# Political irony



## Sigmund451 (Aug 8, 2003)

Its Ironic on a site where politics is banned to see political banner adds.....

Really?....???? 

Is someone just trying to start something?


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## JimD (Feb 3, 2003)

I only see ads if I’m not signed in.


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## Sigmund451 (Aug 8, 2003)

I was signed it. Its the banner ad in at the top, below the sotw title section.

I didnt expect to be invited to the Trump store.


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## Sacks Of Phones (Jan 26, 2017)

Sigmund451 said:


> Its Ironic on a site where politics is banned to see political banner adds.....
> 
> Really?....????
> 
> Is someone just trying to start something?


I only see Oleg ads all day every day.


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## JimD (Feb 3, 2003)

I found an Amazon ad on the front page and an empty slot for a Google ad. Somebody’s obviously after you.

What’s he selling, no don’t answer that.


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## Sigmund451 (Aug 8, 2003)

Well...i didnt visit but it had hats and crap in the picture...campaign junk.


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## lostcircuits (Aug 25, 2015)

I am signed in and I see a big banner on top, BestBuy, Dispatch, or whatever the bots decide they should target me with.


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## JimD (Feb 3, 2003)

Fortunately I don’t need a hat. Strange that I don’t get banner ads, I’m not complaining though. I usually use my iPad to view the forum, maybe it’s different on the computer.


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## Sigmund451 (Aug 8, 2003)

They will be selling masks in a week.


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## JimD (Feb 3, 2003)

���� huh, useless failed emojis.


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## datsaxman (Nov 28, 2005)

Sigmund451 said:


> Its Ironic on a site where politics is banned to see political banner adds.....
> 
> Really?....????
> 
> Is someone just trying to start something?


Must be your search habits. I see ads about the kinds of things I search on. Or generic big ticket ads, like Dodge automobiles right now.

Never political ads.


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## milandro (Dec 22, 2006)

well, there are ways not to get hit by unwanted ads. 

Anyway, I also think that ads follow your preferences or searches or geographic location


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## Sacks Of Phones (Jan 26, 2017)

This is what I see on the right of the home page.........Oleg lives on the top right of the Activity Stream


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## adamk (Jun 22, 2009)

Oleg and Best Buy


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## JimD (Feb 3, 2003)

Still nothing. Maybe they know I won't buy it.


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## Grumps (Feb 3, 2003)

I now use Edge to get on the site. I used the privacy settings to my advantage and reject third party cookies and such. Since then, no ads load here and the site moves much more quickly.


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## Pete Thomas (Sep 12, 2004)

Everyone sees different ads. It's a valid complaint but you'd need to provide a screen shot to get anything done (if they will).

Also it's SOTW has a rule about politics, I'm not sure the owners, Verticalscope have the same rule. It's they who are in control of the advertising.



adamk said:


> Oleg and Best Buy


Oleg is an official VS/SOTW Vendor (possibly now the one and only since Viking are not any longer although i think some Viking ads still remain here and there)

NB: If _everyone_ used adblockers, sites like this would either disappear or become subscription only.


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## Sigmund451 (Aug 8, 2003)

Im pretty sure silicone valley needs to improve their ad search software if they think the chose to show me something Id EVER consider anything but gross. Their math really got it wrong. Sell your Google stock fast!


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## Pete Thomas (Sep 12, 2004)

Sigmund451 said:


> Im pretty sure silicone valley needs to improve their ad search software if they think the chose to show me something Id EVER consider anything but gross. Their math really got it wrong. Sell your Google stock fast!


If you want at least a chance of something being done, this should be in the shouted out to the admins - and probably better in the forum issues section rather than the lounge - do you want me to move it?


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## Sigmund451 (Aug 8, 2003)

I dont expect anything to be done really. I just found it odd and as I said, rather ironic.

If you want to move or remove it that is fine.


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## Benjamin Allen (Aug 24, 2014)

I don't get any exciting adds. Just Oleg in the top right corner and Verizon Fios, Amazon, and a few other blah adverts. I didn't even pay attention until you mentioned it.
Best,
Ben


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## ZootTheSim (Jun 22, 2016)

+3 on Oleg, and sometimes that guy who looks like David Boreanaz.

Google uses over 200 "signals" from your search histories, including geographic location, language preference, purchasing habits, and so forth to narrowcast ads targeted at your "data double," a sort of digital homunculus stitched together from your data streams that lives on their servers, and which may or may not resemble the real you. Welcome to the wonderful world of surveillance capitalism.


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## Atonal (Aug 25, 2010)

It's true that ad tracking happens, but as the political campaigns are now really in high gear, I'm seeing a lot of Trump ads on various social media platforms. There's no way those ads are targeted at me because I am way on the other side of the spectrum.

