Is the Net turning into a Mall?

[Audley Strange]

Perhaps it's just me, or the sites I frequent, but is anyone else finding these days that there is more and more annoying, in your face, advertising on websites? That there is less and less free content as more and more is going behind paywall or "premium" services, that hyperlinks are being linked to semi-pertinent crap by amazon or that companies overcautiously and unfairly slapping copyright warnings leading to all manner of videos being taken down for tenuous reasons?

Do we really want to turn fine means of mass communication into a dark alley full of chancers, spivs and mercenary lawyers?

I said in the 90's it was a bad idea to encourage the masses onto the net since the really have little use for it other than lazy shopping and thus the greedy would follow them onto it like jackals and turn everything into a billboard.

I'm getting right sick of it.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

The free market place in action, dude. They've finally noticed we're not sitting in front of the TV and drooling as much as we used to. Now we're sitting in front of the computer and drooling. So the adverts have followed. Until they get autoplay that will take over the entire screen and can't be muted or turned off I can tune them out.

[Audley Strange]

The free market place in action, dude. They've finally noticed we're not sitting in front of the TV and drooling as much as we used to. Now we're sitting in front of the computer and drooling. So the adverts have followed. Until they get autoplay that will take over the entire screen and can't be muted or turned off I can tune them out.

Well I have adblocker which does a fair job, but one of the sites I have now given up frequenting does have big fucking flash adverts that covers the whole screen and you can do nothing until it loads the trailer for some shit movie. It's only a matter of time. Fora.TV. which I used to love is increasingly locking it's content behind "subscription" and even stupid amateur youtube videos I wanted to show people are commonly being taken down or muted because they happened to play a bit of music without licence. I can understand breaching of copyright being illegal if there is a commercial loss for the owner or commercial gain for the user, but it's getting beyond a joke.

Advertising is in my opinion a form of rape. It is an unsolicited assault designed to imbed itself in our brains, like a trauma. However that's not the only issue, it's the Scrooge like miserly attitude towards any use fair or otherwise of content that is really annoying me.

[Hermit]

Companies charge wherever they can whatever the market will bear. It is inevitable that they will invade the internet because they see an opportunity to make a dollar. Despite this invasion we are better off now in respect to free information and entertainment than we were in the nineties, and as long as sites like the Wikipedia, Youtube and so on don't charge for access per view or by subscription, I am not worried about the future of the free internet, and they don't look as though they will do something like that any time soon. If things get unbearable for you, you can always flee into ftp, torrents, usegroups, mailing lists and so on.

[mistermack]

It's a shame, but some things cost money to make, and put on the web.
I'm happy if other people pay so that I can find stuff that is useful to me.
Advertisers are getting fed up with tv, now that you can watch programs without the ads very easily.
I virtually never watch a tv ad. It's nearly all recorded and watched later, zipping through any ads, or just with the sound muted on the ads, if I'm watching something live.
You can always check your emails when the ads are on.

At the end of the day, there is stuff that doesn't have ads, but if nobody bought off the web, it would probably cost me a lot more, so I'm happy that they do.

[JimC]

The free market place in action, dude. They've finally noticed we're not sitting in front of the TV and drooling as much as we used to. Now we're sitting in front of the computer and drooling. So the adverts have followed. Until they get autoplay that will take over the entire screen and can't be muted or turned off I can tune them out.

Well I have adblocker which does a fair job, but one of the sites I have now given up frequenting does have big fucking flash adverts that covers the whole screen and you can do nothing until it loads the trailer for some shit movie. It's only a matter of time. Fora.TV. which I used to love is increasingly locking it's content behind "subscription" and even stupid amateur youtube videos I wanted to show people are commonly being taken down or muted because they happened to play a bit of music without licence. I can understand breaching of copyright being illegal if there is a commercial loss for the owner or commercial gain for the user, but it's getting beyond a joke.

Advertising is in my opinion a form of rape. It is an unsolicited assault designed to imbed itself in our brains, like a trauma. However that's not the only issue, it's the Scrooge like miserly attitude towards any use fair or otherwise of content that is really annoying me.

I agree 100% with the colourised bit, but everybody tells me to lay back and put up with it...

Advertising executives are the scum of the earth, and there may not be enough lamposts to accomodate them...

[Clinton Huxley]

Jim, could I interest you in this fine cashmere cardigan, hand-crafted in the foothills of the Himalayas, with handy gin-bottle pocket?

[Clinton Huxley]

Jim, could I interest you in this fine cashmere cardigan, hand-crafted in the foothills of the Himalayas, with handy gin-bottle pocket?

[JimC]

Jim, could I interest you in this fine cashmere cardigan, hand-crafted in the foothills of the Himalayas, with handy gin-bottle pocket?

Well yes, actually...

Hang on, is this a fucking ADVERT!

[Clinton Huxley]

Jim, could I interest you in this fine cashmere cardigan, hand-crafted in the foothills of the Himalayas, with handy gin-bottle pocket?

Well yes, actually...

Hang on, is this a fucking ADVERT!

Huxley Industries is happy to serve.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Jim, could I interest you in this fine cashmere cardigan, hand-crafted in the foothills of the Himalayas, with handy gin-bottle pocket?

Well yes, actually...

Hang on, is this a fucking ADVERT!

Huxster Industries is happy to serve.

[Clinton Huxley]

Jim, could I interest you in this fine cashmere cardigan, hand-crafted in the foothills of the Himalayas, with handy gin-bottle pocket?

Well yes, actually...

Hang on, is this a fucking ADVERT!

Huxster Industries is happy to serve.

You will be hearing from our legal dept, the largest dept at Huxley Industries.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Tell them to bring only unmarried men and be well mounted.

[Hermit]

The free market place in action, dude. They've finally noticed we're not sitting in front of the TV and drooling as much as we used to. Now we're sitting in front of the computer and drooling. So the adverts have followed. Until they get autoplay that will take over the entire screen and can't be muted or turned off I can tune them out.

Well I have adblocker which does a fair job, but one of the sites I have now given up frequenting does have big fucking flash adverts that covers the whole screen and you can do nothing until it loads the trailer for some shit movie. It's only a matter of time. Fora.TV. which I used to love is increasingly locking it's content behind "subscription" and even stupid amateur youtube videos I wanted to show people are commonly being taken down or muted because they happened to play a bit of music without licence. I can understand breaching of copyright being illegal if there is a commercial loss for the owner or commercial gain for the user, but it's getting beyond a joke.

Advertising is in my opinion a form of rape. It is an unsolicited assault designed to imbed itself in our brains, like a trauma. However that's not the only issue, it's the Scrooge like miserly attitude towards any use fair or otherwise of content that is really annoying me.

I agree 100% with the colourised bit, but everybody tells me to lay back and put up with it...

As if we don't get wall to wall advertising in the print media, radio and television. Nothing has changed.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

My TV has a mute function. My eyes have an ignore function. The ads on the computer get filtered out the same way billboards on the highway do.