Ask HN: When was the last time you clicked an ad deliberately? |
Ask HN: When was the last time you clicked an ad deliberately? |
Being interested and having nothing better to do on a Saturday night I clicked it, got told my system was infected and to call a number for help.
I called the 800 number, got onto a representative who then attempted to get me to install a piece of software. I played along as the dumb consumer who just really to keep the viruses and hackers off his computer.
2 hours later with multiple service escalations, attempts to install a .exe and a .msi to a Ubuntu install, reboots, running windows commands in my terminal, giving fake credit card numbers (the kind generated to make sure your system can handle all credit cards) and me just acting plain dumb ended with me being hung up on.
I figure the 2 hours that they burned on me was one less poor soul they hooked in.
It got me to click because the guitar looked eye catching and I wanted to know more.
That's probably the first ad I've clicked in months.
Oh, wait, deliberately? 3-5 year ago, I'd guess.
I block ads and thus almost never see them. Even without ad blocking enabled...
A) they're rarely if ever relevant to me B) I'm too skeptical of advertising in general to believe a word of them C) when they are about something I'm researching to buy, they pretty much always suggest an item I've already eliminated from consideration for very good reasons D) I find ads too annoying to be willing to encourage their use by clicking on them
Maybe once every five years I'll see one that piques my curiosity enough that I just have to find out what's behind it.
Besides that, in the past I've found The Deck ads (such as on marco.org) to be more relevant than most and I click them occasionally.
I patronize websites that are for my demographic. I follow people that advertise things I like. They do the initial sourcing, then I do the research into whether or not I like that product.
And if a company is the top result and also shows up in the ads above I click on the ad.