• grue@lemmy.world
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      6 months ago

      They do need to earn some money after all

      If every ad-supported website went dark today, nothing of value would be lost.

      • kevincox@lemmy.ml
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        6 months ago

        I don’t agree. As a single counter example of many YouTube has a huge wealth of information and content.

        Maybe that value isn’t worth the ads, that is much harder to say for certain. But it is clear that there is some valuable information on some sites that are supported by ads.

      • /home/pineapplelover@lemm.ee
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        6 months ago

        Duckduckgo manages to have privacy respecting ads. I really value that. If you’re searching cars, cars pop up, they don’t look at your history or anything else. Unobtrusive and you can look away

        • pizzaboi@lemm.ee
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          6 months ago

          And you can just… Turn them off. No questions asked. DuckDuckGo is a great example of how an advertising company can be both financially viable and respecting of user-choice.

          Google could let users choose to opt out of seeing any ads across their network for free today and still be one of the most profitable companies in existence. A huge percentage of users wouldn’t know or care to turn ads off, another percentage actually wants them, and for advanced users they could offer more advanced, useful features for money.

          But try pitching that to stakeholders and upper-management lol