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If you offered most people free streaming for a $37 USB stick but directly told them it would be faking ad clicks when the TV is off, would any of them really c

If you offered most people free streaming for a $37 USB stick but directly told them it would be faking ad clicks when the TV is off, would any of them really care?

1970-01-01 2mo ago
No, and that's is the root of the problem. The buyer is happy and so is the seller. They don't care to understand what they're allowing and everyone is allowing it to happen.
- GolfPopper 2mo ago
  They're just meeting the standards American society has set.
  - Scroll_Swe 2mo ago
    [flagged]
    - dang 2mo ago
      Could you please stop posting unsubstantive comments and flamebait, and also please stop using HN primarily for political/ideological battle? These things are not what HN is for, and destroy what it is for, so we ban accounts that do them repeatedly. If you'd please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and stick to the rules when posting here, we'd appreciate it.
- bayarearefugee 2mo ago
  I wouldn't use a device like this for a lot of reasons, but the fact that what they are doing might be taking advantage of the incredibly predatory digital advertising system is neutral to positive for me, if I'm being fully honest. If they were using the system to rip off random people, I'd be 100% against it, if they are fucking Google and the giant corps that advertise with them, ehh.. not my problem and can't be assed to care. Google is not a positive force in the world. Hasn't been for many years.
  - mschild 2mo ago
    Wouldn't this ultimately make money FOR Google and only cost money to the company that placed the ad? Sure, Google's paying but they get their money regardless.
    - chowells 2mo ago
      It might damage Google's reputation with advertisers in the long term. I'm not convinced Google would even care about it, given their other behavior.
      - inigyou 2mo ago
        Proctor & Gamble did an experiment: they cancelled all of their online advertising and watched their sales numbers. Sales didn't change. That sort of thing is downstream of this sort of thing. Online advertising is a money black hole, a sacrifice to the gods. It doesn't really do anything.
        a96 1mo ago
        Except annoys people who do see the ads and wastes bandwidth.
    - crote 2mo ago
      It reduces the value of their ads. Let's say you are an ad buyer. Previously 1M clicks resulted in 1000 sales, now 2M clicks result in the same 1000 sales. If you previously paid $1000 for 1M clicks, you paid $1/sale. If they are now asking you to pay the same $1000 / M clicks you'd be paying $2/sale, so Google would have to drop to $500 / M clicks to offer the same value to advertisers. But the same applies to ad sellers as well. Google would have to slash payouts to websites displaying ads by the same 50% / click or they'd be cutting into their margins. A competing ad platform without fraudulent clicks would be able to slide into this space, offering both a better value to ad buyers and a better payout to ad sellers, so they'd be taking market share from Google without having to do anything themselves. Of course that assumes a market in which the value of ad clicks, views, and placements is clear to everyone and switching between ad platforms is trivial, which is not even remotely the case.
- pessimizer 2mo ago
  > They don't care to understand what they're allowing If you told normal people that they could get free content with a TV streaming stick that would also constantly fake clicks on AI generated websites to screw advertisers over, they would think of it as a bonus. Also it would make them trust the stick more (fallaciously), because they would know how the people who sold it were getting paid.
- inigyou 2mo ago
  And why should they care? There is literally no reason they should care, it does not affect them in any way, if it causes ad companies to ban their IP address that's actually good for them personally, and most people outside of the ad business would agree that hurting ad companies is good.
ajnin 2mo ago
Maybe they wouldn't care about the ads but the residential proxy is another story. I'm sure lots of problematic stuff goes through that and you take the risk of being associated with it.
- inigyou 2mo ago
  Not really. Has anyone ever got in trouble for this?
tomjen3 2mo ago
There are probably quite a few others who consider that a bonus. I'm not going to support illegal actions, but it's also not one of the things I would really lose sleep over if I found out that it have been doing that.

If you offered most people free streaming for a $37 USB stick but directly told them it would be faking ad clicks when the TV is off, would any of them really care?

1970-01-01 2mo ago

No, and that's is the root of the problem. The buyer is happy and so is the seller. They don't care to understand what they're allowing and everyone is allowing it to happen.

GolfPopper 2mo ago
They're just meeting the standards American society has set.
- Scroll_Swe 2mo ago
  [flagged]
  - dang 2mo ago
    Could you please stop posting unsubstantive comments and flamebait, and also please stop using HN primarily for political/ideological battle? These things are not what HN is for, and destroy what it is for, so we ban accounts that do them repeatedly. If you'd please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and stick to the rules when posting here, we'd appreciate it.
bayarearefugee 2mo ago
I wouldn't use a device like this for a lot of reasons, but the fact that what they are doing might be taking advantage of the incredibly predatory digital advertising system is neutral to positive for me, if I'm being fully honest. If they were using the system to rip off random people, I'd be 100% against it, if they are fucking Google and the giant corps that advertise with them, ehh.. not my problem and can't be assed to care. Google is not a positive force in the world. Hasn't been for many years.
- mschild 2mo ago
  Wouldn't this ultimately make money FOR Google and only cost money to the company that placed the ad? Sure, Google's paying but they get their money regardless.
  - chowells 2mo ago
    It might damage Google's reputation with advertisers in the long term. I'm not convinced Google would even care about it, given their other behavior.
    - inigyou 2mo ago
      Proctor & Gamble did an experiment: they cancelled all of their online advertising and watched their sales numbers. Sales didn't change. That sort of thing is downstream of this sort of thing. Online advertising is a money black hole, a sacrifice to the gods. It doesn't really do anything.
      - a96 1mo ago
        Except annoys people who do see the ads and wastes bandwidth.
  - crote 2mo ago
    It reduces the value of their ads. Let's say you are an ad buyer. Previously 1M clicks resulted in 1000 sales, now 2M clicks result in the same 1000 sales. If you previously paid $1000 for 1M clicks, you paid $1/sale. If they are now asking you to pay the same $1000 / M clicks you'd be paying $2/sale, so Google would have to drop to $500 / M clicks to offer the same value to advertisers. But the same applies to ad sellers as well. Google would have to slash payouts to websites displaying ads by the same 50% / click or they'd be cutting into their margins. A competing ad platform without fraudulent clicks would be able to slide into this space, offering both a better value to ad buyers and a better payout to ad sellers, so they'd be taking market share from Google without having to do anything themselves. Of course that assumes a market in which the value of ad clicks, views, and placements is clear to everyone and switching between ad platforms is trivial, which is not even remotely the case.
pessimizer 2mo ago
> They don't care to understand what they're allowing If you told normal people that they could get free content with a TV streaming stick that would also constantly fake clicks on AI generated websites to screw advertisers over, they would think of it as a bonus. Also it would make them trust the stick more (fallaciously), because they would know how the people who sold it were getting paid.
inigyou 2mo ago
And why should they care? There is literally no reason they should care, it does not affect them in any way, if it causes ad companies to ban their IP address that's actually good for them personally, and most people outside of the ad business would agree that hurting ad companies is good.

ajnin 2mo ago

Maybe they wouldn't care about the ads but the residential proxy is another story. I'm sure lots of problematic stuff goes through that and you take the risk of being associated with it.

inigyou 2mo ago
Not really. Has anyone ever got in trouble for this?

tomjen3 2mo ago

There are probably quite a few others who consider that a bonus. I'm not going to support illegal actions, but it's also not one of the things I would really lose sleep over if I found out that it have been doing that.