[downandout]

Google makes $21 on average per US user per month [1], almost all of which comes from advertising. Would you pay $21/mo for your Google services?

[1] https://mondaynote.com/the-arpus-of-the-big-four-dwarf-every...

[danielscrubs]

I’ve bought zero products via google ads, except the case when I search for a company name and their official homepage is the top sponsored result. Which is insane.

And yet, my eyeballs looking at text with less text than a tweet is worth 21 USD. It feels like Google disrupted, but it’s far away from being optimal for companies.

[joosters]

Just because you've not bought something by clicking on an ad doesn't mean that the advertising has changed your purchasing habits.

...unless you are magically immune from advertising?

[danielscrubs]

I saw a coke sign three hours ago outside. I’ve been surfing the net for one hour and don’t remember a single ad. I don’t use adblockers.

I’m not saying ads don’t work. I’m saying Google Ads are ready to in turn be disrupted.

Especially with bots running amok...

[feanaro]

And now we get into magical, unprovable territory. You can't prove the ads don't work so we better continue the status quo!

[Someone]

$21 per user per month, on average, doesn’t imply $21 on you, every single month.

Other users react differently to that advertiser and/or you may click once every few years to bring in $1,000 advertising revenue for them on a very high-margin item.

[ferzul]

well, I don't see Google ads so I don't know what the content is, but no-one knows that I bought a coke after seeing an ad for a coke at the train station. but it still works. the effectiveness of advertising is an empirical question.

[Doctor_Fegg]

I’d love to pay £20 a month for a search engine that had results as good as Google, didn’t track me, and behaved responsibly in encouraging a plural web.

[millstone]

Google optimized to help me instead of manipulate me, that would be worth probably $1k a year for me.