Re: [projectvrm] Degrees and kinds of acceptable ads — a wheat-and-chaff exercise

[Doc Searls < >]

> On Dec 10, 2014, at 8:32 PM, T.Rob 
> <
 >
>  wrote:
> 
> Looking at the Lumascape and the recent posts about the life of an ad 
> auction, that's a tough question to answer.  If I understood it correctly, 
> that ad buy goes through many degrees of separation from the browser.  How 
> does that fit into...
> 
>>      Don' t track me outside your site
>>      Don't give data you gather about me to other parties
> 
> ...at all?  

I believe it doesn't. 

Personally, I'm less interested in a taxonomy of all that stuff than in the 
much smaller and simpler range of ads that those two terms would welcome. 

I suggest that those terms would welcome pure brand ads — like the ones 
placed in traditional media, but in this case on the Web. 

And what else? Not sure yet.

> Even if on the network graph we said that each of these entities is 
> adjacent to me and I'm the hub, the web site I'm browsing provides the 
> context that ties it all together and of necessity violates both of these 
> criteria to make it work.

I don't follow that, but it's also late and I'm headed for bed.

> There's probably zero or fewer ads that fit this description.
> 
> Or were you proposing what a future ad ecosystem should look like and I 
> misunderstood?
> 
> -- T.Rob

I hope I made it clearer above.

Doc
> 
> 
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Doc Searls 
>> [mailto:
 ]
>> Sent: Wednesday, December 10, 2014 18:20 PM
>> To: ProjectVRM list
>> Cc: T.Rob; Mike O'Neill; Don Marti
>> Subject: [projectvrm] Degrees and kinds of acceptable ads — a wheat-and-
>> chaff exercise
>> 
>> In discussions over the last few days it has become clear that we need to
>> make some sharp categorical distinctions between kinds of advertising.
>> 
>> Adblock Plus's Manifesto <https://acceptableads.org/en/>....
>> 
>>      • Acceptable Ads are not annoying.
>>      • Acceptable Ads do not disrupt or distort the page content we're
>> trying to read.
>>      • Acceptable Ads are transparent with us about being an ad.
>>      • Acceptable Ads are effective without shouting at us.
>>      • Acceptable Ads are appropriate to the site that we are on.
>> 
>> ... is all judgement-call stuff. And it doesn't address tracking or creepy
>> personalization. We need something clearer than that.
>> 
>> For guidance, look at the Respect Trust Framework's first promise here:
>> 
>> <http://openidentityexchange.org/trust-frameworks/respect-trust-
>> framework/>
>> 
>> "We will respect each other's digital boundaries."
>> 
>> So let's say an individual's boundaries are these:
>> 
>>      Don' t track me outside your site
>>      Don't give data you gather about me to other parties
>> 
>> What kind of advertising would this allow, and not allow?
>> 
>> And what about other boundaries?
>> 
>> I'm looking here to develop clear taxonomies of kinds of advertising that
>> an individual visitor to a site might or might not welcome.
>> 
>> These are matters of interest to PDEC <http://pde.cc> and Customer Commons
>> <http://customercommons.org> — and to advertisers and agencies — as well
>> as to ProjectVRM.
>> 
>> Doc
>> 
>> (I'm splitting this off the thread below, which I want to preserve as
>> well.)
>> 
>>> On Dec 9, 2014, at 11:28 AM, Mike O'Neill 
>>> <
 >
>> wrote:
>>> 
>>> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
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>>> 
>>> Mozilla's TP is good. It still relies on a curated list rather than
>> behaviour detecting like PrivacyBadger but presumably the list will be
>> pruned of servers that properly respect DNT.
>>> 
>>> It is not quite there yet, though the code & process is wonderfully
>> transparent. Requests still go out to "blocked" resources but I reported
>> the bug & it is getting fixed.
>>> 
>>> https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1100024
>>> 
>>> 
>>> Mike
>>> 
>>> 
>>>> -----Original Message-----
>>>> From: Don Marti 
>>>> [mailto:
 ]
>>>> Sent: 09 December 2014 15:45
>>>> To: T.Rob
>>>> Cc: 'Wunderlich, John'; 'Doc Searls'; 'ProjectVRM list'; 'Ben Williams'
>>>> Subject: Re: [projectvrm] The Rise of AdBlock Reveals A Serious
>>>> Problem in the Advertising Ecosystem | Monday Note
>>>> 
>>>> The ad-agency-friendly ad blocker is already here:
>>>> https://www.eff.org/privacybadger
>>>> 
>>>> Mozilla has a built-in tracking protection project as well, haven't
>>>> tried it yet:
>>>> https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/tracking-protection-firefox
>>>> 
>>>> If you want to see how it works, install Privacy Badger, turn off
>>>> other ad blockers, and go read the article on Quartz...
>>>> 
>>>> http://qz.com/308175/the-rise-of-adblock-reveals-a-serious-problem-in
>>>> -the-
>>>> advertising-world/
>>>> 
>>>> There's some tracking going on (and Privacy Badger is blocking it),
>>>> but checkitout...a web implementation of magazine-style ads.  Big and
>>>> attention-getting, not crappy or creepy.  And with tracking
>>>> protection on, unlikely to be "relevant", so the reader has a reason
>>>> to look at them.
>>>> 
>>>> If users block the targeted third-party ads that don't pull their
>>>> weight, and let the potentially valuable non-targeted kind through,
>>>> it's a win for legit advertisers.  Privacy Badger is not 100%, but
>>>> the closest I've seen.  (You can't really understand a media outlet
>>>> without seeing the first-party ads if it has them.)
>>>> 
>>>> Next step is for high-value web properties such as Quartz (run by the
>>>> same company that runs the
>>>> Atlantic) to quietly "nudge" users into turning on their tracking
>>>> protection.  (Ideally you get people to protect themselves from the
>>>> crappy targeted ads before they get frustrated, search "block ads"
>>>> and over-block.) http://ad.aloodo.com/ is a first experiment, but
>>>> there are a lot of ways to do it.
>>>> 
>>>> Don
>>>> 
>>>> begin T.Rob quotation of Tue, Dec 09, 2014 at 07:47:13AM -0500:
>>>>> 
>>>>> The lawsuit is very illustrative.  One group sees a need in the
>>>>> market and
>>>> addresses it with code.  Another sees a need and seeks remedy in
>>>> court.  If you were an investor choosing between a business model
>>>> based on innovation and one based on legal subsidies, where do you
>>>> put your money?  I'm betting on innovation every time.
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> Filloux says that "a single private entity cannot decide what is
>>>>> acceptable or
>>>> not for an entire sector. Especially in such an opaque fashion."  The
>>>> thing is, it
>>>> *isn't* a single private entity.  It is but one approach to ad
>>>> blocking and it has been adopted by millions of private entities as
>>>> being their preferred implementation.  That some of these users do
>>>> not know of other implementations and just take the default confers
>>>> on Eyeo some additional influence but that is hardly something to sue
>> over.
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> Of course, that they haven't tried to solve this through code is a
>>>>> bit
>>>> comforting.  I can't imagine what an ad blocker written by an ad
>>>> company would do under the covers. ;-)  But if they wanted to resolve
>>>> this through innovation instead of seeking legal subsidy of their
>>>> broken business model they might consider actually innovating.  For
>>>> example, by coming up with ads people don't want to block.
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> Kind regards,
>>>>> 
>>>>> -- T.Rob
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> T.Robert Wyatt, Managing partner
>>>>> 
>>>>> IoPT Consulting, LLC
>>>>> 
>>>>> +1 704-443-TROB (8762) Voice/Text
>>>>> 
>>>>> +44 (0) 8714 089 546  Voice
>>>>> 
>>>>> https://ioptconsulting.com <https://ioptconsulting.com/>
>>>>> 
>>>>> https://twitter.com/tdotrob
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> From: Wunderlich, John 
>>>>> [mailto:
 ]
>>>>> Sent: Tuesday, December 09, 2014 6:46 AM
>>>>> To: Doc Searls
>>>>> Cc: ProjectVRM list; Ben Williams
>>>>> Subject: Re: [projectvrm] The Rise of AdBlock Reveals A Serious
>>>>> Problem in the
>>>> Advertising Ecosystem | Monday Note
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> I'd like to hear their response as well. The secondary theme in the
>>>>> piece was
>>>> about how the company does make money - including white listing and
>>>> 'acceptable' ads. If I read it correctly this isn't about allowing
>>>> users to expression intention, but rather trying to align the ad
>>>> economy with what they believe most users will find acceptable.
>>>>> 
>>>>> On Tuesday, December 9, 2014, Doc Searls
>>>>> <
 >
>>>> wrote:
>>>>> 
>>>>> Thanks. A lot in there, and in the comments below.
>>>>> 
>>>>> I am also cc'ing Ben Williams, who works for adblockplus.org in
>>>>> Cologne. I'd
>>>> like to hear their position on the piece.
>>>>> 
>>>>> Doc
>>>>> 
>>>>>> On Dec 9, 2014, at 5:22 AM, John Wunderlich 
>>>>>> <
 
