Ads that waste your time should pay the price. Your time is valuable, your attention is valuable. If someone wants your time and attention, to make themselves money, they shouldn’t get it for free.
Now, what rate should they be taxed at? I’m guessing minimum wage. Maybe only a dollar an hour, who knows. They’re already paying media companies for x number of viewers for y number of seconds. If a commercial gets 36,000 viewers for 30 seconds, that’s 300 man hours lost to the sands of time.
The right rate should drastically reduce the number of advertisements people waste time on. Plus, it would raise revenue that can offset some other form of taxation; I am not particular as to which other tax would go down. The main benefit would be the time saved.
Interruption advertising is unlawful; it’s attention theft; attention is a sacred capital and the orienting function of your consciousness. No one has the right to steal it form you.
I’m trying to tax the advertisements that waste your time.
Billboards, as much as I don’t care for them, don’t take your time.
Radio ads, I really hate, but I’m doing something else like driving or working while I hear them.
Youtube ads that delay your video, do waste your time. But you’re probably already wasting your own time on Youtube, so I can’t recommend taxing them at minimum wage.
Television commercials have wasted sooo much time over the years, but they are on their way out. I can’t stand them so I don’t have a TV, but other people still do. Some are for watching sports, other people are super old. Old people don’t have much time left so it’s even worse to waste it, but they are retired so I can’t recommend minimum wage. Sports are also a waste of time, so same deal. But sports could stand to lose a lot of revenue. If they were all paid a tenth as much, because the ad revenue went down, they’d be fine. I’d expect ad revenue to go down to about half or a little lower at the right tax amount.
Product placement wouldn’t take your time, so I guess those would increase.
Internet and television communications are essentially a utility service, given the prominent role they play in how our communities orient themselves to new and relevant information. Interruption advertising is an obstacle to those who are seeking specific returns for the investment of their attention.
There are numerous examples of people asking in various forums and news articles, “Why does YouTube allow ads before first aid videos?”
When time is of the essence in saving a life, and another person needs to quickly access instructions to do so, an advertisement is more than a simple annoyance.
Not all instances present such an immediate danger to life and limb… however, the free-riding off of one’s focus, especially in a manner that diverts him from his intentional and productive tasks.
No one is saying that there is not a time or place for advertising. In fact, I reckon that many people would prefer to have sorts of designated areas or search engine features that also yields the most relevant results for consumer goods, services, and other materials, as opposed to the commercial crapshoot that exists presently. “We can tell this is what you’re actively searching for,” vs. “HEY! HEY! PUT DOWN WHAT YOU’RE DOING AND INTERACT WITH ME!”
The argument is being made that we should not, by default, owe any form of capital (including attention) to an entity, merely by encountering us. Many of us know how to invest our attention properly, and we don’t need to be distracted from the more important matters we are pursuing.