This is a bit silly. Are there any ads that people do trust?

Ads for products I already use. Probably 90% of the stuff in your house has been advertised somewhere. A good number of the books on my shelves advertise other books by the same author in the back (some of these are order forms, many are not), and I certainly do use them to see what's the next book in a series of what reviewers have had to say about other books by the author. Heck, some of the objects I own and use daily (hopefully lower than average) is itself advertising, such as the branded Crayola desk lamp I'm using.

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matsemann 10 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

While I understand the sentiment, most ads for a long time were fairly reputable? Like in the news papers, most ads were to make you aware of a brand (next car I buy I'll feel safe buying X because I've seen it in the papers), or to notify you about a local store having a sale etc. And disabling my ad blocker and going to a page I see ads for house listings nearby, offers to buy sports gear in a store in my city, and ads for a well known telecom company. All things I would trust.

What I don't understand is why high-value brands sell their screen estate to straight up scams or low quality ads.

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radpanda 9 hours ago | parent [-]

I dunno, I’ve been doing some genealogy research and looking at a lot of newspapers from the 1800’s. It’s striking to me how much they are essentially Facebook. Sure, on the front page there’s the news of the day, but on the inside are jokes, riddles, local notes on who visited who and where. And the ads. Literal snake oil! As well as all sorts of other sketchy tonics for curing any sort of “ill constitution”.

I think those of us on this forum likely grew up in a golden age of ads being relatively harmless, but I’m not sure that’s the normal state.

	▲	pjc50 9 hours ago \| parent [-]
		It's not the "state of nature", but there's obviously been a lot of litigation and regulation in the meantime. Look up the charmingly named Carbolic Smoke Ball case, for example.

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nottorp 10 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Exactly. Why did the article author think ads weren't scams before they were "AI" generated?

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wobfan 10 hours ago | parent [-]

Where does the author claim or even remotely suggest that?

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nottorp 10 hours ago | parent | next [-]

They only NOW assume all ads are scams. Suggests they didn't make that assumption before, doesn't it?

	▲	wobfan 10 hours ago \| parent [-]
		And in your mind NOW always means "since GenAI is a thing"? Most of the time, when people realize something, it happens NOW. Also, AI isn't even mentioned in the headline at all, and not even in the first part of the article. It's just used as one hint that it might be scam, then followed up with further evidence.

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iso1631 10 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

In the headline - the word Now implies "Ads before weren't scams but they are now"

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wobfan 10 hours ago | parent [-]

And where in the headline is "AI"?

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iso1631 10 hours ago | parent [-]

"Here are three ads that are scammy; the first two were clearly generated by AI, and the third may have been created by AI."

	▲	nottorp 9 hours ago \| parent [-]
		The "AI" evangelists are trying to explain to us that all ads are to be trusted because they're "AI" generated now...

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Yossarrian22 10 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I see an ad for a product I bought and it makes me worried I got scammed. The usual offender is Peak Design.

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latexr 10 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Yes, of course. These exist because they work. If no one fell for these scams, they wouldn’t continue to exist.

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Tyr42 10 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I mean I remember when Penny Arcade Ram ads for games and such and they only ran the ads if the approved of the game. The ads were worth clicking into. They sold a real product for a cost approximating its value.

Now ads are just scams

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mcphage 10 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

> Are there any ads that people do trust?

What? Yes, of course. Are you so terminally online that you assume all advertising is the fake AI chum that we see on the web?

	▲	lrem 10 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Even online I get a lot of ads for goods/services I do use, or could see myself using.

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bilsbie 10 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

HN users are mostly 1980s levels of institutional and media trust. Not sure why.