This year, and I mean This Year, a lot of social media companies, unhappy with merely not capsizing and deflating and disappearing, are going through the unprecendented step of making themselves nuisances. From disenfranchising userbases to creating nonsense features that do nothing, to removing the publically-visible metrics that made their platforms interesting (before algorithms built digital cages so impenetrable that you need an anonymous browser to get anything useful out of them), to making themselves User Only Content, and more—the lions of yesteryear are shittier than ever, and less likely than ever to be replaced with better platforms. Let's face it: all your faved social media channels are going to hell.
Showing posts with label ads. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ads. Show all posts
3/4/14
Canadian Politics Update: Justin Trudeau wants to Sell Marijuana to Your Children
If I were more of a bettor and actually had money to risk, the current political atmosphere of Canada would be the most entertaining and fruitful place for small bets on unexpected outcomes. For about a year now things have been less depressing than usual and... well that's not strictly true but there's an awful lot of shit going on. From the Rob Ford crack scandal and his chances of winning the mayoralty again, to the number of days until 'Justin Trudeau' robocalls go out to Canada's Children with probably the best deals on weed outside of B.C.
Then there's the odds of Canada getting politically motivated enough to do something more courageous and insightful than perpetuating a natural-resources based economy which has been the de-facto source of jobs and state monies since the fur trade, since even the fishing of cod by vikings in ~700 A.D. Of course, after more than a thousand years of viking-related overfishing, those cod stocks look worse than Thomas Mulcair's chances of becoming Prime Minister. In springtime, when winter psychosis has set in firmly with most of the population, Canada gets a bit squirrely and a bit speculative, small parts of it go on to smash all comers at Olympic Hockey, and still more Canadians in the Winter Olympics put on great, and often heartwarming, showings.
Economically, the Branch Plant Bet (also referred to in some circles as NAFTA) has managed to keep Canada in the black without solving the problem of the Rust Belt, or the overreliance on natural resources, or the productivity and skills gap. Unemployment is such a problem that many larger corporations have had to bring in foreign workers in order to have anyone to heartlessly terminate. The Canadian banking sector is 'the envy of the world' (their words – not mine), and experts estimate a Citigroup-level superbank to form in Canada in the next twenty years, which ought to make quite the splash in international banking. Why are Canadian banks international superstars? Easily, by being diligent businesses and selling only the finest and least dangerous financial services to their customers. That and sitting on large piles of money... I mean seriously, how was anyone surprised that Canadian banks did OK in the recession? They get money from the public for free, with less grumbling than the tax man faces, and they charge service fees sometimes. It's basically a foolproof industry anywhere it's not run by pure-strain greed (and even then the profits flow, as they must).
Then there's the odds of Canada getting politically motivated enough to do something more courageous and insightful than perpetuating a natural-resources based economy which has been the de-facto source of jobs and state monies since the fur trade, since even the fishing of cod by vikings in ~700 A.D. Of course, after more than a thousand years of viking-related overfishing, those cod stocks look worse than Thomas Mulcair's chances of becoming Prime Minister. In springtime, when winter psychosis has set in firmly with most of the population, Canada gets a bit squirrely and a bit speculative, small parts of it go on to smash all comers at Olympic Hockey, and still more Canadians in the Winter Olympics put on great, and often heartwarming, showings.
Economically, the Branch Plant Bet (also referred to in some circles as NAFTA) has managed to keep Canada in the black without solving the problem of the Rust Belt, or the overreliance on natural resources, or the productivity and skills gap. Unemployment is such a problem that many larger corporations have had to bring in foreign workers in order to have anyone to heartlessly terminate. The Canadian banking sector is 'the envy of the world' (their words – not mine), and experts estimate a Citigroup-level superbank to form in Canada in the next twenty years, which ought to make quite the splash in international banking. Why are Canadian banks international superstars? Easily, by being diligent businesses and selling only the finest and least dangerous financial services to their customers. That and sitting on large piles of money... I mean seriously, how was anyone surprised that Canadian banks did OK in the recession? They get money from the public for free, with less grumbling than the tax man faces, and they charge service fees sometimes. It's basically a foolproof industry anywhere it's not run by pure-strain greed (and even then the profits flow, as they must).
