I actually prefer personalized (targeted) ads, as long as it is a company I trust with my data. And they generate more revenue so they would need fewer ads.
I realize people will argue that they don't generate more revenue, but if that were true then how has this whole industry developed around them?
By tossing out personalized ads we are throwing out the baby with the bathwater.
And there are so many truly nasty things going on on the Internet, how has killing personalized ads become one of the defining battles of our times? Heck, even just looking at my ISP the list of nasty things they are doing without much push back or notice is scary.
There are lots of companies that have a history of never selling, losing, leaking etc. their users' data, such as Apple & Google. So why is it one of the defining battles of our times to force Google etc. to show me less relevant (and therefore more) ads, versus, say, stopping my ISP from its obviously irresponsible practices?
I think personalized ads are overvalued and their price is driven up by either global conglomerates that are looking to make vast amounts of money from small margins or startups with VC cash to burn. I've never heard an organic business success story about adwords.
If it were so obvious that targeted ads increase revenue, you’d think that the advertising industry would be able to prove it. They can’t.
To you, it’s obviously superior. But if it were obviously generating more revenue, the ad industry would easily be able to prove it. They can’t.
I know the chances goes to 0% if it's for authentic, period correct, women's laderhozen. If it's a book about data science, then there's a good chance I'll click through. Of course, this is all anecdotal, especially since I always had ad block on back in the days before targeted ads, and have never really been subjected to ads that's weren't somehow related to me or the immediate context. If you've ever been around a child, you know how much targeted ads can work. They want the toys that they see. Showing them ads of Bentleys won't result in any sales.
I would recommend talking to someone that does A/B testing.
Can you name an ad company you personally would trust?
The only way to to be accountable to users is to remove the profit motive, or charge a fee to use.
Maybe if they really do grow 1:many channels to actually be competitive to FB products they could charge businesses for API access to provide customer support & empower company:1 user messaging.
Kind of more like Twitter which doesn't have a ton of user data to target ads as well - though Twitter does allow audience matching, if Telegram allowed matching to user phones that would be valuable.
Why users shouldn’t worry about ads on Telegram
I read an article that cautioned users from switching to Telegram from other apps, because "Telegram is going to introduce ads". This is misleading for at least 3 reasons:
1. There will be no ads in chats on Telegram. Users who rely on Telegram as a messaging app, not a social network, will never see ads. Private chats and group chats are and will always be ad-free. As I outlined in December, ads are being considered only in large one-to-many channels (like this one), which do not exist in any other messaging app. So users ditching older apps for Telegram won’t increase the number of ads in their lives.
2. User data will not be used to target ads. We believe that collecting private data from users to target ads the way WhatsApp-Facebook do is immoral. We like the approach of privacy-conscious services like DuckDuckGo: monetizing services without collecting information about users. So if we introduce ads in one-to-many-channels, they will be contextual – based on the topic of the channel, not targeted based on any user data.
3. We are fixing ads that are already here. In most markets, content creators on Telegram already monetize their content by selling promotional posts in their channels. This is a chaotic market with multiple third-party ad networks pushing intrusive ads that create a negative user experience. We want to fix this situation by offering a privacy-conscious alternative for channel owners.
Users will be able to opt out of ads, but I do think that privacy-conscious ads are a good way for channel owners to monetize their efforts – as an alternative to donations or subscriptions, which we are also working to offer them.
Our end goal is to establish a new class of content creators – one that is financially sustainable and free to choose the strategy that is best for their subscribers. Traditional social networks have exploited users and publishers for far too long with excessive data collection and manipulative algorithms. It’s time to change this.
https://t.me/PavelDurovs/107