I use ad blockers and open source privacy focused software whenever I can but occasionally I have to use computers that don’t belong to me or an older phone where my usual applications aren’t installed and seeing all the advertisements just feels dirty and dystopian.
I think the worst ads are the text to speech ones that say “Download this app today”. The unblinking energenic people saying you can make a living at home are probably a close second.
I don’t think that’s true at all.
If advertising didn’t exist then content producers and content consumers would embrace an alternative funding model because everyone wants content.
Enough to pay for it? Nope. I’ve been on the other sides of this equation, that is a very naive take.
Enough to pay for it … if it’s good enough to be worth paying for.
It’s that last part that kills most content creators. There’s people whose work I’ll idly browse as long as I don’t have to pay for it (even with ads: I love my ad blocker!). But you’re right, 99.44% of content creators whose work I idly look over would not get a single red cent out of me from direct payment.
So maybe it would be good to switch to payment-only schemes. That would kill off the crap creators and leave those behind who make something people think is worth paying for.
I mean … I still pay for books and music. I do pay for content. Just not shit content.
Enough to pay for it … if it’s good enough to be worth paying for.
I’ll give you an example. I use a site called lacemarket which is a buying/selling site for a niche hobby of Japanese street fashion. It will never be popular enough that enough people would be using the site in order for them to make enough to pay for hosting the site.
So they’re forced to run ad’s cause they have no other way to keep the site up. The owners are also not taking a percentage of people’s sales so they can continue to bring in people who want to use the site. But in order to not take money from the sellers, the only other option they have to keep the site running is ad funding.
It sucks but its too niche to do it any other way.
