may or may not be used against you in some way in the future.

[soared]

Yeah Facebook might not be around, but I'm sure there is an app that will archive everything so you could store it locally.

I don't understand your view though - you believe billboards are an exploiting everyone who sees them? That would mean all advertising should be stopped. I think many people, you included, misunderstand the economic benefit of advertising. It enables commerce that wouldn't take place if it was gone. If a Spotify competitor started out today with zero advertising it would never make it - how would you hear about it? How would anyone learn about it?

I work in digital advetising and see no reason to distrust the industry. Nobody is abusing data about you.. you are tossed into groups that contains millions of people similar to you. No advertisers cares who you are, about any of your data, any of your Facebook posts. They care that you just bought a razor and might want to try their new shaving cream.

I'm not sure what you mean by sneaky methods, but it's as simple as you visited a website or talked online about shaving, so now they know you're interested in shaving. Basic text analysis is most of it.

Edit - very true that most people don't understand it. But then again most people don't understand anything they use daily (the internet, any app, etc).

[gaius]

If a Spotify competitor started out today with zero advertising it would never make it - how would you hear about it?

I can remember when one of the killer advantages of online retail vs B&M was that in the former you didn't need to spend any dollars on TV and magazine and billboard advertising - word of mouth was sufficient. So I think that they would be fine.

[aluhut]

> Yeah Facebook might not be around, but I'm sure there is an app that will archive everything so you could store it locally.

You've forgotten that those pictures belong to Facebook. So whoever buys them out from the remains of Facebook will do whatever they want with it. They may share it with you. They may not. Maybe they'll use it to train some AI and then discard it altogether. Maybe they'll put your head onto some porn star. Maybe China will buy it. Can you imagine, a Chinese man coming to your grandparents house and taking away their photo album? What would your grandpa do?

> I don't understand your view though

It's not a view. It's a fact. Did you even learn your job somewhere? Any scientific background to this "work in digital advertisement"? Ads steal your attention. You can't do anything about it and most of the time you don't even have any kind of profit from it. To say it in the new cultures terms: it's mind rape.

> I think many people, you included, misunderstand the economic benefit of advertising.

Please spare me that marketing talk. I do accept that there are ads on the internet. Sure. Some people even watch and click them. But just like the part you ignored in my previous comment you seem to intentionally forget about _extend_ here too. There is a huge difference between a cookie and a canvas fingerprint. There is a difference between a picture advertising a product and an autoplay video or malware infected script. There is an difference between an IP in your HPs log and a live track of a user.

The internet would have not gone bankrupt without the higher extend of advertisement intrusion. It's a lie to make advertising companies make even more money because that's what you do on the market. Their new product is data, profiles build upon that data (the more data about a single user, the more worth it is) and the continuous lie about the customer who WANTS their tips on where to spend money. I don't want those tips. I don't know anyone who wants them just like I don't know anyone who didn't want an adblocker installed. Think about it. The trust is gone. Forever.

> I work in digital advetising and see no reason to distrust the industry.

Of course you do...it's soothing for me though because such an amount of ignorance would be frightening.

> I'm not sure what you mean by sneaky methods,

Then you are a pretty shitty digital advertiser. You need to get some updates fast.

Edit@Edit:

> Edit - very true that most people don't understand it. But then again most people don't understand anything they use daily (the internet, any app, etc).

So you assume that this gives you a carte blance? I mean, this attitude by people from the ad industry is just another reason nobody trusts you.

Imagine, that I'd be tricking your grandparents into letting me into their apartment by brabbleing some tech bullshit about their cable. I wouldn't do any kind of work. They'd have no benefit at all but I'd have stolen their photo album.

With your world view, I had the justification to do it because they didn't understand a single word I told them to get in their house.

Would you like that?

[aluhut]

Isn't it a great day today? :D