10/21/13
User Comment Rodeo: Rocktoberfest
Listen well, for I know that reading internet user commentary is an unhealthy practice. Every day, many people are drowned in sorrow and rage by scrolling down on a YouTube video. The most vulnerable and fearful video posters have been known to disable commentary altogether – suspecting the wildest, dumbest, and most impassioned responses. User Comment Rodeo asks the rhetorical: why is internet commentary such a low thing? Has it any value? Who gains by it, and who are the principal commentators? Why is it largely hateful, negative, illiterate? Does it reflect on human society in the year 2013? What conclusions can we draw about the spitefulness of modern humanity? It is known the internet can have deleterious effects on health, especially mental health, and I believe that the biggest user comment posters are also the most mentally unwell.
For this instalment of User Comment Rodeo, I wanted to stray as far as possible from the usual set of questions and the usual set of very obvious samples and go a-huntin' for more specialized examples. The beauty of user commentary is that it is limitless: if it could be used to generate energy we could go some distance to solving the energy crisis. If only impotent rage held any value at all, we could even begin to trade it, bringing in an era of fantastic riches. Since it doesn't, I changed the parameters on the UCR 3000 and waited for a haul of brilliant material. Me, getting content farmed? Hah, I'm farming the internet every day and rolling in the 'lulz' like it's dirty money.
You will see above an example of the 'intentional double post'. User is 'raging' at a localized advertisement and revealing a rather high level of acrimony. If you didn't know about the problems of a New Zealand national on Youtube, you know. That has value: not as much value as an AD BLOCKER perhaps, but value nonetheless. Double posts are generally due to user error, but as you can see, they are very enjoyable and visceral when they are intentionally done to express some idea or other.
Here's another double post, which demonstrates the flip-side of 'double posting for emphasis'. It also demonstrates how searching for double posts is risky, because they're not so highly amusing if they're not New Zealots taking the piss out of corrupt businesses, biased governments, and the eternal problem of YouTube advertising.
This is an apologist double post. A big company was at risk of being called mean things, and someone had to stand up for them. Of course length has an inverse relationship to content and quality of communication, so I don't really know where this guy is coming from. "Yeah, you know, who cares if it's people like me who enable large corporations to skirt legal issues, hide from effective taxation, and blow up clouds of careless birds with impunity. They're good for the community, they're sincerely gracious to their employees, and they're not Pamela Wallin."
Let's get back to the relatively basic single post - in this set I'd like to cite one poster (you might have noticed them already) who manages to miss the point, be a buzzkill, and expose himself as a deviant square all at the same time. Also there's an Internet Drug Expert (very cool), and what I think is a tween hipster there in the middle (VICE Montreal or die, bro)... suffice it to say there is only one truly insufferable poster, and the quality of the rest of the comments was significantly higher than what I'd expect from Youtube Comment Sections. People spend their time doing this kind of thing, maybe in isolation, maybe while they ride public transit... scary, isn't it? You may never know who these posters are, but if you're lucky you'll never know who they are.
I decided to close this rather lazy UCR on a high note. Spam comments like this are everywhere, some newer ones are offering drugs but I do enjoy an old fashioned Pick Up Artist 'advertisement'. This guy is very subtly a spam bot, but you'd never know just by reading the blatant yet comment. The internet... it only cares about the one thing it will never possess: sex.
For this instalment of User Comment Rodeo, I wanted to stray as far as possible from the usual set of questions and the usual set of very obvious samples and go a-huntin' for more specialized examples. The beauty of user commentary is that it is limitless: if it could be used to generate energy we could go some distance to solving the energy crisis. If only impotent rage held any value at all, we could even begin to trade it, bringing in an era of fantastic riches. Since it doesn't, I changed the parameters on the UCR 3000 and waited for a haul of brilliant material. Me, getting content farmed? Hah, I'm farming the internet every day and rolling in the 'lulz' like it's dirty money.
You will see above an example of the 'intentional double post'. User is 'raging' at a localized advertisement and revealing a rather high level of acrimony. If you didn't know about the problems of a New Zealand national on Youtube, you know. That has value: not as much value as an AD BLOCKER perhaps, but value nonetheless. Double posts are generally due to user error, but as you can see, they are very enjoyable and visceral when they are intentionally done to express some idea or other.