Not to get political in any specific way, but I find it fascinating and concerning that political ads of any kind and from any party actually influence people.

Anyway, it's hard to escape all of the stupid political advertisements, even on a saxophone forum.


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## ZootTheSim (Jun 22, 2016)

Atonal said:


> Anyway, it's hard to escape all of the stupid political advertisements, even on a saxophone forum.


It's actually quite simple: just move to Canada. Well, maybe not at the moment . . . . but even during elections, we don't see a fraction of the ads that you get down south, and most ads are on TV or radio, so easily tuned out.


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## Pete Thomas (Sep 12, 2004)

ZootTheSim said:


> It's actually quite simple: just move to Canada. Well, maybe not at the moment . . . . but even during elections, we don't see a fraction of the ads that you get down south, and most ads are on TV or radio, so easily tuned out.


How would that help? The ads follow expats (OP is in France!)


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## ZootTheSim (Jun 22, 2016)

Good point, Pete. As long as you're still voting in US elections from France, Phil, you're a viable target for these ads. You may need to go dark--change your name, zero yourself out, and lay low for a while.


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## Reet McVouty (Dec 3, 2008)

Sigmund451 said:


> They will be selling masks in a week.


Not from that site they won't ...


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## Sigmund451 (Aug 8, 2003)

Reet McVouty said:


> Not from that site they won't ...


I was making a joke based on the recent pressured about face coming from some "House"


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## PigSquealer (Dec 27, 2017)

I haven’t seen a single ad since I installed Malwarebytes last October.


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## DarrellMass (May 12, 2016)

I get no ads, but I also get no Google Search function. I use my antivirus browser, so obviously it's filtering out unwanted garbage.


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## Pete Thomas (Sep 12, 2004)

Google search function = unwanted garbage?


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## milandro (Dec 22, 2006)

the google search function is available also to people who use adblockers

HERE https://www.saxontheweb.net

Middle of the page on top


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## whaler (Jan 11, 2006)

Sigmund451 said:


> I was signed it. Its the banner ad in at the top, below the sotw title section.
> 
> I didnt expect to be invited to the Trump store.


Fill your cart with his Chinese junk and leave it without checking out.
I have a friend who said he has $16.000 worth of hats in there.


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## dexdex (May 10, 2011)

*Nonsense: campaign funding for US elections !*

Sorry for the rant. This forum is supposed to be apolitical.
How come I, as a Swiss citizen, currently connected to the net in France, browsing a Finnish forum, get a banner to fund a candidate's campaign for the US presidential elections ?
I still live with the illusion that the GAFAMs are smart operators. 
This would rather prove quite a miserable dumbness. Proportional to the candidate begging for support ?
On vit une époque formidable !


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## JimD (Feb 3, 2003)

*Re: Nonsense: campaign funding for US elections !*

See also Sigmund451, it seems to be the latest fashion


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## Benjamin Allen (Aug 24, 2014)

*Re: Nonsense: campaign funding for US elections !*

I don't get any of those ads--just boring Amazon Fresh and Premium Beauty adds and student loan adds for loans I don't have. Oh, and of course Oleg ads. You and Phil are so lucky to get the US campaign ads!


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## warp x (Aug 12, 2007)

I never see any ads, logged in or not. I use Brave.


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## SaxBass55 (Feb 20, 2017)

*Re: Nonsense: campaign funding for US elections !*

That is an interesting question. First I'll disclose my ignorance on tech; I had to look up the GAFAM acronym. I did come up with some ideas that I'll post in the hopes that someone more knowledgeable enlightens us further.
I don't think that the internet server being French weighs in on the question, as it provides a portal to the world.
The candidate, their campaign or supporters may be marketing to US citizens overseas, for example soldiers. They or the GAFAM company may have reason to believe that these potential voters frequent the Finnish forum. Another possibility would be that US citizens living in the US frequent that forum enough to include it in a large advertising purchase. 
The candidate, their campaign or supporters may be marketing to citizens of other countries, looking to get funding as they may think that those citizens may want to support them. While my read of the law suggests that that strategy would be illegal:
https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/52/30121
suffice it to say that laws can be difficult to enforce.
The algorithms that GAFAM employ to target market may be imperfect (supporting your supposition that the companies are not as smart as they seem). There may be no financial incentive to screen a given forum out. A supposition that unless it adversely affects their income that the GAFAM company doesn't care and has little to no cost from casting that wider net. There may be financial incentives for GAFAM to bury specifics about where the candidate, campaign or supporter's money is being spent. Does the purchaser review every site that the advertising goes to, or just the # of posts?
If it helps, another member on this site posted a thought along the same veins of yours regarding political advertising on a forum:
https://forum.saxontheweb.net/showthread.php?374524-Political-irony
If it helps, here in the states we are barraged with phone calls, many of which are political. These are automatically dialed (called robocalls) and commonly contain a recording. As the 2020 elections loom I anticipate that many of these are political. I have both stopped answering calls coming from a number that I don't recognize, and going to the phone if I am otherwise engaged in an activity; if I recognize the caller I call them back. 
If all you are getting is an ad banner, you are luckier than am I!


