Re:GDPR adtech complaints keep stacking up in Europe
by ericd on Monday May 20, 2019 @04:02PM
(#19964522)
They demonstrably are willing to pay some amount of money - they already pay $40-100+/mo for internet access to their ISP to get access to the stuff online. What they're not willing to do is be nickel and dimed - even if the amount they spend is tiny, the mental overhead of a pay-as-you-go plan vs an unlimited plan is such that it makes the experience much less pleasant.
Re:GDPR adtech complaints keep stacking up in Europe
by Mirioron on Monday May 20, 2019 @07:19PM
(#19966259)
I don't think it follows that they are willing to pay some amount of money. Maybe they're willing to pay for something like Google, Wikipedia, Youtube as a platform, but they're probably not willing to pay for most of the niche and small sites.
And I agree that pay-as-you-go would put a high mental overhead on sites. That's why we have ads instead.
Because you don't own whatever is being used to advertise. It's not your decision to make. They can charge you and then show you ads.
>In short though I believe there has to be a fundamental shift from the belief that ads, tracking, and shadow profiles are the path to profit in an increasingly connected world.
Belief doesn't mean anything. What matters is what pays the bills. If alternatives worked well, then I'm sure we'd have plenty of sites that would already be doing this. You could argue that crowdfunding is one such route, but I don't think that will ever work on a large scale. The amount of money required just isn't there.
The reason ad-tech is so common is because people are unwilling to pay any amount of money.