Here's another double post, which demonstrates the flip-side of 'double posting for emphasis'. It also demonstrates how searching for double posts is risky, because they're not so highly amusing if they're not New Zealots taking the piss out of corrupt businesses, biased governments, and the eternal problem of YouTube advertising.
This is an apologist double post. A big company was at risk of being called mean things, and someone had to stand up for them. Of course length has an inverse relationship to content and quality of communication, so I don't really know where this guy is coming from. "Yeah, you know, who cares if it's people like me who enable large corporations to skirt legal issues, hide from effective taxation, and blow up clouds of careless birds with impunity. They're good for the community, they're sincerely gracious to their employees, and they're not Pamela Wallin."
Let's get back to the relatively basic single post - in this set I'd like to cite one poster (you might have noticed them already) who manages to miss the point, be a buzzkill, and expose himself as a deviant square all at the same time. Also there's an Internet Drug Expert (very cool), and what I think is a tween hipster there in the middle (VICE Montreal or die, bro)... suffice it to say there is only one truly insufferable poster, and the quality of the rest of the comments was significantly higher than what I'd expect from Youtube Comment Sections. People spend their time doing this kind of thing, maybe in isolation, maybe while they ride public transit... scary, isn't it? You may never know who these posters are, but if you're lucky you'll never know who they are.
I decided to close this rather lazy UCR on a high note. Spam comments like this are everywhere, some newer ones are offering drugs but I do enjoy an old fashioned Pick Up Artist 'advertisement'. This guy is very subtly a spam bot, but you'd never know just by reading the blatant yet comment. The internet... it only cares about the one thing it will never possess: sex.
5/9/13
Has the Golden Era of Adblockers Passed?
Recently I tried to watch some online video on a television channel's website. The video applet failed to load completely and it didn't take long for me to develop the correct suspicion. I disabled my adblocker and reloaded the page. No fucking video. So I open the page in a vanilla browser and it loads, a wild contrast from what I had, up till that point, been used to. On the vanilla browser there is a banner and large square add. Then the video starts and I am subjected to extra-loud advertising, TV style, with a vengeance. In addition to the other adds. Another advertisement plays, and a third, before my content is loaded.
Adblockers, with the advent of hijacked banner ads and unscrupulous marketing, to say nothing of the paranoid or political users of the internet, are not simply a tool entitled users employ to rid themselves of annoyances. Ad-blockers are legitimately a way of keeping your computer clean, of preventing your oft-used technological distractions from compromise. The fact you don't have to watch commercials (which are basically always: manipulative, insulting, indoctrinating or some shameful combination of all three) is an added bonus to not having your internet-accessing-device fucked with.
I am not a poweruser but I've been adblocking for years - since I discovered it was possible. I understand that advertising revenue drives some smaller sites, and, yes, I'd agree they deserve their due - assuming they police their advertisements for some level of quality. Fine, whatever, have your .005 cents per impression. You deserve it, plucky little website. However, the worst offenders are often large media sites – sometimes even those which already use paywalls. Let me present a brief overview of the galloping trend of online advertising.
In the early 90's during the second wave of the internet, when things became graphical enough that advertisement in the classic sense became possible, it was largely internet entities that advertised for themselves, and certain forward looking companies often related to the tech-sector. It was a simpler time. By late 1999 basically everyone who wasn't under a rock or a dinosaur was getting into online advertisement. 'Hey, check out our website at http://www.geocities.SonnysPizza/index.htm for some coupons' and other types of hilarity abounded. Whatever, wherever you got advertised to, it took a slice of your pitiful bandwidth and generally wasted time and resources, but you had to face it. Eventually MSN Messenger (R.I.P) becomes huge, and eventually it begins to advertise to you.
Side banner; top banner; .gif flames - all of these things were familiar. Between then and now the internet has grown up and come of age to the point where a huge section of people use it. All the troglodytes, termites, attractive well-adjusted people, and infants came out of the woodwork and the internet is full of everyone now. Whatever, other people will tell you about it, and some gigantic nerd could probably make a convincingly venomous deal about it... all I'll say is it drove a wave of advertising intensity that eventually rivaled the notorious realm of television adverts.