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## dexdex (May 10, 2011)

Sigmund451 said:


> They will be selling masks in a week.


:faceinpalm::mrgreen::mrgreen:


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## JimD (Feb 3, 2003)

*Re: Nonsense: campaign funding for US elections !*

My partner is an art historian and in her search for images ranges all over the web. Often she goes to a site linked to tourism and for the next few days she is barraged with ads from travel operators. If you have spent time looking at US politics related sites then that could be the answer. If you haven't then we're back to the idea that GAFAMs are not as smart as you thought or don't care. There's probably so much of this stuff out there at the moment that some is going to get through to the wrong place.


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## DarrellMass (May 12, 2016)

Pete Thomas said:


> Google search function = unwanted garbage?


"But" infers there's a downside, in the American language. I don't know about English.


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## dexdex (May 10, 2011)

*Re: Nonsense: campaign funding for US elections !*

Travel operators are just doing business. We are speaking of political promotion, which I thought had nothing to do in this forum.


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## dexdex (May 10, 2011)

*Re: Nonsense: campaign funding for US elections !*


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## JimD (Feb 3, 2003)

*Re: Nonsense: campaign funding for US elections !*

The forum doesn't generate the ads.


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## lostcircuits (Aug 25, 2015)

*Re: Nonsense: campaign funding for US elections !*

I'm pretty sure they try to get any penny they can, regardless of where it comes from. I know that DJT has followers in many countries in Europe who are willing to pitch in. so maybe that's the rationale behind the carpet bombing. If it is cheap enough so that there is a potential profit, however small, it'll be used. Nothing devious behind it.


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## dexdex (May 10, 2011)

*Re: Nonsense: campaign funding for US elections !*



JimD said:


> The forum doesn't generate the ads.


Well, that was pretty clear for me. Why should we accept them ? We aren't on FB or any other public place. Our moderators keep reminding us the rules.


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## milandro (Dec 22, 2006)

*Re: Nonsense: campaign funding for US elections !*



dexdex said:


> And ?


So they have no control on which ad is displayed, not only , ads change, dinamically from person to person and largely depend on location and previous search history.

You can use a ad blocker and your problems, like the ads, will disappear

By the way, this thread is about the same thing and has been published recently too

https://forum.saxontheweb.net/showthread.php?374524-Political-irony


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## lostcircuits (Aug 25, 2015)

*Re: Nonsense: campaign funding for US elections !*



dexdex said:


> Well, that was pretty clear for me. Why should we allow them ?


The way it used to work when I was still running my own site(s) was we would sell ad space to advertising brokers and they would populate the banners. I had little saying in the matter other than that I could opt out of some of the displays but even that was too much of a hassle. Some of the ads are "fillers" that have been contracted to be displayed an x number of times and if there is competition for direct paying ads (pay per view) as opposed to pay per click (PPC) or commission-based banners (you get a part of the revenue) then those fillers are just pushed into the path of the least resistance. These are pretty dumb ads that are not targeted, just: we need to empty our inventory type.

In this case, it may be a combination of all of the above.


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## Sacks Of Phones (Jan 26, 2017)

*Re: Nonsense: campaign funding for US elections !*

Where do I send the tissues?


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## JimD (Feb 3, 2003)

*Re: Nonsense: campaign funding for US elections !*

Use a blocker or ignore them, the banner ads aren't that intrusive. I think its funny and pathetic at the same time, and I still don't need a hat.


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## dexdex (May 10, 2011)

*Re: Nonsense: campaign funding for US elections !*



JimD said:


> ....the banner ads aren't that intrusive. I think its funny and pathetic at the same time, and I still don't need a hat.


Would have been, and usually is my general attitude. I already started to click on the banner's corner to define it «inappropriate». Curious to see if it works... or not.

And unlike Milandro seems (or pretends) to think, it isn't "my problems".

If anyone's got problems, it is our apolitical forum. If I show you the moon, don't look at my finger....


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## Pete Thomas (Sep 12, 2004)

*Re: Nonsense: campaign funding for US elections !*



milandro said:


> So they have no control on which ad is displayed, not only , ads change, dinamically from person to person and largely depend on location and previous search history.


