Ah yes, just like how free speech means corporations must be allowed to bribe politicians.
But they’re people! Well, only in that one instance and not in any others that would allow punishments levied against people to be applied to businesses.
Like, if I sold poison that killed millions of people every year, I’d get the death penalty.
Maybe you should have thought of that before you became peasants.
We are dedicated to safe and ethical advertising practices
Mates, that ship has long sailed
There are ethical ad services, but I’ve never seen outside of one random blog site.
Overcast iOS app comes to mind.
I’m sure there are but I don’t have time to go around auditing which ones they are and whitelisting them in my extension and then constantly going back to check if they’ve been bought out or otherwise decided to become shitheads.
What gets me about them (and any other sites really) saying that is there are safer ways in showing ads and that’s just hosting them from their domain instead of selling page space to random ad buyers.
Guess that’s too much trouble and not enough profit for these corporations.
Absolutely. I have no problem displaying a few ads with my content if it results in better content. If it’s done responsibly, which it never is. Instead, it’s always an abusive relationship.
Didn’t you know? Disabling ad blockers ensures free speech and apparently may also peacefully end the current crisis in the middle east… oh, did I mention it helps with world hunger too?
Don’t worry we only serve “ethical” ads.
Free range?
I allow USA Today to speak freely, including speaking their ad frames and images.
But that doesn’t mean I’m compelled to listen to everything they say.
USA Today: speech isn’t free if I’m forced to listen to it.
Well you’re not forced. You don’t actually have to go to their website at all.
They seem to be making the argument that if you want some of their content, you have to accept all of it (ads included). Of course, that’s absurd. I can pick up a printed newspaper (if those still exist) and skip right to the comics if I want, and bypass the sports and classifieds entirely if I wish. I can pick up a book or album and only enjoy a single chapter or track. You get the idea.
While I agree with you in principle, I’m not sure the newspaper example supports your position, although it is an apt analogy.
I would imagine that the counter argument would take the form of something like, “Yes, you don’t have to read the whole paper, but you can’t just buy the comics. You buy the whole paper, get access to the whole thing, and the ads come with it. Similarly, with our web presence, in order to access everything, whether you choose to consume it all or not, the ads must come as a part of it.”
Personally, I don’t fully agree with either that argument or yours, can see the merits and flaws of both, and fall somewhere in the middle.
I’d argue that while they’re within their rights to create, distribute, bundle, and price their content as they see fit, just like the current debate with social media companies, your monitor is your own personal, privately owned platform, and you shouldn’t/can’t be forced to offer a platform to any content you don’t wish to publish (to your audience of one). So you’re perfectly within your rights to want and attempt to only view the content you wish to see, while they’re also perfectly within their rights to want and attempt to package their content in such a way that links their articles with the advertisements of their sponsors.
So at that point, it’s just an arms race between the producer doing their best to force ads onto screens and consumers doing their best to avoid same. Neither side is morally right or wrong, and while there likely is a middle ground that wild be acceptable to both parties, there’s zero good faith between the two sides which would be necessary to establish that middle ground.
I don’t think they’re arguing that the ads are part of the free speech, I think they’re arguing the ads are a revenue source that allows them to fund free speech. Blocking ads in this case is more akin to sitting down at the newsstand for two hours while you read the paper, then putting the paper back without having paid for anything. Yes online advertising has become a massive breach of privacy, but they have no obligation to give away their product for free, and looking at ads is how you pay for it.
Free speech ≠ free beer.
Whether or not USA Today believes in free speech, its sponsors to not. They expect brand safe conduct.
Also USA Today’s upper management has opinions on what they would publish. You won’t see pro-anarchist op-eds in USA Today.
That said, news agencies are less good for getting news rather used in conjunction with others to confirm their veracity.
Corporations are not people, therefore do not have a right to free speech.
Wasn’t that the whole crux of Citizens United?
CU vs FEC was specifically about campaign financing, but yeah basically ruled that organizations like corporations are protected by 1A, and money counts as free speech.
Which is obviously bullshit on every level, but just one way that a SCOTUS with a few corrupt individuals can destroy democracy for an entire country.
They ruled that people acting together have all the same rights that they would have acting individually, and that preventing someone from spending money on producing and promoting their speech effectively prevents them from being heard. Which are both perfectly true, common-sense statements.
They ruled that people acting together have all the same rights that they would have acting individually
Bullshit, corporations are not “people acting together”, they’re autocratic command structures where one or few people hold all the power.
preventing someone from spending money on producing and promoting their speech effectively prevents them from being heard
Also total bullshit, unless you agree that allowing people to be poor is a violation of the first amendment, because being poor effectively prevents them from being heard. Which you won’t.
Which are both perfectly true, common-sense statements
I’m already confident you don’t have a single ounce of common sense in your empty head after reading those two sentences.
In reality, no, you’re right. Legally though, they are. And we are second class citizens.
I disagree. If you think USA today or any other news outlet shouldn’t have free speech then why bother with free speech to begin with.
I don’t think USA today or any other outlet should be protected. I do think the reporters that work there should be protected.
Corporations should be held accountable for what they say or “strongly encourage” others to say. Individuals should be protected if they get things wrong, though.
Yeah, advertising is not “free speech.” It’s a way for corporations to steal your life from you, 60 seconds at a time
… They mean that you’re supporting free speech by disabling and block and supporting them
Seriously. When did everyone get so stupid? They obviously aren’t saying ads are free speech
FREE* speech for everyone
*conditions_apply
Fee speech
Injection hackers do not give a single wet fuck about your “safe and ethical advertising practices”.
I wouldn’t visit these sites if you paid me. Much less forced me to watch ads.
That’s perfect then, you both agree you shouldn’t visit their site.
Freedom of speech includes the freedom not to be forced to consume something (including ads). Freedom of speech includes not sending all of my metadata to you and your business partners.
freedom of their speech, not ours
Your ads are award-winning?!?
If garbage had a face.
Is this even real? It has to be a meme…
“Turn off your ad blocked to prove that you believe in free speech.”
This is a hilarious level of argumentation. What’s quality of their content?
“Hit yourself in the balls with a mallet to prove how tough you are.”
“Step in this pile of dog crap to prove how brave you are.”