Fucking pop-ups were one thing, but there came layers of advertising that would jump into existence around key-words. Video sidebars that glitched out your browser and had to fling their audio payloads into your ears. 'Interactive' commercials made by committees of dullards and shills. YouTube videos became clogged with side, top, and skippable pre-video advertisements for every user account considered important enough to waste your time for their profit. What was once dumb, became even dumber, amen. So it goes, right? Absolutely. Yet there were additions to your browsers that would kill all advertising.
True to form, adblockers were free. They worked, and nobody who adopted them ever looked back. Surfing without them was like going back in time. It sucked, you were exposed to all the reprehensible shit that barely existed in your ideal internet experience. Going back to ads is like hitting yourself in the face with a shoe. Beautiful adblocking programs, released by benevolent and right-minded developers, worked on classic print ads, video ads, and even ads played in video content. It is like a magic balm that drives mosquitoes far, far away. For those who use adblockers, the internet just is that much less shitty. It's less claustrophobic and it can seem like the terminal cash-in state of the world has been opposed.
So of course, it comes to an end, by hosted content ('hosting ain't free, yo') which a profitable broadcaster puts online. Until very recently I had never been blocked for anything but geographical reasons (though nationalization of the internet is another ugly recent phenomenon) but a week or two ago I was denied a show I had been following online. I imagine in a year it will be impossible to skip video-advertisements everywhere, and only the smug power users will know what to do about it. Hopefully the same people who did the good work of blocking online advertising will keep up and their programs will not lapse into irrelevance due to some frightening and monstrous online advertising epidemic.
Because what the hell? You're running a profitable business already, and why not add some more revenue? Why not even more? Why not three advertisements every five-and-a-half minutes on video content? Why not have it be 30% louder than actual content, like on TV? Who cares is the commercial is ideologically loaded or bankrupt of all value? Who cares if it's annoying? 'I like money, gentlemen, and nobody gets a free lunch!'
A browser without an adblocker is a sign of a pitiable person trapped in the commercial arena, a hopeless square, a submissive lackadaisical fuck, a worthless shit hyperbole rapist. This is one fight the internet should not lose.
Adblockers, with the advent of hijacked banner ads and unscrupulous marketing, to say nothing of the paranoid or political users of the internet, are not simply a tool entitled users employ to rid themselves of annoyances. Ad-blockers are legitimately a way of keeping your computer clean, of preventing your oft-used technological distractions from compromise. The fact you don't have to watch commercials (which are basically always: manipulative, insulting, indoctrinating or some shameful combination of all three) is an added bonus to not having your internet-accessing-device fucked with.
I am not a poweruser but I've been adblocking for years - since I discovered it was possible. I understand that advertising revenue drives some smaller sites, and, yes, I'd agree they deserve their due - assuming they police their advertisements for some level of quality. Fine, whatever, have your .005 cents per impression. You deserve it, plucky little website. However, the worst offenders are often large media sites – sometimes even those which already use paywalls. Let me present a brief overview of the galloping trend of online advertising.
In the early 90's during the second wave of the internet, when things became graphical enough that advertisement in the classic sense became possible, it was largely internet entities that advertised for themselves, and certain forward looking companies often related to the tech-sector. It was a simpler time. By late 1999 basically everyone who wasn't under a rock or a dinosaur was getting into online advertisement. 'Hey, check out our website at http://www.geocities.SonnysPizza/index.htm for some coupons' and other types of hilarity abounded. Whatever, wherever you got advertised to, it took a slice of your pitiful bandwidth and generally wasted time and resources, but you had to face it. Eventually MSN Messenger (R.I.P) becomes huge, and eventually it begins to advertise to you.
Side banner; top banner; .gif flames - all of these things were familiar. Between then and now the internet has grown up and come of age to the point where a huge section of people use it. All the troglodytes, termites, attractive well-adjusted people, and infants came out of the woodwork and the internet is full of everyone now. Whatever, other people will tell you about it, and some gigantic nerd could probably make a convincingly venomous deal about it... all I'll say is it drove a wave of advertising intensity that eventually rivaled the notorious realm of television adverts.
