From: bengtl@maths.lth.se (Bengt Larsson)
Subject: Re: Advertising on Net: how can we stop it?
Organization: Lund Institute of Technology, Sweden
Date: Mon, 14 Dec 1992 21:54:46 GMT

[quite long, I'm afraid]

In article <1992Dec13.032746.3695@clarinet.com> brad@clarinet.com (Brad Templeton) writes:
>In article <1992Dec11.181039.4479@lth.se> bengtl@maths.lth.se (Bengt Larsson) writes:
>
>But it isn't.  On-topic advertising is not only not disliked, it is
>desired. 

Why then is biz.* so small?

>In general, an on-topic, non-hype, relevant advertising posting
>in any group seems to draw opposition only from those who are confused
>and think USENET has some rules banning commercial traffic and those who
>have some philosophical agenda -- who don't complain about the posting
>because it bothered them more than any other posting, but simply because
>it didn't fit their ideals.

Or because it didn't fit the group charter, like "Discussions about..."

>By and large, everybody else seems to like it or not mind it, and indeed
>they certainly like it more than pointless flame threads.  

Some do, yes, but many people like the flames themselves! (I'm not
commenting on it, just noting the fact. There are quite a few
.advocacy groups these days)

>Any posting
>that gives me real factual information on my topic of interest is one
>I want to see, and I don't care if the poster happened to profit by it.

Well, I guess 90% of the advertising I can look at in newspapers,
magazines, TV etc doesn't benefit me the slightest (in terms of
product information). It's mostly "noise", as far as I'm concerned. 

The fact that advertisers have to pay to get into a newspaper but
writers get paid for their articles would give a hint on what's
most wanted by the audience.

>>I guess next we'll hear you moaning that Unix discussions are "banned"
>>from rec.books or something equally silly.
>
>No they are not.   But you're saying you want a universal ban on commercial
>postings in all groups not dedicated to advertising, and you want to ban
>postings based on the motives of the poster rather than whether their topic
>is germane to the topic of the newsgroup.

Essentially, yes. But the motives of the poster tend to carry over in
what type of posting it is(*).

I don't know why you're so fond of the word "ban". To be a real "ban"
it must have real authority and that's what Usenet doesn't have (I
don't say that it should). 

*) You're yourself a prime example. I don't know how many times you
   have advocated something that I happened to know is already there
   on Cl*rin*t. Extensive keywording is one example.

>The purpose of rec.books is discussion and information about books.  I
>would be happy to see a publisher list its upcoming book titles in that
>group, or see announcements about new book publishing ventures, or
>electronic books, or bookstores that will take special orders over the net.
>I think many other readers would feel a similar desire.  Why do you think
>they should be denied this?

As I scan the group I see discussions about literary merit, and (true)
solicitations for "where can I buy". Having free (unsolicited)
advertising would change the characteristics of the group, and I think
that unsolicited advertising would quickly dominate. 

And this would harm those reading the group for the literary
discussions (more "noise", messages to skip etc.).

And of course, there's always the philosophical argument.

I see no real basis for the assertion that many people would want
this.  Do you have any basis for it? Why isn't there a biz.books, where
both discussion and advertising could happily coexist? Maybe because
it's actually _not_ wanted, and most people desire having these
topics separated?

I'm more familiar with the comp.* groups, and I know I wouldn't think
it would be useful to have (unrestricted, unsolicited) advertising
there. Opening any magazine will get me advertising. A phone call to a
company will get me a lot of (free) advertising. So why would I want
it in a newsgroup, which is, after all, a uniquely direct medium for
me, where I can myself post, ask questions, and help others?

No, I say! :-)

>Well, I guess I know why.  Because from time to time we certainly see
>inappropriate advertising.   Postings that are entirely off topic.  Postings
>that have nothing specific to do with the net audience, or which contain
>very little real information, or which are repeated with annoying
>frequency.  I'm all for telling these people that this sort of activity
>is not welcome, just as unwelcome as discussion of Unix in a general books
>group.  But you're saying that commercial book publishing information is
>not welcome in a books group, and that is banning something.  Something
>people *want* to read.

And that some people don't *want* to transport. Don't forget that.

I also think it's much more likely that you would see exactly the same
article posted repeatedly and often, if it's an ad. Maybe you would
like to comment? 

The size of Usenet more or less demands "think before you post".  The
number of posters in a group is much smaller than the number of
readers. I don't believe in only feedback from readers to keep ads on
topic. In my experience the answer often is "But some people want it.
I get customers. So it must be right.". 

Which of course wasn't the point at all (someone answering like
this declines to take responsibility for his postings being on
or off topic).

>You misunderstand the desire of people to see advertising.  The fact
>that misc.forsale groups now surpass rec.humor.funny and alt.sex and all
>the computer books in readership says more than just that ads are
>desired in their own groups.  

It says no such thing. It says they want to read it. Period.

And even though misc.forsale ranks very high (if not the highest) on
the chart, there are literally thousands of other groups. misc.forsale
is a very small part of the total volume and groups. If it wasn't,
there wouldn't be any desire to tap all other groups for advertising
use, now would there?

>It says that people will go out of their
>way to see ads -- even ads that are put in an unorganized mishmash.

So it's being reorganized.

>The correct conclusion is that people would be even more keen to see
>just the ads that match their areas of interest.  

I have no doubt about that.

>The best way to do that
>is to define a tag to put on such postings so that those who have
>the philosophical problems can easily put them in a killfile.  

Then DEFINE such a tag. We've been through this many times. There've
been suggestions from "opposers of advertising".  I've not heard a
peep or seen some action from you concerning this, despite all your
talk about "doing, not talking". I exclude clari.* from this, of
course. I'm talking mainline Usenet. 

>Let the
>people -- the bulk of people -- who want to see useful commercial information,
>see it in the right place.

Exactly. Use "Distribution: biz" for commercial postings, and post
them in any group. What do you have against such a proposal? 

[Probably such a scheme would result in many links blocking "biz"
 as a general distribution if they didn't already, belying that this
 information is "much wanted" at all. But that's what I think]

-- 
Bengt Larsson - bengtl@maths.lth.se

Newsgroups: news.admin,news.sysadmin,news.groups,alt.config