Magical thinking is not limited to political actors from right or left, many technocrats indulge in it too.

Sir, Edward Luce referring to “brassy slogan” and “fabulism” among politicians of all sides writes: “Facebook’s algorithm rewards magical thinking” “Magical thinking crosses party lines” March 21.

Yes, solid common sense thinking and truth generates much less advertising revenues than grandiose idiocy or mindboggling fake news.

So what are we to do? There’s no easy answer. 

I would suppose that limiting some social media use to duly identified citizens, would at least reduce all the anonymous noise that is so much harder to put to shame, when it should be shamed. 

Also charging a truly minuscule fee for each web access would help limiting the polarization and redistribution profiteers from marketing their messages of hate and envy at zero marginal cost. (That fee could help fund a universal basic income).

But, magical thinking is not limited to political actors from right or left, or needing the web for its promotion.

The Basel Committee’s risk weighted bank capital requirements are pure unabridged utterly dumb magical thinking, imposed by a bunch of loony technocrats.

Their magical thinking guarantees us a weak economy, and especially severe bank crisis, resulting from especially large exposures, to what was especially perceived as safe, against especially little capital.

@PerKurowski

Imposing a marginal minuscule cost per web-ad-message could perhaps help level the playing field for the boring truths against the much more fun fake news.

Sir, Tim Harford expresses it clearly when he writes, “Fake news itself does not pose an existential threat either to democracy or the free press. What does pose such a threat is a draconian response from governments.” “There is no need to panic about fake news” January 5.

Indeed but Basic Skepticism 101 courses are still much needed. I have for decades objected to that draconian response from regulators that states: “We will make your banks safer with risk weighted capital requirements”, which they based on the loony idea that what’s perceived as risky is more dangerous to our bank systems than what is perceived as safe. 

Of course that is as fake as a regulation can be. Not only does it distort the allocation of credit to the real economy but it also puts bank crises on steroids. As for now, that only guarantees especially large crisis, because of especially large exposures, to what is especially perceived as safe, against especially little capital.

Hartford also worries about “that there is far too little transparency over political advertising in the digital age: we don’t know who is paying for what message to be shown to whom”. I agree but one important cause for that is that there is no marginal cost to be paid by those spreading news and ads on the web.

If every ad messaging on the web forced the messenger to pay a minuscule amount per message, then we would be more carefully targeted, meaning wasting less of our limited attention span, and it would be less easy for fake-more-fun-news messengers to compete with “real” not-as-fun-news outfits, if there now is such a thing.

PS. If those revenues help fund an unconditional universal basic income, then it would be even better. 

@PerKurowski

Caring more about us, the targets, would go a long way to improve advertising efficiency on the web, and reduce fraud.

Sir, John Gapper describes some tip of icebergs in the word of online advertising “Regulators are failing to block fraudulent ads”, February 3.

But I also assume that those paying for the ads do not pay, or stop the advertising, if the ads fail to translate into profits.

We, the targets, we used to be hit with some few advertising bullets while reading a paper, looking at TV or listening to radio… now, on the web, more and more we are hit with thousand of ad pellets, which give very little consideration to the physical limits of our attention span. If the computer has a malware that keeps it reading ads while I sleep I don’t care… but when I sit there and try to use the web for its original purposes the ads are really getting into my way and into my nerves.

What could be done about it? I have suggested the advertisers, with the help of ad-blockers, take contact directly with us the targets. I am sure we could work something out. I my case I have offered to hire out my very scarce attention span for 30 seconds against the low price of US$ 1… initially!

@PerKurowski ©

Ad-blockers, do not allow any unsolicited ads on my mobile… unless of course I get paid good money for looking at it.

Sir, Richard Waters writes: “Slow loading times for mobile web pages — when users are paying for data… cost more than just time” and yet, while discussing the issue of ad blocking he refers to all major actors, except the users. “Who gets to block ads is flip side of who gets to decide which get through” September 10.

It is we the users who end up bearing the brunt of the costs, when having our limited and valuable attention span filled up with noises of all types. And so therefore let me repeat a request for ad-blocking services that would better serve my purpose.

I want an ad-blocking that charges anyone trying to send me an unrequested solicitation of any sort, or more than one per moth of the requested, to charge the advertiser an adjustable fee for me to look at it. Let us say initially US$1 per 30 second’s view. And on that income I would be willing to pay the ad-blocker for his services an adjustable commission, let us say initially 20%.

An alternative in which I could perhaps bypass the ad-blocker is signing up an agreement, for instance with Facebook, Twitter, Google and Apple by which they share their revenues obtained from targeting me and my preferences, for instance, initially 50 percent.

Users unite! Let us maximize the returns for us of our valuable and very limited attention span. 

http://teawithft.blogspot.com/2015/07/my-ideal-adblocker-besides-earning-on.html

http://teawithft.blogspot.com/2015/03/i-want-net-40-percent-of-revenues.html

http://perkurowski.blogspot.com/2015/06/for-1us-i-will-look-for-30-seconds-with.html

http://perkurowski.blogspot.com/2014/06/should-not-google-and-other-public-eyes.html
http://teawithft.blogspot.ca/2007/06/in-search-of-answers-on-search-engines.html

@PerKurowski

If we get a copyright on our own personal data and preferences, then we have something to trade with.

