Has the internet made advertising worse?

 dvertising has been around for centuries. Almost from the moment humans began having products to sell we began to produce effective means to convince others to buy them. In China in the 11th Century BCE most advertising was oral, as indicated by recorded poetry used to sell sweets, whereas Ancient Egyptians produced wall posters on papyrus to advertise their products. Indeed, whether on the radio, TV or the sides of buses companies never miss an opportunity to sell us their products. However, over the last 2 decades the ways in which companies advertise to us has evolved for the internet age. But the question here is how far has advertising strayed from that what we were used to even 20 years ago and whether or not that’s a bad thing?

On the surface advertising has remained largely the same to what it was in the 90s, before many social media sites were created and when we still had to experience the internet dial tone. Indeed, we still have many of the same traditional ads in newspapers, billboards and before movies. Furthermore this type of adverting has simply translated to the internet space, there is seemingly not much difference between having an ad before a YouTube video and one before a tv program, no matter how more infinitely annoying YouTube ads seem. Additionally, at surface level ads on our social media platforms aren’t too dissimilar from ones in newspapers or on the side of the road, they simply disrupt what we are doing for a moment or two, such as reading Facebook posts or reading a news article, before we then move past them to continue what we were originally looking at. Yet, this is really where comparison ends, as the internet has truly changed the landscape of advertising and what I would say for the worse. 

Firstly internet advertising departs from that of more traditional advertising due to internet algorithms which advertise things tailored to you interests. Indeed, as information about the sites you browse is stored and then accessed by social media sites you will likely see advertisement for a laptop if you had been searching for one online the day previous. Indeed, this is extremely different from the hit and miss advertising of before where companies would have to hope the right sort of people see their adverts. Yet, algorithm based advertising is increasingly worrying due to the uncertainty about the amount of information advertisers are able to access about you, such as your age or your location. Indeed modern internet advertising greatly reduces your privacy in ways advertisers before 2000 could never achieve. Furthermore this form of advertising is far more exploitive, as by keying into specific interests of members of the general public and then advertising a product directly to them, many will be more inclined to buy a product whether they truly need it or not. For example if someone likes dogs and has been searching photos of them online, when the algorithm produces an advert for a dog T-shirt they are more likely to buy it despite not necessarily wanting a T-shirt, simply because it displays their interest. This would not occur so often in advertising that is non-algorithm based as If one were to be advertised a random assortment of T-shirt’s which do not necessarily display their interest (in dogs) then one will feel less inclined to buy it. The internet age therefore has changed advertising greatly by allowing companies to those who would be interested in their product specifically rather than a random assortment of people. 

But perhaps the most worrying thing is the amount of power advertisers hold over the way websites are run. It has become an increasing issue over the past few years with websites, largely social media sites, censoring their content in order to make themselves advertiser friendly. Indeed, YouTube has essentially forced its creators to censor swear words and crude language in their videos or creators forfeit their ability to make the highest wage from their videos. YouTube has done this to essentially create a platform in which all companies feel comfortable advertising (as some will only advertise next to family friendly content to maintain their brand) thus maximising their profit. Whilst the subtraction of crude language from certain internet platforms may not seem too bad it has led to a worrying climate of advertiser control which is growing worse each day. Indeed, Instagram through its anti-nudity algorithms, which are put in place to maximise advertising profits, has been known to take down or reject images of fine art often displayed in galleries and museums such as that of Liebespaar by Koloman Moser. Thus increasing a type of artistic censorship which has not be founded in the UK for centuries. There are also recent reports that Wikia has recently removed certain pages with information about sexual topics in order to make their website more palatable and thus appeal to more advertising companies . Whilst some may not care about this particular pages removal or the censorship of classic art on sites such as Instagram it paints a worrying future in which art is banned and information is readily censored by sites dedicated to informing in order for websites to maximise profit. Indeed, this is an issue for the internet age as whilst advertisers may pull away from certain tv channels if they don’t like the content they produce (Koppaberg pulling advertising from gb news for example) this has little effect on the overall running of the channel and relevant information is still broadcasted. Therefore, internet advertising greatly departs from that of advertising 20 years ago and worryingly so as advertisers now have the power to indirectly censor information or things of cultural significance by insisting on family friendly content. 

Indeed, the internet has altered the way companies advertise to the general public. Producing a far more invasive form of advertising which infringes on ones privacy whilst also wielding a great power over the spaces for which they advertise upon. Indeed, this form of advertising seems far more sinister than anything we’ve seen before and if websites keep placing the profits they receive from the advertisers over people we could be heading for a rather dystopian future.