Also shown due to content, so this may be due to the subject matter in the first thread:


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## mmichel (Oct 1, 2006)

*Re: Nonsense: campaign funding for US elections !*



lostcircuits said:


> I'm pretty sure they try to get any penny they can, regardless of where it comes from. I know that DJT has followers in many countries in Europe who are willing to pitch in. so maybe that's the rationale behind the carpet bombing. If it is cheap enough so that there is a potential profit, however small, it'll be used. Nothing devious behind it.


An interesting suggestion, but unless those followers consist exclusively of expatriate American citizens, this would clearly be against US election laws.

Edit: in fact even just soliciting such funds (e.g., via sale of campaign memorabilia) is illegal.


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## Pete Thomas (Sep 12, 2004)

DarrellMass said:


> "But" infers there's a downside, in the American language. I don't know about English.


_*But*_ English is the American language.


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## milandro (Dec 22, 2006)

*Re: Nonsense: campaign funding for US elections !*



dexdex said:


> And unlike Milandro seems (or pretends) to think, it isn't "my problems".....





Pete Thomas said:


> Also shown due to content, so this may be due to the subject matter in the first thread:


Let me clarify, although I sympathize with being against political ads, again, these ads are not generated by the forum they are on a portion of the forum that is for hire and the ads there are targeted to the user, the location, the searches and probably, as Pete says the type of posts.

, short of the forum owner canceling their contract with whatever generates the ad I don't think that the forum can do anything about that.

What you can do is to use an ad blocker. This is the best way to boycott ads



warp x said:


> I never see any ads, logged in or not. I use Brave.


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## milandro (Dec 22, 2006)

Pete Thomas said:


> _*But*_ English is the American language.


actually there is nothing that says so in any law in the US

from wikipedia

Languages of the United States

_"
*Although the United States does not have an official language*, the most commonly used language is English (specifically, American English), which is the de facto national language. Many other languages are also spoken in the United States, especially Spanish. These include indigenous languages, languages brought to the country by colonists, enslaved people and immigrants from Europe, Africa and Asia. There are also several languages, including creoles and sign languages, that developed in the United States. Approximately 430 languages are spoken or signed by the population, of which 176 are indigenous to the area. Fifty-two languages formerly spoken in the country's territory are now extinct."_

read this too

https://edition.cnn.com/2018/05/20/us/english-us-official-language-trnd/index.html
https://juravin.com/research/opinion/the-united-states-technically-has-no-official-language/


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## Pete Thomas (Sep 12, 2004)

milandro said:


> actually there is nothing that says so in any law in the US


I know, you missed the BUT irony - I forgot the smilie

(and anyway it is not the most used language there either I believe that may well be Spanish, but we digress....)


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## Pete Thomas (Sep 12, 2004)

*Re: Nonsense: campaign funding for US elections !*



milandro said:


> L
> short of the forum owner canceling their contract with whatever generates the ad I don't think that the forum can do anything about that.


I use Adsense, and it _*is*_ possible to block specific ad types and providers.



milandro said:


> L
> What you can do is to use an ad blocker. This is the best way to boycott ads


But if everyone uses an adblocker you'd end up with no SOTW. And the ineternet would have far fewer sites. Of course the subscription sites would be able to survive, but quite a lot of the ones you don't pay for may just disappear.


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## AddictedToSax (Aug 18, 2007)

milandro said:


> Pete Thomas said:
> 
> 
> > _*But*_ English is the American language.
> ...


There is no official American language but English is the language of the marketplace. Many new immigrants speak their native language at home but in their jobs and in commerce everyone speaks English.

There are some minor exceptions. Parts of central and Southern California have small pockets where more people speak Spanish than English. Walk into a store and everyone there speaks Spanish. Walk in as an English speaker they switch over to English much like being an American visiting Europe. I had that experience in a small town in Orange County, CA when needed to buy an iPhone. I was the only English speaker there and they had to find a clerk with good English to help me. This isn';t prevalent but it does happen in areas where illegal immigration has swamped California with new people from the south.

As for the ads I use a VPN with an ad blocker so I don't see them.


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## dexdex (May 10, 2011)

*Re: Nonsense: campaign funding for US elections !*



Pete Thomas said:


> I use Adsense, and it _*is*_ possible to block specific ad types and providers.
> 
> But if everyone uses an adblocker you'd end up with no SOTW. And the ineternet would have far fewer sites. Of course the subscription sites would be able to survive, but quite a lot of the ones you don't pay for may just disappear.


Thanks Pete, both your reactions make sense, and are what I was trying to trigger. I know we need the banners, and I'm sure we DON'T need politics among them.