Sir, I refer to Edward Luce’s “Big Data’s infinite harvest” May 25.

In it Luce asks “Should we charge Big Data for our personal data?” And my answer to that has for quite some time been, even to FT, that we should at least get a copyright on our own personal data, so as to have something to trade with.

I recently bought a Tuxedo shirt on the web, and since then I have been receiving many offers on Tuxedo shirts on the social media where I socialize. It crowds my computer and, in doing so, it definitely affects negatively my possibilities of going on with the rest of my own virtual life, as well as intruding on other ads trying to reach my immense purchasing power :-)

And so I believe that if all these content providers had to share some of the ad revenue they got from targeting me, with me, the owner of my own preferences, then we could put some order in the house, an order that could even benefit our Big Brothers. Frankly, I think that any advertiser would love this idea, as that would guarantee that the ad recipient looks more favorable, or even looks, at his ad… of course current advertisers would initially not like it too much… until they understand that would benefit them too.

Now on the issue of information and searches, there I might be a little bit more radical. Because there I would request that at least 50 percent of all search results provided by Google should be provided on a totally pro-bono basis. That is because it is much too important for us to know what the poorer outliers might be thinking, and because we cannot afford our information needs to be satisfied solely by information lobbyist.

But clearly all this is just in its initial stages and developing.

@PerKurowski

They pay just 0.0025 to 0.02 cents of a dollar per advert to reach me online? No way! I am worth much more!

Sir, I refer to Tim Harford’s “Online ads: log in, tune out, turn off” April 4. It contains some very enlightening data for someone not in the business of targeting ads but only being a target of ads. Harford mentions that the rate for cheap advert may be as low 25 cents of a dollar per 1000 views, while good adverts may pay the publisher 2 dollars per 1000 view.

So that means that someone reaching me with a cheap advert pays for that 1/40th of a cent of a dollar while someone reaching me with a good advert pays 1/5th of a cent of a dollar. What a shocker, I thought getting my attention span was worth more than that. De facto I am a Mechanical Turk working at the receiving end. Not only do I perceive any income for that, zero salary, but, to add insult to injury, they are valuing the access to my attention span at ridiculous low rates.

It is clear that I urgently need someone to develop an App that will only allow ads that produces me an income of X dollars per hour of my attention span to reach me. The provider of that service, in charge of collecting my earnings, would have to work on a commission basis, so that I can be sure we are both targeting the same end results.

Since now and again I would wish to see a little of what is available in the cheap advert markets, occasionally I authorize allotting some of my valuable attention span, on a pro-bono basis.

PS. That X dollars per hour of my attention span will fluctuate according to market conditions.

@PerKurowski

I want a net 40 percent of the revenues generated by ads on the web in which I am the target. Who can help me?

Sir, I refer to Robert Cookson’s “Web publishers in arms race with adblockers” March 30.

Clearly picking up information about what we are up to on the Internet, and screening us for what we might like, in order to reach us for with some advertising, is big big business. And stopping that from happening seems also to be big big businesses… and now we read that sometimes those two big big interests even collude to get the most out of us.

But what about us, the targets? Is there no way we can participate in those revenues? Anyone who figures that out could have a very interesting business model in his hands.

For instance: “I want to prohibit any ad blocker to block any ad in which I am the target and in which I do not get a share of the ad-revenues… let’s say 50 percent”. Who can help me with that? I am willing to pay 20 percent out of my revenues for that service… in order to retain a quite modest 40% of my value as a target.

PS. Sir, between us, to block any ads targeted at me, without my explicit authorization, sounds like something quite criminal to me.

@PerKurowski

Do I own a copyright of myself? If so, should I not get a cut of what’s paid when advertising is tailored to me?

Sir, I refer to your editorial on the upcoming law in Spain that indicates that “all online news aggregators will be required to pay Spanish publishers a fee for contents that they link to”, “Spain’s flawed challenge to the mighty Goggle” December 12.

I mostly agree with what you write, but I do have some question on other two related issues:

First, if online news aggregators have to pay, why do not newspapers also have to do that, for instance when they review a book… and when that review can even lead to the book not being read, much less bought?

Second, cannot it be said that I own a copyright of myself? If so, why should I not get a cut of what’s paid to Google for someone to be able to tailor his advertising to me? And also, when somebody searches me, should not Goggle collect a fee and split it 50-50 with me?

PS. By the way, if all advertising I receive is tailored to me, does that not go against my human right to be able to become someone different… perhaps even someone better… or as a minimum at least someone with a better taste?

PS. Should not Google and other public private eyes also search our permission before searching us for other to us unknown parties?

Matchmaking on the web is still a quite chancy affair

Sir, your editorial “the wrong crowd” August 4, about risks with advertising on places such as Facebook reminded me of when, mind you for research purposes only, I recently visited one of those fanatic leftist pure anti-Yankee web sites that also tries to make a living earning some capitalistic advertising dollars, and up popped a recruitment add for the US Army. This comes to show our savvy matchmakers on the web still have a long way to go as having probably used “sovereignty” as their key word they failed to realize that this word depends so much on what side of the border you find yourself on.