I think it’s the interjection that really rubs me the wrong way. If the shop I was purchasing from offered me credit on their website during checkout, I wouldn’t mind—I’m entering a transaction with the shop. But why is Microsoft offering me credit? This is nothing to do with them.
Same goes for the ads on smart TVs. I’ve paid Samsung money for the TV. Why are they still here?
Not saying it's the same - it's not - but the motivations has some similarity.
I know some incredibly talented artists and writers putting all their effort into ads so they can make a living and it completely sucks.
I say the solution is to move all ads to a dedicated space (ads.gov, say) and then when you have a problem as a consumer you can go there and search for a solution or a product.
Then it will become cheaper for the rest of us, and services will have to become more focused on consumers needs, not the needs of advertisers.
Currently the status quo is that tech people like me just exclude themselves from it. We can block ads very effectively, download video content with the ads removed etc. I see so few ads now that it really surprises me when I do get one.
It works for me but it's not a solution for society as a whole. We can already see adblockers becoming less effective as more people adopt them and ads are being served in different ways by companies like AdDefend.
But personally I don't mind the status quo, it works for me. Fixing the problems of society as a whole is not my problem.
It's strongly tied to economic growth, and thus everybody's pensions are tied up in the success of advertising. It seems illogical it makes such an obscene amount of money, but collectively the advertising industry is bigger than even oil & gas.
Now I don't exactly enjoy ads, I accept a few, but every time they're implemented the pressures of the market just increase it over and over until it ruins the base product, like a cancer.
What's the alternative?
Consumers don't have enough money to pay for dozens and dozens of subscriptions. The ads industry is effectively a tax on every other industry, and thus makes more money than consumers would ever spend on content. I'm open to ban advertising entirely but that also seems like an opposite extreme and counterproductive.