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posted by cmn32480 on Wednesday April 22 2015, @12:39PM   Printer-friendly
from the take-back-the-internet dept.

During an outbreak of common sense in a Hamburg, Germany, court it was ruled that.. no, advertisers don't get their own way every time.

Zeit Online GmbH and Handelsblatt GmbH as representatives of the advertising world filed suit against Eyeo GmbH (the owners of AdBlock Plus) claiming that the latter should not be allowed to distribute software (a browser plugin that blocks ads) that disrupts their income stream.

The court did not look favourably on the advertisers' case.

From an article in The Register :

Ben Williams, a director of Eyeo, wrote in a blog: "The Hamburg court decision is an important one, because it sets a precedent that may help us avoid additional lawsuits and expenses defending what we feel is an obvious consumer right: giving people the ability to control their own screens by letting them block annoying ads and protect their privacy."

This has ramifications for another simmering case in neighboring France.

 
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  • (Score: 5, Insightful) by ikanreed on Wednesday April 22 2015, @01:18PM

    by ikanreed (3164) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday April 22 2015, @01:18PM (#173941) Journal

    1. It hurts economies by convincing people of things that are not true.

    2. It creates a layer of competition that exists only as a drain the companies that need it: if nobody's advertising, the playing field is exactly as level as if everyone is, except the products lack the 25-100% markup that marketing expenses create in various fields.

    3. Marketing wastes peoples' time and attention. A lot of it. We only have our short little lives, and demanding our attention is an unreasonable behavior.

    And the only excuses neoliberal economics types have for it really fall flat for me. "It's a trust negotiation expense" they say, which is bullshit; everyone knows ads are laden with as many half-truths(or unrelated emotional manipulation) as the law allows. "It increases the informativeness of the marketplace" they say, which is bullshit for the same reasons.

    I value some of the things that depend on ads for revenue, but not the ads themselves. They're unhealthy, and need to be excised like a tumor.

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  • (Score: 5, Interesting) by VLM on Wednesday April 22 2015, @01:28PM

    by VLM (445) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday April 22 2015, @01:28PM (#173949)

    The only strong argument I can make in favor of advertising is some folks need an outlet for certain energies or behaviors. Its kinda like pr0n in that way.

    So if you didn't have job positions for liars and crooks to make advertising, they'd get jobs somewhere more important and F that all up. Would not want that type to be managing operations, or in charge of environmental regulation compliance, etc. Sort of the court jester, the kingdom needs at least one guy who can tell the king he's full of shit and thats the jesters full time job. Likewise liars and cheats and crooks are gonna get jobs and better in advertising than in accounting or whatever. Gotta have a spot for that kind of person somewhere and advertising causes the least societal damage of the alternative job categories.

    In the long run maybe you could educate or beat anti-social tendencies like that outta a population. Maybe. Then you wouldn't need a place for them and wouldn't need advertising.

    Of course I admit upfront this argument stinks of the broken window fallacy of economics where obviously producing ads that no one looks at is a waste of food water and oxygen even if on paper it generates economic growth. But its not that awful of an argument overall.

  • (Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 22 2015, @01:47PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 22 2015, @01:47PM (#173963)

    In the era of the adblocker, tabbed browser, and smartphone, no ad can demand too much attention.

    (Block ads, switch away from unskippable video ads, and divert attention from captive ads.)

    • (Score: 3, Insightful) by ikanreed on Wednesday April 22 2015, @02:10PM

      by ikanreed (3164) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday April 22 2015, @02:10PM (#173974) Journal

      Excising ads from your own life is a good thing for me, yes. But a broader economy that actively punishes a lack of advertising with bankruptcy is symptomatic of a larger problem.

      • (Score: 2) by kaszz on Wednesday April 22 2015, @09:43PM

        by kaszz (4211) on Wednesday April 22 2015, @09:43PM (#174125) Journal

        That the public at large exercise insufficient quality control or if they need the product at all? In nature large hordes can trample valuable areas in the same way. So divert the dead fish elsewhere and constrain resources available to groupthinkers.

  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by M. Baranczak on Wednesday April 22 2015, @04:24PM

    by M. Baranczak (1673) on Wednesday April 22 2015, @04:24PM (#174039)

    This is true, and you can say the same thing about the banking/investment sector. Modern society needs these businesses - but nowadays, they've grown way bigger than they need to be, and they're sucking resources away from the people who actually do useful work.

    • (Score: 3, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 22 2015, @07:15PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 22 2015, @07:15PM (#174086)

      banking [...] Modern society needs these businesses

      s/businesses/services

      Let the USA's #1 advocate for banks owned by THE PEOPLE tell you how 1 state has stayed out of the crapper by having a public bank for over a century.
      Don't give your money to corporate bankers [google.com]

      -- gewg_

  • (Score: 2) by Non Sequor on Thursday April 23 2015, @02:23AM

    by Non Sequor (1005) on Thursday April 23 2015, @02:23AM (#174182) Journal

    Say one nontrivial thing that's true.

    It's bullshit half truths all the way down. Bullshit half truths are the currency of the human race. They're the substitute for the deeper truths we try to connect with but fail to attain.

    For me personally, advertising works like simulated annealing: sure most of the time the changes it promotes in my behavior are of dubious marginal improvement but sometimes I find something I like and stick with it. Most of the time, doing my own research doesn't yield a high enough value over the above pattern so I live with advertising.

    If you reject that pattern, maybe it's because doing your own research on the things you use gives you a feeling that you have control over your life.

    --
    Write your congressman. Tell him he sucks.
    • (Score: 2) by ikanreed on Thursday April 23 2015, @01:20PM

      by ikanreed (3164) Subscriber Badge on Thursday April 23 2015, @01:20PM (#174280) Journal

      Say one nontrivial thing that's true.

      You're a moron who overestimates their resistance to advertising.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 23 2015, @03:19PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 23 2015, @03:19PM (#174321)

        Maybe you underestimate your resistance to pseudoscientific brainwashing waves. I see lots of people refer to how much money companies spend on advertising research, but they've never proven that the specific people they're replying to are actually susceptible to advertising. Yes, some people are different. Amazing. I heard the FBI also spent boatloads of money on psychic detectives at one point; they must have been effective.

      • (Score: 2) by Non Sequor on Thursday April 23 2015, @11:14PM

        by Non Sequor (1005) on Thursday April 23 2015, @11:14PM (#174475) Journal

        Well, given that I think all humans are stupid, I don't doubt the first part, but I don't overestimate my resistance to advertising, I just don't care about its negative effects on me. I embrace and enjoy the arbitrary and capricious nature of the universe.

        --
        Write your congressman. Tell him he sucks.