[whimsicalism]

I agree with your first statement, but your second statement means that you think FB should be compelled to serve free riders. If you are being compelled to serve users that are unprofitable, a clear implication of the GDPR, then you are compelling free ridership. The difference between targeting and not is the different between net profit or not for many users.

[alkonaut]

I think the end game is that if ads are generally NOT targeted based on a huge volume of information, then the pay for ads with less targeting will go up. During a transition those who show pinpoint targeted ads while others don't will make more money. But eventually if the whole 2000-2025 era of ad targeting is confined to the historybooks, then we could have a better internet. And the amount of ad spend in total will be unchanged (perhaps some of money will return to print/tv etc. since internet ads will be relatively less effective). But the bottom line is I think it SHOULD be profitable to show ads with less targeting, not that it WILL be. And I think regulators have the power to ensure that this is the future.

> The difference between targeting and not is the different between net profit or not for many users

I don't think it's a bad idea to have regulation that makes entire regions of an industry unprofitable over night, if that's what it takes.

[whimsicalism]

> And the amount of ad spend in total will be unchanged

Citation very very much needed as that is not at all what standard economic theory would predict.

As I said, there are lots of niche small businesses that literally could not survive without targeted advertising so that demand goes away as soon as these bans go into effect.

> I don't think it's a bad idea to have regulation that makes entire regions of an industry unprofitable over night, if that's what it takes.

Yes but I think if the choice were actually presented as “pay for FB or repeal this regulation” and the EU had a referenda on it, the regulation would be banned. The only way this is getting through is because the public is being convinced that they can have their cake and eat it too. They might be right, but only because they are being subsidized by users in the rest of the world.

[alkonaut]

> Citation very very much needed as that is not at all what standard economic theory would predict.

That was assuming that the total ad spend is constant as a fraction of revenue and that revenue would be unchanged. If less effective ads overall would lead to lower revenues then the ad spends would shrink. But they would shrink equally for everyone, at least.

> there are lots of niche small businesses that literally could not survive without targeted advertising

There is nothing banning targeting. The problem is using info that users don't know/think is used for targeting, and using it for targeting. I'd be happy to take a 200 question survey as a condition for using facebook, where they ask me about my hobbies and whereabouts and clearly say it's for ad targeting. Obviously I could say "I'd rather not tell" instead of "I like guitars", but in such a scenario I'd happily give up my targeting info. But I don't want to be shown a guitar ad because I looked at one on an unrelated site with a facebook tracking pixel on it. It's absolutely dystopian.

> public is being convinced that they can have their cake and eat it too.

Yes I'm sure many think that. But I think the only way of changing the status quo is through heavy handed regulation and making initially impopular decisions and risking the death of a lot of business in the process.

[another-dave]

> If you are being compelled to serve users that are unprofitable, a clear implication of the GDPR, then you are compelling free ridership.

Facebook are the ones who've structured their business like this though — they could profitable with a subscription model instead, they've just chosen to make their product free at the point of use.

[alkonaut]

Exactly. There is no one proposing anyone provide anything for nothing. It's only one particular transaction that is disallowed. You can show dumb ads, use subscriptions and also freely target based on info that people are aware is used for targeting. That's by no means "free" in any of those scenarios.