this post was submitted on 06 Apr 2025
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Mildly Interesting

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What If We Made Advertising Illegal? (simone.org)
submitted 1 day ago by sundrei to c/mildlyinteresting@lemmy.world
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The idea feels like sci-fi because you're so used to it, imagining ads gone feels like asking to outlaw gravity. But humanity had been free of current forms of advertising for 99.9% of its existence. Word-of-mouth and community networks worked just fine. First-party websites and online communities would now improve on that.

The traditional argument pro-advertising—that it provides consumers with necessary information—hasn't been valid for decades.

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[–] heavydust@sh.itjust.works 85 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

5 minutes ago on Hacker News, among a lot of stupid stuff like "your life is empty without having ads all around you."

Reference for fun: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43596333

[–] WanderingThoughts@europe.pub 43 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I love that in Cyberpunk 2077 they're is often a channel on called "just ads". Of course in pure cyberpunk style those ads can be horrific.

[–] comfy@lemmy.ml 3 points 17 hours ago* (last edited 17 hours ago)

There are shopping channels in many countries (or at least paid cable television) which are literally just ads. In classic cyberpunk style, it's a reflection of the dystopian present.