Most of the time when people say they have an unpopular opinion, it turns out it’s actually pretty popular.
Do you have some that’s really unpopular and most likely will get you downvoted?
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Fuck ALL advertisements. Yes, even “unobtrusive” ones, especially yours. If I want your shit, I will find you. If I appreciate your shit, I’ll pay you for your time. If you want to connect, I’m all ears. Otherwise, fuck off capitalists, fuck off advertisers, and fuck off useful idiots who want to waste my finite lifespan in this miserable universe showing me ads.
I literally just came from another post that was talking about this.
Basically what happened to the Internet as a whole.
Unfortunately there’s a lot of products that most people don’t even know exist. Hell I keep finding new tools and wondering why I’ve been doing things the hard way for so long.
OTOH, fuck all the advertisers who use shady tactics to make sales, and especially fuck all the people who pray on the naivety of others to steal their money. I was just showing a customer an email I got the other day stating her domain hosting was past due and required immediate payment, and she asked how I knew it was a scam. Uh, hello, because —I— am hosting your domain and website (and this is exactly why I share this kind of stuff with people, to make them think before they blindly write a check).
Unfortunately there’s a lot of products that most people don’t even know exist. Hell I keep finding new tools and wondering why I’ve been doing things the hard way for so long.
For sure. I’m not against promotion in the large, but the constant and intrusive advertisements within other tasks, such as web ads that take up valuable screen real estate, or TV/YouTube commercials that keep me from the programs I want to watch.
Like my username is literally PM_ME_VINTAGE_30S. I have no problem getting PM’ed or emailed stuff. For example, I’m subscribed to a number of mailing lists from sites I ordered from. Guitar Center can send me all the emails they want [1], sell me all the crap they want, because I can opt out at any time, and I have a work email so I can put them aside for later.
[1] To the specific email I gave them, which I do check.
I would argue that if there’s a product that nobody knows exist that’s not necessarily because we need to allow constant intrusive ads, and more indicative that people don’t actually need the product.
I want to say that in any given day, 60% of the ads I see are from big, well known companies who don’t need me to see them to know they exist. Shit like Liberty Mutual (I swear I see more of their ads than anyone else and THEY ARE ALREADY MY INSURANCE PROVIDER), Coke, Pepsi, etc. 39.9% of the remaining 40% are advertisements for shit that I just don’t care about. I don’t care about the newest tech toys. I don’t care about the newest car mods, or random shit I can put on my desk, or stupid extra kitchen gadgets. Fully 40% of the ads I see are trying to convince me that I should buy a product that I straight up don’t need because the ad looked cool. Why should those ads be allowed to exist? Why should I be constantly bombarded with ads for services that I either already know plenty about or for things that are trying to manufacture a reason for their existence?
Only about 0.5% of the ads I see are actually for things I did know know about and that seem useful to me, or like something I would like. Probably even less than that, I’m drunk rn and estimating.
I keep throwing away ads from Comcast trying to sell me on the virtues of their business internet packages. Guys, I left you because your lame-ass shit was expensive as hell, slow as hell, and you couldn’t even be counted on to meet a single appointment in 6 months to bury your damn line you left laying across my yard.
I agree with you, there’s a lot of companies that just need to be silenced. You’re allowed to send me ONE ad, and you better make it good because I don’t ever want to hear from you again.
If I want your shit, I will find you. If I appreciate your shit, I’ll pay you for your time.
This literally won’t happen because you will never find my content without ads.
… what’s your content? If you’re not comfortable posting it, them what type of media is it? Not to rub it in, but getting your content from you, your fans, or someone who contacts me currently is the only way I will ever get your content, as I ruthlessly block advertising in every aspect of my life.
To be clear, I’m not against self promotion. For example, if you went into a video game forum and posted links to your game, that’s not advertising in my view. More importantly, I would probably actually be interested in a new video game by you if I were browsing a video game forum. Hell, if you randomly PM’ed it to me or emailed it, that would be fine too.
I make games and stuff. Let me tell you, it’s pretty hard to get noticed on the internet. There comes a point where whatever you’re selling will be popular enough in a closed circle that it spreads through word of mouth but before that you need to get an audience. That means some shameless advertising in social media and maybe buying some ad spaces. If you don’t get that momentum whatever content you’re making might be dead on arrival. A lot of people and companies making ads don’t actually like annoying others with them, but it’s really hard to get anyone’s attention now that there’s like a billion new things releasing every day.
That means some shameless advertising in social media and maybe buying some ad spaces.
