The idea feels like sci-fi because you’re so used to it, imagining ads gone feels like asking to outlaw gravity. But humanity had been free of current forms of advertising for 99.9% of its existence. Word-of-mouth and community networks worked just fine. First-party websites and online communities would now improve on that.
The traditional argument pro-advertising—that it provides consumers with necessary information—hasn’t been valid for decades.
The web has been cleaned with uBlock Origin. Doing that IRL would be great. And for every stupid counter argument (I’ve seen those on HackerNews), I don’t tolerate brain washing.
The most stupid argument I’ve seen is from an American who said “what if you don’t know about the effects of a drug that could save your life?” Well, that’s the job of the doctor. Your society has failed if you rely on marketing to eat random chemical dangerous stuff.
lol what? No way anyone says that with a straight face
5 minutes ago on Hacker News, among a lot of stupid stuff like “your life is empty without having ads all around you.”
Reference for fun: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43596333
I love that in Cyberpunk 2077 they’re is often a channel on called “just ads”. Of course in pure cyberpunk style those ads can be horrific.
There are shopping channels in many countries (or at least paid cable television) which are literally just ads. In classic cyberpunk style, it’s a reflection of the dystopian present.
That’s not an ad, it’s the “Scamming old people by phone” show.
They’re on HN acting like Googling and getting WebMD is uüuber rare
When I watch a US sport, I’m blown away that the ads are all medical, banking/insurance, cars, and maybe fast food. It’s so weird.
Don’t forget personal injury or liability lawyers.
And gambling.
What’s a normal selection of sports ads look like elsewhere?
Every time I watch premier league it’s just gambling ads nonstop lol
I was going to note it down as I was watching F1 at the time of writing that comment. There was a kids hospital charity, a food charity, a car, other sport, and a travel/tourism ad.
Wow, even if we imagine some different situation where information about a new development, service or creation is needed, that’s what reviews and journalism are supposed to cover, not advertisement. (In b4: the observation that those have tragically been becoming more and more indistinguishable from advertising.)
In fact the pervasive drug commercials were illegal until the 1990s because why would you target the patient rather than the doctor?
They are still illegal in many countries.
As they should be
If only there was a system of interconnected knowledge bases where new information could be published and indexed for easy lookup… Nah what am I saying, who would have interest in such a thing…
Don’t be silly, no-one knows what a library is these days! They’re all stuck on that internet thing.