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## Arundo Donax (Oct 25, 2007)

I don't use ad-blockers - not on this site nor any other site I go to.

I've *never* had a political ad appear.

Perhaps it's because I never go to political sites nor do I mention candidate's names or party names.

I've been googling clarinet stuff considerably in the last month, but haven't seen anything clarinet or woodwind-related pop up in ads. Almost disappointing.


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## dexdex (May 10, 2011)

Arundo Donax said:


> I don't use ad-blockers - not on this site nor any other site I go to.
> 
> I've *never* had a political ad appear.
> 
> ...


Never use ad-blockers neither. As a teacher I use computers, tablets and phones all over the place, and don't have time to bother with such coquetry. Ads allow many sites to exist, which is fine. Politics have nothing to do in commercial ads, c'est tout.


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## AddictedToSax (Aug 18, 2007)

Never thought of myself as the coquettish type. I think my Marine drill instructors beat it out of me. 😉


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## AddictedToSax (Aug 18, 2007)

Arundo Donax said:


> I don't use ad-blockers - not on this site nor any other site I go to.
> 
> I've *never* had a political ad appear.
> 
> ...


 That's odd. I looked up some camera ads a week or so ago and have been bombarded with camera and lens ads on sites where so don't use AdBlocker.


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## Arundo Donax (Oct 25, 2007)

AddictedToSax said:


> That's odd. I looked up some camera ads a week or so ago and have been bombarded with camera and lens ads on sites where so don't use AdBlocker.


Hmmm. Maybe camera sellers are more marketing-aggressive than woodwind sellers.

It's just as well - the _last_ thing I need is another clarinet. I need a new washing machine, but somehow the evil clarinet stick attracts me.


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## milandro (Dec 22, 2006)

As Pete says, ads are built in the system, unfortunately some political parties in some countries buy ads, and this site, seen the number of Americans must be seen as an interesting target.



Pete Thomas said:


> I use Adsense, and it _*is*_ possible to block specific ad types and providers.


Maybe this may help, of course it won't do anything to prevent the ads but they will block them for the user

Is adsense something that Vs would have to implement?


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## DarrellMass (May 12, 2016)

Pete Thomas said:


> _*But*_ English is the American language.


You think so, huh? Not by a long shot.


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## Sigmund451 (Aug 8, 2003)

91 percent of those in America speak english to the level considered proficient.
However, America has no official language.


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## Pete Thomas (Sep 12, 2004)

DarrellMass said:


> "But" infers there's a downside, in the American language. I don't know about English.





Pete Thomas said:


> _*But*_ English is the American language.





DarrellMass said:


> You think so, huh? Not by a long shot.


I apologise I will stop attempting humour/wit/irony etc. especially in certain cases if it does not survive translation or via the written word very well. I should have learnt that by now.


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## Pete Thomas (Sep 12, 2004)

milandro said:


> Is adsense something that Vs would have to implement?


They already have, it is what serves the Google ads


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## milandro (Dec 22, 2006)

Pete Thomas said:


> They already have, it is what serves the Google ads


So, they could opt out political ads?


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## Pete Thomas (Sep 12, 2004)

milandro said:


> So, they could opt out political ads?


I believe so


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## Pete Thomas (Sep 12, 2004)

https://support.google.com/adsense/answer/180609?hl=en-GB


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## milandro (Dec 22, 2006)

then the question has to be, do they know?

And, do they care? Does Vertical Scope have any policy against political ads (or any type of ad)?

https://www.verticalscope.com/site-privacy-policy/


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## lostcircuits (Aug 25, 2015)

*Re: Nonsense: campaign funding for US elections !*



mmichel said:


> An interesting suggestion, but unless those followers consist exclusively of expatriate American citizens, this would clearly be against US election laws.
> 
> Edit: in fact even just soliciting such funds (e.g., via sale of campaign memorabilia) is illegal.


I didn't know but now that you bring it up, that's a very interesting aspect. Of course, there is always the last resort of claiming ignorance..


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## Benjamin Allen (Aug 24, 2014)

Does one have to "click on" the ad to trigger use of the add (to generate revenue for the marketing firm) or is it simply that whatever company agreed to show so many ads over so many days/weeks/months? I don't know how these things work.


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## Pete Thomas (Sep 12, 2004)

Allen Mouthpieces said:


> Does one have to "click on" the ad to trigger use of the add (to generate revenue for the marketing firm) or is it simply that whatever company agreed to show so many ads over so many days/weeks/months? I don't know how these things work.


