There seems to be a really strong disdain on HN for AdTech in general, which I think is misguided, and comes fundamentally from a "web consumer" mentality. I think that it would be valuable to reframe the question from the producers point of view: 1) I am a niche small business - how do I let people know that I exist? 2) I run a website and would like to monetize it - how can I get paid for the content that I produce?

The ad-tech solution is actually quite elegant in theory - if you can show ads only to the people to whom they are relevant, then, as a small business you can let people know you exist without blowing your ad budget, and, as a content producer, the more valuable an ad-view is, the more you can charge for it.

The current movement to avoid tracking is an extremely powerful centralizing force. The large platforms know a lot about you already - Facebook, Google, Amazon, Apple, etc. So, in a way, "we're not going to let AdTech track users" = "we're going to make only ads on large platforms effective", which means that both content producers and advertisers will prefer them, and then people ask "where did the old internet go"?

The AdTech system isn't ideal, but it would be great if the people who criticize it came up with something other than "fuck the small businesses and content producers".

> 1) I am a niche small business - how do I let people know that I exist? 2) I run a website and would like to monetize it - how can I get paid for the content that I produce?

The thing is, this isn’t my problem. The fact that someone wants to market their business doesn’t entitle them to my attention.

> doesn’t entitle them to my attention

if you're looking at someone's website then yes they are entitled to your attention. what gave you the idea that you're entitled to consume for free content that other people payed to produce and host?

> what gave you the idea that you're entitled to consume for free content that other people payed to produce and host?

The fact that their HTTP server replied 200 OK. If they want to put up a paywall or use a different protocol they're totally free to do so, but permission was inherently granted by the act of serving the content.

Acting like anyone who views a webpage has any obligations regarding how they render or reproduce it is like putting a barbecue on the side of the road with a free sign on it after hiding a bill inside, then getting mad when you don't get paid. Trying to tack on riders that fundamentally alter the mechanics of the underlying protocol is fundamentally invalid.

You're right, permission was given. Your browser also gave all of that data to the webserver and happily shows you that ad. Both sides were voluntary.

In the case of an incorrectly configured browser, sure, but definitely not mine - which is the whole point. Once freely offered, conditions can't be imposed on use. If you don't want my browser to render content as it sees fit, don't serve the content over a protocol where that dynamic is inherent.

The reason very few actually take that route is because they want to have their cake and eat it too: the openness of www/http but the monetizability of AOL-esque pseudointernet schemes. If a publisher wants to fuck off to corponet with blackjack, hookers, DRM and WEI they're more than free to do so, but traffic may not follow them. Mine certainly won't.

to play the devil's advocate, this is why google proposed the WEI (https://github.com/RupertBenWiser/Web-Environment-Integrity/...). Be careful what you wish for...