Fucking pop-ups were one thing, but there came layers of advertising that would jump into existence around key-words. Video sidebars that glitched out your browser and had to fling their audio payloads into your ears. 'Interactive' commercials made by committees of dullards and shills. YouTube videos became clogged with side, top, and skippable pre-video advertisements for every user account considered important enough to waste your time for their profit. What was once dumb, became even dumber, amen. So it goes, right? Absolutely. Yet there were additions to your browsers that would kill all advertising.
True to form, adblockers were free. They worked, and nobody who adopted them ever looked back. Surfing without them was like going back in time. It sucked, you were exposed to all the reprehensible shit that barely existed in your ideal internet experience. Going back to ads is like hitting yourself in the face with a shoe. Beautiful adblocking programs, released by benevolent and right-minded developers, worked on classic print ads, video ads, and even ads played in video content. It is like a magic balm that drives mosquitoes far, far away. For those who use adblockers, the internet just is that much less shitty. It's less claustrophobic and it can seem like the terminal cash-in state of the world has been opposed.
So of course, it comes to an end, by hosted content ('hosting ain't free, yo') which a profitable broadcaster puts online. Until very recently I had never been blocked for anything but geographical reasons (though nationalization of the internet is another ugly recent phenomenon) but a week or two ago I was denied a show I had been following online. I imagine in a year it will be impossible to skip video-advertisements everywhere, and only the smug power users will know what to do about it. Hopefully the same people who did the good work of blocking online advertising will keep up and their programs will not lapse into irrelevance due to some frightening and monstrous online advertising epidemic.
Because what the hell? You're running a profitable business already, and why not add some more revenue? Why not even more? Why not three advertisements every five-and-a-half minutes on video content? Why not have it be 30% louder than actual content, like on TV? Who cares is the commercial is ideologically loaded or bankrupt of all value? Who cares if it's annoying? 'I like money, gentlemen, and nobody gets a free lunch!'
A browser without an adblocker is a sign of a pitiable person trapped in the commercial arena, a hopeless square, a submissive lackadaisical fuck, a worthless shit hyperbole rapist. This is one fight the internet should not lose.
8/15/12
Modern Hopelessness - User Comment Rodeo
I read an article awhile ago while I was looking around for interesting anti-consumerist agitprop. Mostly I was just trying to feel better, but of course there are a million problems and only a few dozens of mostly ideological solutions so I wound up feeling completely fucked. But you gotta believe in something! That or you begin to volunteer and first try to solve your stubborn local problems, remembering the enemy for later. While, you know, scraping a living together and trying not to end up on the streets, without a roof over your head or a pot to piss in. Odds are if you're young, you're over-educated and underemployed, and everyone is shitting on you because you want a good life, not even The Good Life as sold to you by the multinational greed-ignorance system. Or you're an entitled youth with an iPhone and you used to really like Dubstep but now it's more EDM and mostly it's weed, beers, and bros.
I sort of like Adbusters. All of their articles are alarmist, which gets a bit old, and which excuses severe lapses in discipline and research. Best part is, the alarmist tone is often warranted. Anybody not actively living in deluded ignorance can see that there are a lot of things wrong with the world and that, as a species, we might be fucking ourselves over. In fact, we probably are, and the problems stack up while the disbelievers go around like business as usual. Racism, sexism, ageism, exceptionalism, cronyism, patriarchy, oligarchy, police states, xenophobia, terrorism, war mongering, corporatism, you name it – there are issues for everyone. Pick your side and hold a fractious conflict against your opponents while the world withers. Throw stones, hurl insults, utter blanket statements about shit you don't really know much about. That's the game right now and we're doing a great job wasting the years playing it. There's this huge amount of angst everywhere, seemingly residing in less than 5% of the population. So it goes without saying that Adbusters is not popular and possibly stigmatized by whatever evil ghosts rule the world.
There was one online article that was kind of interesting. It was written in the same mildly alarmist hyperbolic style and touched on reality in a way that complements the dread of modern society that some people feel. Ironically, to be on point, the article has to focus on the hollow spectacle of western culture – which means it discusses a lot of supercilious bullshit amongst the mentions of economic woes, class warfare, and impending monolithic doom. Pretty much worth the fifteen minutes it takes to read and dismissive of 'feel good' movements in the west. The comment section drew me further into the puzzle... I didn't have time to read it all, but it didn't take long to find some real beauties lurking among the rank weeds.
