I think it's more that the landscape has evolved. When systems that needed to exchange information were maintained by enterprises, SOAP made sense (and still does, if you ask some of my ex-colleagues).
When web development became accessible to the masses and the number of fast-moving resource-strapped startups boomed, apps and websites needed to integrate data from 3rd parties they had no prior relationship/interaction with, and a lighter and looser mechanism won -- REST (ish), without client/server transactional contracts and without XML, using formats and constructs people already knew (JSON, HTTP verbs).
What I can't understand is how the ads are still effective, targeted or otherwise.
I've long thought we are going to reach a point where the return on social advertising isn't worth the investment, these models have a crisis and pivot, but it still seems to be going strong.
Enough people to sustain the model still click. At Meta's scale, you only need a small fraction of clicks and conversions to make it worth it. Meta reaches billions of people, so even a small slice of that is still a huge chunk of people.
There's also a bit of competitive pressure. Even if people get numb to ads, business, especially small businesses, can't afford to not show up if their competitors are still showing up in feeds.
The usual advertising psychology tricks still apply also which is why ads still work. Even if the ad itself doesn't result in a conversion, there's still the exposure effect of someone seeing your brand over and over again in their feed. The more times someone sees it, they'll subconsciously start preferring that brand or see it as more trustworthy. Among other tricks.
Thanks for the thoughts -- the points you make align with my understanding. It still seems so... frail? At least given how much money is circulating in that world.
Attribution, for example, has to be an absolute mess. Especially in the case of the psychology tricks you mention... If I was shown an ad for Subway, and then ate a Subway sandwich a few days later -- it had absolutely nothing to do with the ad. I only eat there when there aren't better options. Yet, I bet some ad conversion counter ticked up somewhere. I see ads for ShopRite all the time, but it's the only grocery store in my area, so of course I shop there. When you repeat this millions of times, it's surprising to me that ads are still provably effective to the point of being a trillion dollar industry.
I wonder if it will become less so as older generations go offline.
Right, but the UK is saying they'll fine Imgur even after Imgur blocked access. At that point, what tooth does the fine have? "You must pay this fine if you want to, err, nothing I guess"?
They used to have UK legal presence, and planning to move out. The UK is saying something like "crimes done during your presence won't be ignored".
If Imgur never had UK presence, then yeah there would be no teeth. But if you're doing business in a country you can't break the law then leave and expect them to just ignore what you did during that time.
Why does it have to be immediately enforceable? Now Imgur have thrown the baby out with the bath water and cannot serve the UK and it leaves a big market for another company to come along and capitalise on that.
American companies are too use to being able to bully their way in America. Some countries do have better consumer protection laws.
The regulatory hurdles here are quite small, actually. If COPPA were worded better, Imgur would've been in violation of that, too, from what I can tell of the complaint.
How do you expect the "pull out" to happen? They must have had a UK bank account or similar, whose transfers won't get approved as they're trying to escape from criminal prosecution. Or they'll work with the US to ensure responsible individuals are held responsible.
It isn't exactly the first time someone/something commits crime in a country then try to escape, there is lots of ways to work with others on this.
>they'll work with the US to ensure responsible individuals are held responsible.
I heard here recently during a similar discussion (about 4chan and this same British watchdog agency) that the US does not allow extradition of its citizens for breaking non-US laws if the behavior is legal in the US.
> they'll fine Imgur even after Imgur blocked access
after they have infringed the data protection laws.
For example, if I get a parking fine, and then move my car. I can't claim that now that I've moved my car, I'm not liable for the previous fine. This is no different.
There are various international economic laws, treaties and agreements between cooperating countries, whether or not any of them cover this scenario for to US, and whether the US would honour any agreement in the current political climate remains to be seen. But there are mechanisms in place that allow w the UK to reach US companies through each others legal systems to a degree and vice versa, regardless of asset location.
> whether the US would honour any agreement in the current political climate remains to be seen
That this is even a question is bananas to me. Isn't that handled by the judicial system rather than involving politics/the administration? Shouldn't be possible for the US to have a treaty, and there are questions about if the treaty will actually be enforced or not, how could anyone trust the US as a whole for anything if those aren't enforced?
If Imgur decides they want to make money in the UK after all, and they have an unpaid fine outstanding, that money can be seized to pay off the fine first.
The whole point of corporations is that the company is liable, not its employees. also the shareholders are only liable for the money they put in, and not anything else.
Convictions in the UK are non-transferable. you can't convict a company, then transfer guilt onto its employees, they need to be tried at the same time.
> Are you saying that the Pavel Durov situation wouldn't have been possible in the UK
first Durov is a French citizen, so its not like he's immune to french laws
Second france has a totally different legal system to the UK(legal code vs common law)
thirdly, he's the primary owner of telegram, not an employee
Fourthly he was arrested on fraud, money laundering and child porn charges. Those are all criminal charges, not civil(GDPR is mostly Civil, same with the online saftey act, howefver with the OSA "senior managers" could be criminally liable, but again that's for CSAM, of which possession and distribution is a criminal already)
> Seems naive.
I really wish people would actually bother to understand law, because its pretty important. For programmers is much easier, because we are used to reading oddly worded specifically ordered paragraphs to divine logical intent. The law is really similar to programming.
They're only threatening to fine them for previous violations of the law, not anything after they block access. Blocking access doesn't make the existing fine from when they were doing business in the UK go away, it just prevents future fines.
Whether they can collect the money while Imgur aren't doing business in the UK is a different argument, but it's not particularly controversial that a country can fine a business operating in its jurisdiction for violating that country's laws. Even if those laws are authoritarian bullshit.
Sure, I'm only saying that I don't think there's much they can do by way of enforcement if the company decides to stop doing business there, especially over fines this small (it's not like the UK will push to extradite over this).
Honestly, that's the most noteworthy part of this. The EU hasn't pursued any site that just blocks EU access (see any number of US sites than aren't GDPR compliant and I can't access from Europe). The UK is threatening to do something nobody else has really done before. It's crazy, imo, because I can see a whole lot of sites immediately blocking the UK to avoid any potential litigation.
Thanks. That needs to be in an HN guide somewhere, along with: online services cost money to run so don't be surprised that they need either fees or advertising.
Being accessible over the internet from a country can't be the same as having a physical presence there. Otherwise, anyone putting any content on the internet needs to comply with the laws of every single country.
New York City has had it's real-time mass surveillance Domain Awareness System in place for years (courtesy of MSFT)... and the crime still happens. What exactly would you expect this to accomplish that's worth the sacrifice to privacy?
Long time Pop user -- I've been eagerly following Cosmic's development for over a year. I resisted the temptation of the alphas, and know how I'll be spending my evening.
Congrats to the devs. It's a significant achievement.
My only PH launch was a memorably bad experience. Competing in real time with whoever else launched that day, in a game where the rules are mysterious and the outcomes are inconsequential.
Becoming a career CEO might be a way out, though.
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