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this post was submitted on 11 Sep 2023
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How online ads actually work.
Very simplified TLDR: you visit a news site. They load an ad network and tell it "put ads here, here and here".
The ad network now tells 300 companies (seriously, look at the details of some cookie consent dialogs) that you visited that news site so they can bid for the right to shove an ad in your face.
One of them goes "I know this guy, they're an easy mark for scams according to my tracking, I'll pay you 0.3 cents to shove this ad in their face". Someone else yells "I know this guy, he looked at toasters last week, I want to pay 0.2 cents to show him toaster ads just in case he hasn't bought one yet."
The others bid less, so that scam ad gets shoved in your face.
That's extremely simplified of course. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Real-time_bidding has a bit more of an explanation.
And how you're tracked online. I've worked on Google ads accounts every day for a decade and I don't see you,the user, and your data.
I just click "female, 50+, likes home decor, uses a phone" and then a little business I work with bids 10% extra on you because they think you might be interested in their new autumn wreaths they're super proud of, and Google think you fit that box I ticked.
And that's advanced marketing for most businesses. Most businesses won't even get into the audience side of things and they'll stick to keywords: they'll show you an ad because you searched for "autumn home decor" and that's all.
Google take advantage of most advertisers by saying "let us be in charge of your keywords, and how much money you spend, our AI is smarter than you and you don't have time!"And most businesses just use the automatic stuff because they don't understand it, and it's true, they don't have time... so then Google takes your "autumn wreath" keyword and shows your ads to someone looking for "Christmas trees", because they're both seasons and they're both plant related, right?
And then the small business gets charged $1 by Google to show their autumnal page to someone who wasn't interested and left right away.
My job is to help these businesses actually make an advertising account that doesn't fall for all these little bear traps that Google sets all over their ads interface. They weren't there 7 years ago, but things have been getting worse and worse. Including third party sales companies like regalix, hired by Google to constantly call you and telling you to trust the automation and spend more.
It's fascinating that the enshittification is taking place on both ends of Google. I would have thought that the slow bastardization of search was for the benefit of advertizers but it's bad for everyone except Google.
It's very frustrating watching it happen as someone who is old enough to remember when it wasn't always this way. It used to be common business knowledge that if you help your customers, then your business will grow, and you'll be successful. But now these companies are so enormous, with such little competition, that their philosophy is "squeeze everyone until they're dead and then squeeze the new people who are forced to walk into your lair". It's not just the enshitification of the Internet, or the consumer market. These are companies that provide products and services so intertwined with our lives that it has become enshitification of the world, our very lives.
You're absolutely right. From this side of the fence, Google are clearly focused on short term profits above all else. They used to run on the fact they could make you a profit easily, now they run on "you have no choice!"
Thats the entire world anymore. Everyone wants to make wall street happy, and those assholes are more addicted to money than cocaine. There is no long term planning anymore, everything is next quarter's profits. It is what is killing capitalism, short term greed.
Rolling Stone published a great article a few years back from a former trader, talked about how he got out of college, was super happy when he got his first bonus worth $100K. A few years later, he was mad, lividly pissed, his bonus was on a couple million, and not more.
That was always part of the enshittification formula. The final stage after exploiting users is to exploit business customers to the breaking point.
https://pluralistic.net/2023/01/21/potemkin-ai/#hey-guys