I’d have no problem if you just spammed my inbox or all of my communities. I’m all for self-promotion or even just promoting stuff you like. I don’t get adverts anymore, but there have been so many times where I got a negative impression of something I later found out was cool because it was advertised to me first.
I have no problem with people being annoying in my inbox or trying to promote themselves. What I do have a problem with is the constant stream of undiluted, intrusive bullshit being sold to me since the day I was born. If I saw your game in a web ad that’s keeping me from the content I actually wanted to see, I would absolutely not be interested in it; if you or a fan blindly spammed it into my inbox 69 times in a row, I would definitely check it out.
I hate ads as much as the next guy, but without ads get ready to start paying for things. You go to a news website, sorry you need to login and hand over your credit card to access anything. Youtube? Sorry you need to login and pay up to watch anything. You want to Google,Bing, Duckduckgo something sorry you better pay up can’t sell you data to advertisers anymore.
Not saying this is necessarily a bad thing but it will fundamentally change how the internet works and it potentially could limit informational access to poor people.
I brought this up the last time I talked about this, but to be clear, if we must choose between advertisements and paywall, then we should choose advertisements as the lesser evil. However, we must never accept the fallacy that advertising or paywalls are the only possible choices! More generally, we must never accept the fallacy that a market is the only acceptable way to distribute goods, a corollary of which is the idea that any acceptable solution needs to compete on equal terms with existing products in a market.
Not saying this is necessarily a bad thing but it will fundamentally change how the internet works and it potentially could limit informational access to poor people.
Well the first part at least would be a welcome change. The issue in my view is the very fact that poor people are treated as second-class citizens in information access or any other field of endeavor.
Youtube? Sorry you need to login and pay up to watch anything. You want to Google,Bing, Duckduckgo something sorry you better pay up can’t sell you data to advertisers anymore.
I very genuinely want those sites to fucking die so I don’t have to coexist in a world where they dominate the internet. I would be literally thrilled to join a group of like-minded people who have to reimplement the conveniences of the modern web from scratch for free.
Why on earth is a paywall an evil and worse than ads? This idea that everything on the Internet needs to be free-as-in-beer is the toxicity that has resulted in our entire world corrupted with ads. A News organization needs money to pay journalists and to send them to where news is happening. A video service like YouTube needs to pay for massive amounts of storage and servers. If you want quality professional content, and not just fake blogging thinly disguising advertising, you need to pay writers.
The alternative is that is it all corrupted with ads, or by the “rich uncle” of the day like a musk or a zuckerberg or whatever with an ulterior motive.
If you want the provider of a service or product to be beholden and at all responsive to you, as a user, rather than someone else, you need to be a customer, a paying customer. That’s your only real leverage. If someone else is the real source of their revenue stream then their every act is geared to please them and not you. That’s what we have now.
If you want to socialize it all instead, like a PBS, I’m fine with that, but good luck.
Still end of the day the server bill has got to be paid.
And who is to be blamed for setting up this system ?
I’m down voting you because I agree lol
How do you reach people with a new product that didn’t exist before? Or a Service? Do you want monopolys that never change because smaller business cant advertise with their stuff.
I don’t like 99% of advertising either, especially online, but there are some exceptions.
How do you reach people with a new product that didn’t exist before? Or a Service?
What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun. Is there anything of which one can say, “Look! This is something new"? It was here already, long ago; it was here before our time. No one remembers the former generations, and even those yet to come will not be remembered by those who follow them.
—Ecclesiastes 1:9-10, New International Version
EDIT: I’m not a Christian and I’m not trying to convert anyone to my faith (or lack thereof), I just think it’s a neat quote.
My point really is that you can generally talk about your products in some existing forum with reference to existing things. For example, if I wanted people to listen to my music, which
I have deluded myself into thinkingis a unique, previously unheard-of blend of genres, I would post links onto music forums and groups who are interested in recommendations of music adjacent to the type I produce. And that is how I actually spread my music on Reddit (although not as PM_ME_VINTAGE_30S) back when it was fresh. No ads, no wasting people’s time and internet. I only reached people who already expressed their interest to receive music like mine. I got a very small following, but I achieved my goal.Nothing is so unique that it belongs in no forum or is of interest to no existing community, yet simultaneously needs to be broadcast to the entire world. I have no problem with people sending me stuff they believe in to my email or other inbox, blow it up for all I care, but what I do take issue with is shoving that stuff into my web browsing experience or even sandwiched into the content I’m trying to watch.