It could be either or both I believe


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## Benjamin Allen (Aug 24, 2014)

Pete Thomas said:


> It could be either or both I believe


Makes sense . . . thank you.
Best,
Ben


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## lostcircuits (Aug 25, 2015)

Allen Mouthpieces said:


> Does one have to "click on" the ad to trigger use of the add (to generate revenue for the marketing firm) or is it simply that whatever company agreed to show so many ads over so many days/weeks/months? I don't know how these things work.


There are different options / offers. The easiest one is the number of displays of a banner but of course, the rates are low. Back in 2000, there were such CPM banners that generated as much as $60 for 1000 views but that completely crashed with the burst of the dot com bubble. Over night the rates dropped to $2.- maybe $3.- on a good deal, and the next thing we knew was $0.75 which was then followed by click through counts for monetizing and finally a commission based on revenue generated. There were all kinds of cheats like have somebody just click on the banners but they counted IP addresses and so on.

Now things are more like you have to take an entire package of ads, 10, maybe 20 or 30 different kinds that are a mixture of high pay and low pay banners but as the site owner you have very little control over what is shown and generates revenue (or not). I got burned a few times with an ad agency run by the "Potter" family out of Nebraska and Salt Lake City who managed to completely obfuscate the counts and with a few hundred thousand page views per month I ended up with $10.- revenue for a 3 month period instead of the projected at least $500.- to 600.- per month.

In other words, the side owner contracts out to an agency that acts as middleman for ~ 100 different sites, and who does a wholesale deal with the individual advertisers and then distributes the ads according to AI-based profiling of the users for the paying ads and throws in the "ok, I have to take those, too" ads more or less randomly just to make the quota.


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## Benjamin Allen (Aug 24, 2014)

lostcircuits said:


> There are different options / offers. The easiest one is the number of displays of a banner but of course, the rates are low. Back in 2000, there were such CPM banners that generated as much as $60 for 1000 views but that completely crashed with the burst of the dot com bubble. Over night the rates dropped to $2.- maybe $3.- on a good deal, and the next thing we knew was $0.75 which was then followed by click through counts for monetizing and finally a commission based on revenue generated. There were all kinds of cheats like have somebody just click on the banners but they counted IP addresses and so on.
> 
> Now things are more like you have to take an entire package of ads, 10, maybe 20 or 30 different kinds that are a mixture of high pay and low pay banners but as the site owner you have very little control over what is shown and generates revenue (or not). I got burned a few times with an ad agency run by the "Potter" family out of Nebraska and Salt Lake City who managed to completely obfuscate the counts and with a few hundred thousand page views per month I ended up with $10.- revenue for a 3 month period instead of the projected at least $500.- to 600.- per month.
> 
> In other words, the side owner contracts out to an agency that acts as middleman for ~ 100 different sites, and who does a wholesale deal with the individual advertisers and then distributes the ads according to AI-based profiling of the users for the paying ads and throws in the "ok, I have to take those, too" ads more or less randomly just to make the quota.


The complexity of web advertisements is so complex . . . thanks for sharing this.
Best,
Ben


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## dexdex (May 10, 2011)

48 hours later, I don't get the ad anymore. Did something change somewhere, or did my feedback to the banner really have some effect ? 
In the mean time I get another funny one, confirming I'm on a French IP address. I'm no French citizen though, so I couldn't apply anyway... not to mention my age. ???


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## Pete Thomas (Sep 12, 2004)

dexdex said:


> 48 hours later, I don't get the ad anymore. Did something change somewhere,ect ?


Ads change all the time, they may have ended that specific ad campaign, it may hev been an error that was corrected - I doubt we'll ever know



dexdex said:


> or did my feedback to the banner really have some effect ?


That I find unlikely as we see a lot of this kind of thing.

This is above this thread right now:









NB: it appears to be an independent press poll, not affiliated with any specific party so Google Adsense may not even put it in the political campaign category.

It is what it is.

(And @VSadmin are aware of this thread)


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## dexdex (May 10, 2011)

Thanks Pete. At least it does make some kind of sense.


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## GaSax (Jan 7, 2020)

I've never clicked on any banner ads on any forum because a lot of them appear to be spam of some degree or another to me.

But if I do see something that interests me I'll search for the direct link to the business rather than clicking on the ad. Just to be sure it's not click bait or a phishing scam.

Although I can't stand most advertising or commercials on TV, the web page or radio etc I don't complain because that's how web page or TV show etc is paid for. Otherwise I would have to pay a lot more for it or do with out it.

BTW what was the name of that Trump campaign store? I could use a new hat. 🙂


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## DarrellMass (May 12, 2016)

Pete Thomas said:


> I apologise I will stop attempting humour/wit/irony etc. especially in certain cases if it does not survive translation or via the written word very well. I should have learnt that by now.


