Ads target a specific sub group. And I think many HNlers are not part of that group. My guess is that ads online target people with more impulsive buying.

Even if you showed me the perfect ad, I probably would not buy it. Because if I need it, I probably already bought it, and if I don't need it, I won't buy it. So there is not much money being made, ergo we get shown ads for the other type of person.

More or less everybody thinks the way that you do here. Nobody thinks ads work on them, yet companies spend trillions of dollars advertising. One side is right, one side is wrong. Advertising is a particularly insidious industry.

Also, I think a lot of people don't really understand how advertising works. For instance one of the most famous, and effective, ads was Apple's 1984 ad. [1] The goal of advertising isn't necessarily to make you impulsively go click 'buy now', but rather to subconsciously instill certain motivations, drives, and associations within you. That's a 60 second add, ran at Superbowl pricing levels (to say nothing of the rest of cast being directed by Ridley Scott and more), where only about 3 seconds of it has anything directly to do with what's being sold.

[1] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VtvjbmoDx-I

> My guess is that ads online target people with more impulsive buying.

There's a dial between ad relevancy and ad yield. Gambling ads are probably high-yield because of high LTV, so advertisers will spend more, even if impressions don't generate many clicks.

Whether or not it works on you, you are not them, and there are millions of people on whom gambling advertising works really well.

I don't understand why people comment "I am not the target audience" so often. No, you're not, but the target audience definitely exists.

I despise advertising too, but unfortunately we are not above their effects (which is why they are so damaging). If you look at cars or clothes or other products and recognize their brand logos or colors or designs, those ads are serving their purpose. Showing you the ad at all and stealing your attention for that moment is their goal.

You may think the ads dont work on people like you, but often data shows otherwise.