Perhaps I am a pessimist but I think most advertising, 90+% of it, is absolutely wasted and pointless. Adults, IMO, ignore advertising and have trained their brands to block it out, and dismiss it immediately. Some of us are even petty enough to mute them, or look away; I may be guilty of this too.
What is very interesting to me, however, is how much online advertising works on kids. We know advertising works on kids, you can get them to become excited and demand to buy just about anything. But I am curious if the kids of today, technically sophisticated, are not also learning how to block out ads.
When I was a kid I got ads from the tv, and while I could walk away, I had to wait for my programing to resume. Today kids can swipe away, look away, dual screen, etc. so I am curious if advertising works on kids today and how well..
Let’s say you’re correct, that only 10% of ads are effective.
How many ads do you see a day?
If you use social media or read articles online (without an ad blocker) I’d bet it approaches triple digits.
For children it’s even worse as most children content are, themselves, ads for toys and games. Many mobile games aimed at children are commonly vehicles for micro transactions too and thus laden with ads
Hell, the only reason I know of raid shadow legends or nord vpn is the insane number of YouTube ads they buy.
> Let’s say you’re correct, that only 10% of ads are effective.
You know, the biggest financial disasters in history have happened because of this reasoning. This is not how complex systems behave, and humans are very complex systems. Those turns out to be much closer to fixed points processes, which implies a very different:
Either ads are 0% effective, or they're 100% effective. Very little exists in between and events can cause even the very same ads to flip between 0% and 100%, and even the time when it flips will be very short (and won't be a simple linear 0% -> 100% move, but a fast, wild, oscillating process that at times looks small and controllable but is utterly unstoppable)
Which would imply the GP is right: for the vast majority of ads, it makes no sense to show them to anyone. It's just annoying and wastes everyone's time.
Oh and the reason it doesn't have effectiveness measures is that normal distribution requires independence. Whether I respond to or ignore an ad must be independent of whether you do, for all factors not taking into the calculation. Meaning even if I am your twin and we live together it must be independent. Otherwise, because things like average are really a way to refer to normally distributed events, it doesn't even make sense to say an ad is "10% effective". There is no mathematical meaning behind that, and it's no different from saying "Orange tomatoes shot Joe".
What I'm saying is that the idea that quantity will work where quality fails does not work on complex systems, like humans. If you present me 10, or 100, or 1000 wrong solutions to my problems I will ignore 100% of those ads.
Not 90%. Not 99%. Not 99.9%. Not 99.99%.
Every last one.
And this behavior is the same for complex systems in general. They "lock" to a particular solution, and you can perturb their behavior, but not for long. It will go back to whatever the individual thinks is the best solution. The only thing an ad can hope to accomplish is to present a new solution, nothing more. It cannot hope to change preferences.
> If you present me 10, or 100, or 1000 wrong solutions to my problems I will ignore 100% of those ads.
I don’t think this is true. If you’re watching something and the “HeadOn apply directly to the forehead” add plays 1000 times, even if you try to ignore it, it’ll stick.
That’s why so many people know “HeadOn apply directly to the forehead” even though it’s a product that did literally nothing.
What’s more, most ads don’t even seek to explain how a product solves a problem (like in the 50s) they just try getting you to notice the ad.
Regardless, I was talking about the percentages of all the ads you see in a day. Not the times you saw one kind of ad.
Speaking about the percentage of all ads you say throughout the day is not the same as the percentage of retention of a single ad.
either it works on customers, or it works on business people - by duping them into spending alot of money ever since Edward Bernays. projected to be a trillion a year 2025
I would not leave. Getting into the federal system was hard before, it's going to be near impossible now. For people who are not AI experts, engineers, doctors, etc. the federal government offers pay and benefits unparalleled to anything those same people would find in the private sector. Not to mention the job protections that really don't exist in any other private sector American company.
I feel like that used to be true, but I'm not sure it's been true for the last ~decade or so. My mom works for the federal government as an attorney. She likes her job, but she has mentioned to me that there are just as many layoff rounds, if not more, as you'd get in the private sector.
Moreover, there are a lot of things that are kind of bullshit; her office refused to provide paper towels or soap in the kitchen, so she had to spend her own money and bring them in herself.
Are soap or paper towels expensive? No, it's not beyond her means, but it's not like most private sector jobs "brag" about having paper towels near the sink, it's usually not considered a "perk".
ETA:
Just a note, these complaints go back to even the Obama years, I think.
I would also worry whether I would receive my pension payouts. Depending upon future governments to pay out for your work investment seems risky. My ignorant impression is that pension funds will always be raided (whether private or government) and payments seem to decrease regardless of past promises.
Here's a detailed look at how total compensation compares between the private sector and federal positions by education level: https://www.cbo.gov/publication/60235
The key takeaways:
- staffers with high school or some college make more, on average, working for federal gov't, primarily due to the benefits. But it's an exaggeration to describe the difference as "unparalleled"
- comp is roughly equivalent for holders of bachelor's
- comp for holders of professional degrees or doctorates (JD, MD, MBA, PhD) is significantly lower on average for federal jobs
> For people who are not AI experts, engineers, doctors, etc. the federal government offers pay and benefits unparalleled to anything those same people would find in the private sector.
This is just not really true. I work in the private sector with former federal employees and every single one is making more money now than they were in government.
What is true is that there are jobs in the government that are not available at all in the private sector, like prosecutor, police officer, military officer, spy, law clerk, legislative director, special agent, etc.
Many of these require high educational achievement and/or expensive training and are compensated to attract talented people. But it’s also true that most of those people who leave for the private sector make more money there.
They are, this is supposedly part of the "Nexgen" air traffic system. I think eventually airlines will be forced into greater automation. When a possible collision scenario arises, the plane will take over and evade on it's own. Airplanes will increasingly become automated and pilots wait for emergencies.
This is the worst possible move. After 9/11 CIA did not even have anyone at the Afghanistan desk, and as the rumor goes, had to go find him in retirement, sober him up, and get him to the White House.
The press conference this morning mentioned that this was a new flight path. I wonder if the helicopter crew were not fully briefed on the new path, if that is the case.
I hate to think that prison should be harsher but if you had to go to prison somewhere, Sweden looks to be the most comfortable place to serve your time.
It would be remarkable if DOGE was bipartisan but IIRC the last time a bipartisan committee came together to cut federal spending, they were not able to agree and it triggered automatic cuts.
Actually, I think it was Musk. If you consider the Issacson biography in which Musk (basically) said to remove enough of something until it breaks, and you have to add something back. What I call the move fast and break things mentality is a very, very bad idea for government, but it seems to be what they are doing. Pause everything, and see what is really needed; Get rid of as many employees as possible, see what stops working, then bring people back in.
That plan works just as well as the equivalent "tighten the bolt until you hear the crack, then back off a quarter turn" does with fasteners. The thing tends to stay broken!
What is very interesting to me, however, is how much online advertising works on kids. We know advertising works on kids, you can get them to become excited and demand to buy just about anything. But I am curious if the kids of today, technically sophisticated, are not also learning how to block out ads.
When I was a kid I got ads from the tv, and while I could walk away, I had to wait for my programing to resume. Today kids can swipe away, look away, dual screen, etc. so I am curious if advertising works on kids today and how well..
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