No apologies necessary. What I meant to get across to you was the fact that there are nuances or colloquialisms, in both English and the Americainization of it, that tend to make them two very separate languages which only briefly share a common base. Added to that are the currently, innumerable mispronunciations of common everyday words, by the general American population, to include professional speakers, such as news anchors on TV, that it befuddles the mind. Two common examples of those are "emergency" and "immediately." So many people over here are now saying "uhmergency" and "uhmmediately." Drives me crazy! It all stems from basic laziness, but mispronunciations like these are quickly becoming the norm, and there are so many more following right behind. I'm afraid English and "American" are quickly becoming two very different languages.


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## Arundo Donax (Oct 25, 2007)

DarrellMass said:


> ... English and the Americainization of it,... , to include professional speakers, such as news anchors on TV ... I'm afraid English and "American" are quickly becoming two very different languages.


It's not just mispronunciation, though you're correct.

I've written before that my longtime hobby of over 40 years is languages and linguistics and that I've been a professional translator in the past. Studying language change can be fun and, sometimes, depressing!

What bothers me most about what Americans do to English is creating unnecessary idiotic words when perfectly good ones exist. Top of my list is "impactful" - and the misuse of "impact", when "effective" or "effect" is what they mean.

Another thing I've noticed in the American workplace is the extremely widespread use of sports- or other metaphors. I wonder what foreign employees (on the phone or Skype) must think of "let me touch bases with you" or other even more obscure phrases.

It worries me that serious, important, documents in business, in government, in the sciences, now contain metaphorical language which I think would be puzzling to anyone not immersed in popular culture. Consider what was written in English merely 200 years ago, in books, documents, and other publications, and it was magnificently eloquent in comparison to today.

Anyway, the English language and other languages are changing and diverging constantly.


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## JimD (Feb 3, 2003)

The first time I was in New York I was puzzled because I really had to concentrate to understand some people and it did seem like a different language, I guess they found the same thing with me as I have a Yorkshire accent. The most common irritant for me in the UK is people using absolutely to mean yes, certainly or even just an affirmative yes. I’ve started awarding myself a pound each time I hear it on tv in the morning, I made £7 the other day in 15 minutes and that was a slow day. It disappeared for a while but now we are having a second spike. It’s hard to collect on it though.


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## Pete Thomas (Sep 12, 2004)

JimD said:


> It's hard to collect on it though.


Absolutely!


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## Arundo Donax (Oct 25, 2007)

JimD said:


> The first time I was in New York I was puzzled because I really had to concentrate to understand some people and it did seem like a different language, I guess they found the same thing with me as I have a Yorkshire accent...


Accents in New York City and environs can be fun. In the UK, Yorkshire is one of my favorites, but I like the Geordie accent best of all - probably because of the pretty girl I was listening to. I thought Geordie was generally disliked, but I found this little chart not long ago.


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## JimD (Feb 3, 2003)

They use Geordie in adverts because they think it confers honesty and a down to earth attitude. They use Brummie for a laugh although people generally confuse it with Dudley which is pretty funny and there have been some great Dudley comedians. No offence to any Dudleyites. My mother was a Geordie and my partner is a Brummie so I have in depth knowledge of both. Yorkshire accents used to vary from town to town, especially the slang, not so much now.

I think that chart says more about the people who answer YouGov polls than anything else.


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## JimD (Feb 3, 2003)

Pete Thomas said:


> Absolutely!


That's a quid you owe me.


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## Arundo Donax (Oct 25, 2007)

JimD said:


> ... Yorkshire accents used to vary from town to town, especially the slang, not so much now.
> ...


It could be that television, songs, YouTube, and social media over the last 75 years have influenced how people speak, reducing the regional accents and nuances.

We used to be able to spot inva^H^H^H^H new arrivals to this area by their accents, but now what often reveals their true identity are their mispronunciations of regional names which serve as shibboleths.


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## JimD (Feb 3, 2003)

Local names will get you every time. There's a street in London called Beauchamp Place that isn't pronounced as you might think. Same with Harewood House in Leeds.


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## ZootTheSim (Jun 22, 2016)

Learned that the hard way when I went looking for Howarth of London in Marylebone.


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## GaSax (Jan 7, 2020)

I'm from the south (FL and GA) and I pronounce emergency with an "E" and immediately "i." 🙂


One thing that annoys me is people type or write "5$" instead of "$5."


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## Arundo Donax (Oct 25, 2007)

GaSax said:


> ...
> One thing that annoys me is people type or write "5$" instead of "$5."


