Is internet advertising dying?

beiller (25)in #cryptocurrency • 7 years ago

Malware Ahead

Do you remember the free internet that would show you ads while you browsed the Yahoo internet directory? I do! Oh the joy! How times have changed. Thinking back on those simpler times makes me think, how much are my eyeballs worth? I guess it was worth about $29 per month in 1999. That beautiful modem handshake sound I got before leaping onto the information superhighway, at an ideally optimistic 56 kilobits per second was such a rush!

I wonder what NetZero[1], a local ISP offering free internet laced with custom ads, would think of ablock software today? 615 million devices use some sort of ad blocking software. That makes up about 11% of the global internet population[2].

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Adblock the Magnificent!

Adblocking “plugins” have been used to distribute malware[3]. When installed inside of a browser as an addon, they can cause all sorts of issues and have more direct access to your browser. Blockchain is a pretty hyped technology, can that solve our problems?

“Cryptojacking” is a word. It seems like it makes the problem worse, with bad actors installing “malware” into your browser and stealing your precious CPU cycles and/or battery mAhs. MAH BATTERIES!

But it does offer some interesting benefits, such as being more secure for the user, and not blasting your precious human senses with useless deals on products I literally just finished purchasing on Amazon. Will sites like sparechange.io and coinhive.com join the most hated technology hall of fame along with autoplay video ads? Only time will tell.