—Ecclesiastes 1:9-10, New International Version
You’re quoting the fantasy book of a group of Bronze Age goatherders as an argument? Really?
Chill out, I’m an atheist. I just think it’s a pretty good quote. The argument is what follows.
It’s not really a very good quote. Advanced electronics, genetic engineering, quantum computing… there are a lot of things that are actually new.
It’s not really a very good quote.
I respect your opinion.
Advanced electronics
Clearly an advancement from simple electromagnetism, which was the unification of the previous studies of electricity and magnetism. Not fully original.
Genetic engineering
Based on prior analysis of genetics, which itself descended from simple breeding, and chemistry. Not fully original.
Quantum computing
Hybrid of computing with quantum principles. Not fully original.
Like I get it, we do discover new stuff and create new techniques, but (1) these physics still existed before we discovered them and (2) (much more importantly) these things are not new in the sense that they’re not totally unique, that we can compare them to things that exist because they are inspired by things that already exist.
I mulled over whether or not to quote the Bible directly once I figured out where that quote came from, and I ultimately decided to do so because of the Bible’s reputation for needing to be “read into”. I think that particular passage says something really interesting about how, in some sense, nothing really new happens, that what we’re doing can be seen as a version of something else. This is particularly interesting as a piece of a Christian document; Christianity generally doesn’t posit a cyclical view of the world. You live, you die, you go into the afterlife, judgement day happens, and God’s chosen few spend eternity in heaven; e.g., the plot is linear. Therefore, there clearly must be some deeper context to the text.
Regardless, it was a minor part of my original argument. The rest should stand on its own.
Also, I went to Catholic school. I’d like to use my religion classes for something; I’m most certainly not using them for praying 😂
I’d like to use my religion classes for something
Why?
That’s like saying “I was poisoned for years, I should use this poison for something good”.
Ok so I suppose you’ll be using raw electromagnetism instead of anything that uses advanced electronics? Just because something has a history doesn’t mean it’s not new, and even if that were the case, just because something’s not new that doesn’t mean it’s not a useful improvement.
I’m pretty sure ads don’t work on me. People tell me ‘ackshually they do, you just don’t notice.’ Nah, mate. They don’t. They just annoy me.
Are there people who genuinely enjoy ads?
Are there a nontrivial number of people who genuinely enjoy ads?
Maybe? My parents are boomers and they watch cable TV with ads. I’ve told them a few dozen times that they don’t need to watch them, that they could mute them or watch elsewhere, but they don’t care. My grandmother also watches the ads when she watches TV. Oh well…
My girlfriend does enjoy some ads. And she is very susceptible to them as well.
Marketing is only manipulation. It wants to manipulate me into doing something I otherwise wouldn’t have.
Since I don’t know how well their manipulation works, my only option is to only buy things that I have never seen an ad for.
To make sure I can still buy anything at all, I block/avoid ads where I can.
I’m upvoting because this should actually be unpopular. Intrusive ads are bad but less intrusive ones let you know who the patrons are of the otherwise highly expensive services you enjoy. That all of this gets paid for with ad money is nothing less than a miracle.
If you don’t want to see ads then don’t give them your notice! I like being informed when new products go to market.
Yeah, I watch about fifty different people making videos and they make money from it and all I have up do is watch fifteen seconds of adverts? I love it, my genuinely unpopular opinion is there should be more things making use of them, I wish Ubuntu had an optional add bar or advert box that I could watch while working to generate money to fund development, even better if they mix in adverts for cool open source projects so I can lean they exist.
You really should be directing your angst at the bastards who respond to advertising. If it weren’t for them, there would be no advertising at all because it would be completely unfeasible. Nobody would be willing to pay for something that has no return on investment.
Disagree. Ad campaigns are made the way they are because marketing people are abusing how our brain works naturally. Some people have managed to build defenses for it, but most people simply lack the ability. That’s like blaming people on wheelchair that they can’t walk.
Exactly! I can’t even stand physical ads like billboards because the concept of reserving land for manipulating every passing person into buying something they don’t need is ridiculously perverse to me. Ads are an attack against my psyche and I will do everything I can to avoid them.
When I want to invest in a better product or look for something that solves my wants or needs, I research my options. I will never make my decision based on an obvious ad because they are intrinsically deceitful.
People responding to ads are only human. Advertising companies went to a great length to hire psychologists and study the effects of ads on people to make them more efficient.
Blame them, not the people being bombarded.
