LAURA CHAMBERS, CEO, MOZILLA CORPORATION As Mark shared in his blog, Mozilla is going to be more active in digital advertising. Our hypothesis is that we n

our expanded focus on online advertising won’t be embraced by everyone in our community

you don’t say

  • capt_kafei@lemmy.caEnglish
    2012·
    1 month ago

    I’m honestly not against this. I know a lot of people will be furious with Mozilla about doing anything related to advertising, but as the article says:

    And, for the foreseeable future at least, advertising is a key commercial engine of the internet, and the most efficient way to ensure the majority of content remains free and accessible to as many people as possible.

    We may dislike ads, but the vast majority of internet users are not going to engage with content that requires you to pay up front. Creators and journalists need money to survive, and currently, ad-supported viewing is necessary for that to happen.

    Instead of just hoping that advertising somehow goes away, I’m glad that Mozilla is working on ways for ads to exist without mass individual user tracking. I wish it wasn’t necessary, but wishing won’t change the world.

    • LWD@lemm.eeEnglish
      162·
      1 month ago

      With all due respect, Mozilla is now (and, for a while, has been) an ad company. When an ad company tells you ads are necessary, you should not trust them. Plenty of lousy things have been entrenched as social norms, but it is the job of the entrenchers to justify their existence… Which Mozilla is definitely not doing here.

    • rhabarba@feddit.orgOPEnglish
      164·
      1 month ago

      Creators and journalists need money to survive, and currently, ad-supported viewing is necessary for that to happen.

      The only way out of this is to block advertising. I, personally, think that you should not have a website if you can’t pay for it yourself, but the only acceptable kind of website income is a paywall. If you just have “better advertising”, advertising will never go away. And I hate ads.

      • d0ntpan1c@lemmy.blahaj.zoneEnglish
        84·
        1 month ago

        I, personally, think that you should not have a website if you can’t pay for it yourself

        You might want to consider how expensive web hosting can be, depending on the content and traffic. A belief like that can shut out a huge portion of the world from being able to even bother with a web site. Even a simple blog can get very expensive due to traffic. Maybe not expensive enough for your average 1st world individual… But that still excludes a large portion of the population with internet access.

        • rhabarba@feddit.orgOPEnglish
          42·
          1 month ago

          So? Is anyone who can’t afford one legally obliged to have a website?

          • d0ntpan1c@lemmy.blahaj.zoneEnglish
            43·
            1 month ago

            No, but if its prohibitively impossible to do so, people with legitimate good ideas will never be able to do anything about it. Barriers to entry only serve the wealthy.