I sort of like Adbusters. All of their articles are alarmist, which gets a bit old, and which excuses severe lapses in discipline and research. Best part is, the alarmist tone is often warranted. Anybody not actively living in deluded ignorance can see that there are a lot of things wrong with the world and that, as a species, we might be fucking ourselves over. In fact, we probably are, and the problems stack up while the disbelievers go around like business as usual. Racism, sexism, ageism, exceptionalism, cronyism, patriarchy, oligarchy, police states, xenophobia, terrorism, war mongering, corporatism, you name it – there are issues for everyone. Pick your side and hold a fractious conflict against your opponents while the world withers. Throw stones, hurl insults, utter blanket statements about shit you don't really know much about. That's the game right now and we're doing a great job wasting the years playing it. There's this huge amount of angst everywhere, seemingly residing in less than 5% of the population. So it goes without saying that Adbusters is not popular and possibly stigmatized by whatever evil ghosts rule the world.
There was one online article that was kind of interesting. It was written in the same mildly alarmist hyperbolic style and touched on reality in a way that complements the dread of modern society that some people feel. Ironically, to be on point, the article has to focus on the hollow spectacle of western culture – which means it discusses a lot of supercilious bullshit amongst the mentions of economic woes, class warfare, and impending monolithic doom. Pretty much worth the fifteen minutes it takes to read and dismissive of 'feel good' movements in the west. The comment section drew me further into the puzzle... I didn't have time to read it all, but it didn't take long to find some real beauties lurking among the rank weeds.
1/13/11
Commericals Should be Taxed
Since they are a form of noise pollution, it is only reasonable to tax commercials unless advertisers stop cranking up the volume or begin to focus on quality and variety. And I mean television, here. Radio is as dependent or more on ad revenue than print media.
Maybe I sound like an old, embittered man for complaining about noise pollution, but the truth stands: television programming is pretty bad at times, but commercials are always worse by at least a factor of two. And they are loud, so they pollute with noise the very homes we live in. And people without televisions feel smug about it.
Television advertisements should be taxed because they are at least as bad for your health as cigarettes. Ads convince people to eat at greasy franchise restaurants, buy insidious deep-fried snack foods, participate in 'Cash 4 Gold' schemes, and pay to watch crappy movies in theaters. All of this drives the economy, sure, but also makes each and every person a compulsive and hollow shell. The bottom line has always been worth the common man, of course, but cannot the sham democratic system throw at least one bone to the very small percentage of people who watch TV and dislike being condescended to between their 22 minutes of show?
Smokers, used to the glares of passerby, now have to deal with being unable to smoke in places of business. Now this is somewhat of a twist unlogical, but why should normal people have to deal with business being brought into their place of living? And this analogy holds, because as smokers are addicted to tobacco (or the quest to look cool), so are TV addicts to their shows and dramas and sporting events and news. There are enough opportunities for untaxed product placements in television programming, so it's not like either taxing or abolishing televised commercials will really change everything.
Maybe I sound like an old, embittered man for complaining about noise pollution, but the truth stands: television programming is pretty bad at times, but commercials are always worse by at least a factor of two. And they are loud, so they pollute with noise the very homes we live in. And people without televisions feel smug about it.
Television advertisements should be taxed because they are at least as bad for your health as cigarettes. Ads convince people to eat at greasy franchise restaurants, buy insidious deep-fried snack foods, participate in 'Cash 4 Gold' schemes, and pay to watch crappy movies in theaters. All of this drives the economy, sure, but also makes each and every person a compulsive and hollow shell. The bottom line has always been worth the common man, of course, but cannot the sham democratic system throw at least one bone to the very small percentage of people who watch TV and dislike being condescended to between their 22 minutes of show?
Smokers, used to the glares of passerby, now have to deal with being unable to smoke in places of business. Now this is somewhat of a twist unlogical, but why should normal people have to deal with business being brought into their place of living? And this analogy holds, because as smokers are addicted to tobacco (or the quest to look cool), so are TV addicts to their shows and dramas and sporting events and news. There are enough opportunities for untaxed product placements in television programming, so it's not like either taxing or abolishing televised commercials will really change everything.
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