The average person shouldn’t be allowed to drive. It’s extremely dangerous and most people are desensitized to it and absolutely don’t take the natural responsibility towards others that comes with having the ability to kill someone with a finger twitch (or a slight lapse in attention) seriously enough. I don’t think it would be allowed if it was just invented this year.
Too many places let you drive if you do the happy path stuff right: stopping at a stop sign, changing lanes safely, etc. But the most important time of your driving is when you’re about to hit a semitruck and you need to get your car out of the way, and there is no training material for this at all. People often panic and slam the brakes and aggressively turn the wheel, which is a perfect setup for understeer and losing control of your car. They are literally getting in a situation where they are about to die and they choose to greatly increase their risk due to negligence.
It’s cheaper to run simulators than purchase cars and hire trainers. Get em in nasty situations and teach them how to get out of it. For real, if mom and dad can’t evade sinking their freeway missile into a van full of kids, they shouldn’t be able to get behind the wheel and be presented with opportunities where this might happen any time they drive.
Problem is that there’s no other alternative for most people. Unless you live in a city, public transportation isn’t a valid option. Most people living in most locations (at least in the US) have to have personal vehicles to attend school/work, shop, and socialize.
Once self driving cars become commonly available, driving will no longer be a requirement and I think that driving licenses should be stricter on who’s allowed to drive.
Germany’s driving test (and school) is fairly strict and will fail you for small mistakes which is good for beginners but after all, there is no test or reinsurance after some years of driving. After some time, people will see driving as a right not a privilege. This is the case for the vast majority of counties. This is the problem.
Star Wars sucks.
Pansexual, polysexual, and omnisexual are all microlabels and are all subsets of bisexual. You don’t need more labels than gay, straight, and bi.
Edit: I forgot about asexuals. But I specifically only care about bi subsets. They’re dumb, and you only need bi
All religions should be heavily taxed. NO EXCEPTIONS!!
We don’t need more pronouns. We need less of them.
In my native language there is no even he/she pronouns. The word is “hän” and it’s gender neutral. You can be male, female, FTM, MTF, non-binary or what ever and you’re still called “hän”. You can identify as anything you like and “hän” already includes you.
Most people shouldn’t be parents.
Being fat is a choice the vast majority of the time, and I have a huge bias against big people.
I used to be fat (250ish lbs (110ish kg) at 5’8"ish (172ish cm)), and as much as I would like to blame my shit on anything else, the person feeding me, the person sitting at the computer for hours, the person actively avoiding all physical activity was me and no one else. After I got diagnosed with some weight related shit, I turned my entire life upside down, am at a much healthier 150 lbs (68ish kg), and feel so much better, both physically and mentally.
I’m aware of my bias, and I make every active effort to counter it in my actual dealings with bigger people. Especially because there are certain circumstances, however rarely, where it may not actually be their fault. But I’d be lying if I said my initial impression was anything except “God, what a lazy, fat fuck.”
Edit: Added metric units
Dogs were hardwired by selective breeding to worship their owners. Not long ago they at least were loyal companions. You got one off the streets, fed it leftovers, washed it with a hose, it lived in the yard, and it was VERY happy and proud of doing its job. Some breeds now were bred into painful disabling deformities just to look “cute”, and they became hysterical neurotic yapping fashion accessories. Useless high maintenance toys people store in small cages (“oh, but my child loves his cage”) when they don’t need hardwired unconditional lopsided “love” to feed their narcissism.
After an entity reaches an annual cap (say $5m profit), 95c of every dollar should be taxed
We have blown the concept of ownership way out of proportion. No one should be able to own things they have absolutely no connection to, like investment firms owning companies they don’t work for, houses they don’t live in or land they’ve never been to.
Most conservatives, however deeply red, are not intentionally hateful and are usually open to rational discussion. People just don’t know how to have rational discussions nowadays and the few times they do, they don’t know how to think like somebody else and put things in a way they can understand.
People nowadays think because a point convinced them, it should convince everybody else and anybody who’s not convinced by it is just being willfully ignorant. The truth is we all process things differently and some people need to hear totally different arguments to understand, often put in ways that wouldn’t convince you if you heard it.
It’s hard to understand other people and I feel like the majority of people have given up trying in favor of assuming everybody who disagrees with you knows their wrong and refuses to admit it.
Tax is not theft
People who are strongly against nuclear power are ignorant of the actual safety statistics and are harming our ability to sustainably transition off fossil fuels and into renewables.
Religion is nothing more then social engineering on a grand scale.
