Re:Fast Ads Matter
by akersten on Thursday October 31, 2019 @12:38AM
(#21405806)
>> > I think making this conclusion from the data in the linked adblock report is a bizarre interpretation of that data.
> How so? One of the big pros every ad blocker advertises is "faster page loads"
Without getting too much into how questionable I find the copy of the source site (pagefair):
There's no dose-response here. It's not like ads getting 50ms faster, there's some percentage of ad-block users that convert to non-ad-block.
The activation energy to go from non-ad-block to ad-block is so much lower than it is to go the other way around. How often do you turn off your ad-blocker just to check how fast the web is without it? And would it convince you to keep it that way, knowing that it's still slower anyway - other reasons to use an adblocker aside?
Now, to be fair to the study - it's talking about reduced incentive to install an ad-blocker. But I don't really think that's quantifiable, since there is such a stark and objectively better difference in browsing the web with an ad-blocker in pretty much every metric, speed notwithstanding. I mean, it's just baffling to me that given the choices "really shitty (ads), pretty shitty (slightly faster ads), and not shitty at all (ad-blocker)", someone would choose "pretty shitty" when they can have "not shitty at all."
So, I've made some scientifically-questionable arguments, but I don't feel like it takes any serious analysis to doubt the value of this study.
Re:Fast Ads Matter
by ehsankia on Thursday October 31, 2019 @07:01PM
(#21414668)
Right, I don't think they're trying to win back ad-blocking people, but rather avoid irritating people without ad-blockers more and driving them towards ad-blockers.
> How so? One of the big pros every ad blocker advertises is "faster page loads"
Without getting too much into how questionable I find the copy of the source site (pagefair):
There's no dose-response here. It's not like ads getting 50ms faster, there's some percentage of ad-block users that convert to non-ad-block.
The activation energy to go from non-ad-block to ad-block is so much lower than it is to go the other way around. How often do you turn off your ad-blocker just to check how fast the web is without it? And would it convince you to keep it that way, knowing that it's still slower anyway - other reasons to use an adblocker aside?
Now, to be fair to the study - it's talking about reduced incentive to install an ad-blocker. But I don't really think that's quantifiable, since there is such a stark and objectively better difference in browsing the web with an ad-blocker in pretty much every metric, speed notwithstanding. I mean, it's just baffling to me that given the choices "really shitty (ads), pretty shitty (slightly faster ads), and not shitty at all (ad-blocker)", someone would choose "pretty shitty" when they can have "not shitty at all."
So, I've made some scientifically-questionable arguments, but I don't feel like it takes any serious analysis to doubt the value of this study.