
Ask HN: Prefer being tracked and seeing ads, or pay small subscription? - elamje
I am curious, after seeing so many consumer tech companies in the news about data collection, if you would rather pay a small fee, (something like $1 a month) for all of the big tech companies you use that are currently &quot;free&quot; thanks to ad-revenue?<p>Instead of a company tracking you, you would pay them about $1 a month to not track you and show you ads. Assume the economics of all of the web services you use for free is such that, they are incentivized for you to pay $1 rather than try to get $1 from you with ad revenue.
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madamelic
God no.

I'd much rather pay like $15, $20, $30...

$1 isn't going to cover it. $1 is maybe 1 or 2 really good CPC. I am not going
to attempt to use all of the acronyms but $1 is still within the range of
still needing more revenue.

I'd much rather pay a large amount and have a definite "this money will make
us not sell your data" than a "a $1 donation means we won't show you ads".

All of that said, I am extremely doubtful any large company would abide. Most
would take the $15+ and continue doing what they're doing.

In my opinion, it's not about needing to cover costs and make a tidy profit.
It's a complete failure of how tech companies are valued. They are expected to
"eat the world" and therefore, their revenues have to continually climb. There
is a dearth of "good enough" in tech companies.

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elamje
It's not so much a question about would they honor your subscription contract
or not. Assuming they would, would you rather pay explicitly, or just continue
with the current "free" model.

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potta_coffee
I prefer neither. I enjoyed the web better before the big sites took all the
traffic away from small forums and passion-project, personal websites.

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elamje
Given the current situation, which would you choose? I understand the desire
for the web to be like it was in the late 90's and early 00's, but we are here
now, and some of the services are incredibly great compared to the previous
generation of websites.

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sarcasmatwork
Neither. Anonymous browsing? Why should we have to accept being tracked or
paying $$ when its NEVER been like that? It's not their data, its mine. How
about these companies pay me to use my info? I choose to sell how much and
what. They dont like it? Well, you have a poor business model.

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elamje
Just to add onto what someone else said, if all users did what you do, the
companies would shut down or have to work off of donations

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rolph
if all users did what S_at Work , and I do we would actually be back to the
internet the way it used to be with those of capability hosting thier sites
and BBS's and everyone having a jolly good time for free. I feel sorry for
those who have never even experienced the real internet and think the web and
facebook are the internet.

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potta_coffee
That's how I feel about it. The crazy thing is, communities I used to go for
information have died, the forums are still there but they're essentially
dead. Some users went to Facebook, some to Reddit, but I can't go to those
places and actually get the information I want, like I used to be able to do.
The current corporate internet gobbled up everything without giving us
anything in return, and now they want to complain about not making enough
money. Boo hoo.

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rchaud
I would not pay a fee to Big Tech, since that's not how their business model
works. They wouldn't be billion dollar companies if they started off by
offering email for $1/month or whatever. They would have turned away 90%+ of
their users the second they asked for your credit card information.

Why do you think SV companies are measured on the basis of 'user
growth/engagement' rather than actual cash? It's because the value of the
company is based on the size of their userbase, not the actual quality of
their product. Once network effects are established and switching costs have
increased, that's when you can really start to compromise on the product to
start meeting business objectives.

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shanecleveland
No. I pay and donate to some, but they tend to be niche sites where ad revenue
wouldn't be high enough. I get so much value out of ad-supported sites and
could never afford to pay enough for all of them.

Ads can be done well.

I commonly back out of sites with intrusive ads that significantly degrade the
experience. And I completely avoid most social medial, including Facebook.

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rolph
I would choose none of the above, i would go to a nonindexed site and find the
information i want for free, and let them link to my site for free. actually
this is what i do already my site is in excess of 20 TB and uses mesh
technology as well as providing a gateway to the common internet.