>>>> <javascript:;> > wrote:
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> Did anyone see this piece? I don't know the site, but the main
>>>>>> point is that
>>>> advertisers are considering suing the makers of AdBlock Plus, I
>>>> pulled this quote for the list:
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> "Regardless of its validity, the legal action misses a critical
>>>>>> point. By
>>>> downloading the plug-in AdBlock Plus (ABP) on a massive scale, users
>>>> do vote with their mice against the growing invasiveness of digital
>> advertising.
>>>> Therefore, suing Eyeo, the company that maintains ABP, is like using
>>>> Aspirin to fight cancer. A different approach is required but very
>>>> few seem ready to face that fact."
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> http://www.mondaynote.com/2014/12/08/the-rise-of-adblock-reveals-a-
>>>> serious-problem-in-the-advertising-ecosystem/?utm_source=feedburner
>>>> <http://www.mondaynote.com/2014/12/08/the-rise-of-adblock-reveals-a-
>>>> serious-problem-in-the-advertising-
>>>> ecosystem/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed
>>>> %3A+monday-note+(Monday+Note)>
>>>> &utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+monday-note+(Monday+Note)
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> Fat fingered from a portable device...disregard errurs
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> John Wunderlich
>>>>>> Privacist
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> --
>>>>> John Wunderlich
>>>>> 
>>>>> Fat fingered from a mobile device
>>>>> Pleez 4give spelling errurz!
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
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>>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> --
>>>> Don Marti
>>>> http://zgp.org/~dmarti/
>>>> 
 
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>