Haven't seen that. But logical. Like it. "5$" = fi' dollah. Good notation. Must use it sometime.

As a kid, riding in the car, I'd see "XING PED" painted on the street. Who is Xing Ped and why is his name on the streets? Apparently the Official Painters of Street Warnings felt that cars go so quickly, and our vision is so close-focused, that they have to present the message to humans in Burma Shave style snippets.


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## DarrellMass (May 12, 2016)

Pete Thomas said:


> Absolutely!


Smashing!


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## lostcircuits (Aug 25, 2015)

dexdex said:


> 48 hours later, I don't get the ad anymore. Did something change somewhere, or did my feedback to the banner really have some effect ?
> In the mean time I get another funny one, confirming I'm on a French IP address. I'm no French citizen though, so I couldn't apply anyway... not to mention my age. &#55358;&#56618;&#55358;&#56617;&#55358;&#56621;
> 
> View attachment 264030


They must have read the post by mmichel and were scared out of their wits (****less as we call it now)


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## GaSax (Jan 7, 2020)

Arundo Donax said:


> GaSax said:
> 
> 
> > ...
> ...


I've seen it on Facebook and forums alot. Even this forum!

Sometimes I wonder if texting is making people dumber. I tend to text in complete sentences but know people, 10 plus years older than me using slang or shorthand in text messages. I sometimes can't tell if it's slang, laziness, misspelling or if they're just stupid? I've starting seeing the same stuff on Facebook.


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## JimD (Feb 3, 2003)

ZootTheSim said:


> Learned that the hard way when I went looking for Howarth of London in Marylebone.


Did you try asking for Leicester Square?


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## neilslade (Jan 2, 2014)

Oh yeah, I see ads-- but don't tell me this site is accepting political ads- much less from Trump. If so, I'm leaving...


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## Arundo Donax (Oct 25, 2007)

neilslade said:


> Oh yeah, I see ads-- but don't tell me this site is accepting political ads- much less from Trump. If so, I'm leaving...


Had you read the first few posts at the beginning of this thread, you would've had your answer.


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## GaSax (Jan 7, 2020)

neilslade said:


> Oh yeah, I see ads-- but don't tell me this site is accepting political ads- much less from Trump. If so, I'm leaving...


Eight posts since 2014? I'm new here and I could be wrong but I don't think anyone would miss you if you did leave. 🙂

I sometimes get the impression, on this forum, that a number of members are likely liberal leaning. As a result if politics we're discussed more openly I would just " leave" and not announce my intentions. I just came here for discussions on and about saxophones. I'm new to this forum and not very active on it. I'm sure most wouldn't even notice or care if I ever posted here again. 
🙂


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## Johan H Nilsson (Aug 24, 2015)

It's even more hilarious when forum users get upset over search history based porn ads...


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## Arundo Donax (Oct 25, 2007)

Some people feel compelled to advertise their views. It's like a car plastered with stickers for various candidates or causes. Same thing with lawn signs. Whatever. I ignore it and vote the way I want. 

Long ago, in the year leading up to a major election, some of my fellow engineers at work who supported a particular candidate, A, plastered signs and other paraphernalia all over their cubicle walls (this was when such displays were allowed at work). Not only that, they were very vocal about A and would interject their A support into topics that had nothing to do with politics. Supporters of the other candidate, Z, put up nothing and said nothing. After months of this fanfare, A-supporters thought everyone supported A and were truly shocked when candidate A lost to Z. I was in my cubicle next to an A supporter and there was a day long procession of fellow A "mourners" coming by to discuss their loss. To this day, people still live in such bubbles.


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## Pete Thomas (Sep 12, 2004)

neilslade said:


> Oh yeah, I see ads-- but don't tell me this site is accepting political ads- much less from Trump. If so, I'm leaving...


The site accepts the ads that Google (or whatever else they choose) serves them. It can be based on settings that are supposed to filter certain categories. I'm quite sure they have those filters in place, but I wouldn't like to hazard a guess as to whether the filters work 100% or that advertisers won't sometimes find a way round from time to time.

It's everyone's prerogative to use an adblocker (although I don't recommend it) or to not visit the site.



Johan H Nilsson said:


> It's even more hilarious when forum users get upset over search history based porn ads...


Yes that is ironic. Lack of privacy and security has become well embedded in social media and discussion forums. In many respects, you can knock GDPR, but it has done something to improve the situation.

But I wonder if the same people who might be upset about this could well be installing apps that do the exact opposite. I'm aware that many people here are happy to use Tapatalk.


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## musekatcher (Dec 8, 2015)

Ignoring advertising and pervasive marketing is a necessary skill now. Ignoring politics is a survival skill now. I'm a subject matter expert


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