IAB Urges People To Stop "Mozilla From Hijacking the Internet" 499
hypnosec writes "In its latest attempt to stop Mozilla from going ahead with its proposed default blocking of third-party cookies in Firefox, the Interactive Advertising Bureau took out a full page ad urging users to stop 'Mozilla from hijacking the Internet.' Through the advert, IAB has claimed that the Firefox maker wants to be the 'judge and jury' when it comes to business models on the web. According to the IAB, Mozilla wants to eliminate the cookies which enable online advertisers to reach the right audience. IAB notes that 'If cookies are eliminated, it is clear to us that consumers will get a less relevant and diverse Internet experience.'"
My Response (Score:5, Interesting)
http://it.slashdot.org/story/13/08/12/2011245/new-attack-uses-attackers-own-ad-network-to-deliver-android-malware [slashdot.org]
There are too many stories of ads delivering malware or otherwise compromising someone's computer. If we can reduce the number of systems that are added to a C&C network, we'll all be that much better off.
Of course, for the tin foil hat folks, big brother is watching out for you. :)
[John]
I don't know what's worse... (Score:2, Interesting)
That they're actually trying to say that changing a default setting to a more secure option is taking control away from users or that a large portion of people who find out about this will believe them...
Send feedback? (Score:3, Interesting)
The IAB advertisement includes the text:
Send an email to StopMozilla@aboutads.info to tell Mozilla you don’t want them hijacking cookies on the Internet.
Provided they actually read any text in emails to that address, I don't see why you couldn't send email in support of Mozilla instead.
Bad Writing (Score:0, Interesting)
Who is the IAB? Why do they matter?
I clicked the link and at least I found out who the hell the IAB was. I still don't know why they matter.
Re:I don't know what's worse... (Score:5, Interesting)
The next logical step would be legal harassment, either via lobbying efforts ("Senator, Mozilla's block could cost the US advertising industry hundreds of millions, and potentially tens of billions lost off the economy due to decreased purchasing!") or direct attacks (Sue the Mozilla foundation for interference in contract).
Reminds me of another ad (Score:2, Interesting)
My towns newspaper had a full page ad in it from an advertisment agency a while back. It had a picture of North Korea, the "country without advertisment". Basically what they claimed was that, without ads, we would become like them.
Re:Ten Bleeding Hearts (Score:5, Interesting)
IAB notes that 'If cookies are eliminated, it is clear to us that consumers will get a less relevant and diverse Internet experience.'"
I love it when they try to make it sound like the ads are there for our benefit. Gosh, I wouldn't want to have a less diverse Internet experience!
Safari Did it First (Score:4, Interesting)
Where's the full-page ad against Apple? Oh, right, better to not take on a billion-dollar behemoth and run ads against the nonprofit giving people more control over their Internet browsing experience.
Re:Dear Advertisers (Score:5, Interesting)
Well I run a site (see "homepage" link) that wasn't made for advertising, but it has allowed me, for a brief time at least, to devote my time to researching the information and purchasing materials for researching the information. Much of what you see on the site is online through my effort first. A whole lot is parsed by me from low-quality images that can't be searched, OCRd or otherwise rendered (see what I did there?) useful for people requiring answers. I tried to behave as respectfully towards my users as I could - no extraneous pages to click through, no annoying ads, and I made the decision to serve only text ads. I guess I'm SOL for now, but it would be nice not to be hated for just trying to make ends meet and doing what I love.
From my point of view, the advertisers are the problem for another reason - they have ridiculously high demands for honouring payments, like not only must a user click, they must complete so and so action or the click doesn't count (which leads to ever more prominent, gaudy ads to try and bait users to click), extremely low revenue if the metric is views rather than clicks, etc. There is also zero transparency from their side - a click is valid or not on their say-so alone.
Hopefully this will push ads towards a more peaceful and unobtrusive pay-to-display model - as per any other medium that has ads at all.
6 ways advertisers are ignorant and destructive. (Score:5, Interesting)
1) I'm not a "consumer". I'm a person.
2) Advertising in the U.S. has become more and more disgusting. Most ads include some dishonesty. A lot of advertising is extremely evil, such as trying to get people to eat expensive sugary food. In my opinion, you at the IAB represent one of the most destructive social forces in the United States. Most ads are attempts to get people to waste their money.
3) You don't know what experience I want. My internet interests cannot be predicted by knowing what I did in the past.
4) I don't buy things because of ads. I do research. I spend money carefully, not because I saw an ad written by someone who thinks he is smarter than me and can take advantage of some weakness in me.
5) You at the IAB obviously have NO technical knowledge. If the Mozilla browsers don't block "cookies" from being stored on my computers, I can block them other ways. And will! You have an opinion about something you don't understand.
6) A large part of what causes people to block advertising is moving pictures, which are distracting when someone is trying to read. If you want ads accepted, avoid making them intrusive and annoying.
Re: fud (Score:1, Interesting)
It's a problem for the ecosystem because un targeted ads earn web sites considerably less money than targeted ads. Less revenue means fewer employees and less content.
Re:6 ways advertisers are ignorant and destructive (Score:5, Interesting)
>> I don't buy things because of ads. I do research.
Marketers giggle when they read stuff like this.
They use sidebar ads to repeat brands and brand attributes, since repetition leads to better recall. Then they research what sites consumers like you use to research products, and seed those sites (including, yes, Wikipedia) with information, reviews and other content that will build up their products and steer you away from other products (often by rigging evaluation criteria or "what you should look for in...").
You say it doesn't work...but results demonstrate that it does.
Re:fud (Score:5, Interesting)
You're close to the IAB's point.
If you don't accept their cookies, they will send you totally random ads - feminine hygiene products, mayonnaise, Mall of America, etc. The chances are that you will be interested in less than 5% of them. If you take their cookies, they will follow you from Slashdot, Apple, and Honda, then send you an ad for a car with an iPhone interface. At least there is a higher chance you'd be interested, or at least not completely pissed off at the stupid ads.
They don't want to send you ads for stupid or irrelevant stuff, because that's worse than a waste of bandwidth - it may drive you to seek out an ad blocker.
A big part of their problem is their history of sending crap ads that used the same cookie technology.
What might work better is an "anonymous cookie" technology. Instead of sending you a personally identifiable ID, let them access a special "topical cookie area" that has a finite set of pre-defined categories with a finite set of ratings (low/medium/high), and your surfing habits would change the levels of the topics. Slashdot might boost a TECH cookie to "high", and lower your other cookies slightly. Visiting Kimberly-Clark would boost your HOUSEHOLD cookie. Ford would boost your CAR interest. Advertisers could look only at that shared pool of topical cookies and decide which ads to show you. There are lots of details to work out, of course, but it could help preserve anonymity while not completely shutting out targeted ads.