Public Address | Cafe | Hard News: MegaBox: From f**k-all to zero

tussock

Sun, 03 Feb 2013 16:07:33 +1300

But at the same time I/S you seem to be claiming that you have a right to experience and interact the content, which you yourself refer to as product.
You mean like radio, and tv, and libraries, which also contain newspapers and magazines, and the internet (you might have heard…

tussock

Sun, 03 Feb 2013 15:54:00 +1300

And so my right to decide what’s displayed on my site, next to my work, is unimportant? Good to know.
I can see the pictures, for .gif and .jpg and .png and even .bmp, which lets you track traffic and everything just fine at the server level, as does a…

David Hood

Sat, 02 Feb 2013 08:56:03 +1300

Just on cultural content and consumption and business models, a major new survey on media trends by the U.S. bureau of labour statistics. Atlantic article

BenWilson

Sat, 26 Jan 2013 15:13:54 +1300

Better to try and get the model right where we are, rather than assume the main 'profitable' purpose is some form of CV-padding.

Sure, if there is a way, which there might not be. Maybe there's just not much oil in this well. I thought that it was worth noting…

Damian Christie

Sat, 26 Jan 2013 11:40:19 +1300

It raises the profile, if successful, of the owners and major contributors.

This assumes that the model works better wherever it is the now-high-profile person moves to, and will continue to do so – especially when you're talking about moving into newspapers, TV, or other traditional forms of media. Better…

BenWilson

Sat, 26 Jan 2013 11:29:34 +1300

Putting aside the question of whether one has a moral duty to watch ads, or at least to be polite enough not to mention when they don't, it's pretty clear it's not a particularly successful business model. So what is actually better? Why do people make sites with useful content…

Damian Christie

Sat, 26 Jan 2013 09:49:45 +1300

Your rights as a creator do not extend to parasitizing my brain space, or to dictating how I experience and interact with your product

I can see two sides to this – in a sense AdBlocking is just a modern version of getting up to make a cuppa when the…

Anthony Behrens Esq

Fri, 25 Jan 2013 13:27:19 +1300

I do understand that people would want to use ad-blockers – although it sometimes seems a bit precious to me – but the level of arrogance you display about it is remarkable.

It's a pity that IS comes across as arrogant...I think he/she really is just saying the "system" is…

Sacha

Fri, 25 Jan 2013 10:12:42 +1300

what if this was reversed and the content creator had all the power?

please go on..

Richard Aston

Fri, 25 Jan 2013 09:31:44 +1300

sponsorship

Yeah I guess, but depends which way the power goes. Trad sponsorship deals give a lot of power and control to the sponsors but what if this was reversed and the content creator had all the power?

Sacha

Thu, 24 Jan 2013 11:09:00 +1300

the site owners carefully choosing which ads they run

sponsorship

Richard Aston

Thu, 24 Jan 2013 08:45:15 +1300

I’ve often wondered how a site like this one makes it coin, sounds like it doesn’t…. ok so adblock now disabled for p/address will be clicking away

There is something in this idea. Valuing a web site so much you deliberately click on the ads knowing this simple action will…

Tom Semmens

Thu, 24 Jan 2013 08:14:13 +1300

British soldiers arriving in France in 1914 spent a lot of time trying to communicate with bewildered locals in pidgin Hindi, on the basis that the world spoke two languages – English and that of the principle subject people of their empire. Most Americans now seem to know at least…

Rich of Observationz

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 18:41:58 +1300

how else would it know if it was a top 100

Upload a list to the browser / gateway? (Not saying that it *will* do things that way, but it could).

headasunder

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 17:48:25 +1300

I am a simple blue collar boy who still enjoys The Weekend Press more for the ritual aspect as there are more adds than hard copy. I have always used ad-block for much of the same reason idiot savant lists but I've often wondered how a site like this one…

Russell Brown

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 17:47:07 +1300

The ad revenue diversion is certainly problematic. But consider this, the MegaKey technology is basically spyware and nasty substitution technology. It’s spyware because it will report on the site you are visiting (how else would it know if it was a top 100) and it could presumably substitute *anything* on…

Chris Waugh

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 17:12:00 +1300

That may explain why the Americans I know are in Beijing rather than America, as they're generally at least bilingual... They were exiled for speaking Foreign? Then again, my experience says Kiwis tend to be worse than Yanks at learning foreign languages, even when their host country is not English…

Rich of Observationz

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 17:09:16 +1300

Interesting:
Google US revenues – $7 bln = 1/20 of 1% of US GDP, or just over $20 per capita.

I'd be amazed that the average American buys enough Stuff as a result of Google delivered advertising to pay for that. But then again, total US ad spend is about…

Sacha

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 17:08:11 +1300

Reading DomPost hard copy can be confusing

and just try increasing the text size

Rich of Observationz

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 16:55:15 +1300

Google are Americans and consequently only recognise two languages: American and Foreign.

Rob Stowell

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 16:36:25 +1300

Google's revenue, from the horse's mouth :)

Chris Waugh

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 16:34:29 +1300

The ‘tailoring’ of advertising content is designed to please and interest, but so far, for me, it seems most often to be random- and often TOTALLY on the wrong track.

Me, too. I can't understand how, if Google is so smart, it can see that the websites I visit are…

David Hood

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 16:30:52 +1300

It tends to be a function of art as well.

There is some very interesting stuff around creators "moral rights" (related to copyright) in other jurisdictions. In particular the rights of creators to the integrity of the work (not having in altered) that could play out very interestingly in relation…

Rob Stowell

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 16:03:47 +1300

The technology is not new, simply a nasty virus that Dotcom is trying to legitamise.
That sounds right.
But internet advertising is... broken, and a little more. Just been trying to make sense of AdSense. It serves up ads against youtube videos that just DON'T work with the content.
The…

Russell Brown

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 15:56:25 +1300

__You’re not about to bring down anything by using an ad-blocker as an individual – but if everyone took the same stance as you, there wouldn’t be any Scoop to rely on. You may wish to consider parallels with, say, taxes and resource use. Or at least come down from…

Russell Brown

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 15:45:31 +1300

Your rights as a creator do not extend to .. dictating how I experience and interact with your product

Actually, copyright has always done that as one of its functions.

It tends to be a function of art as well. Artists are terrible control freaks ;-)

Don Christie

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 15:39:23 +1300

Don Christie

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 15:33:57 +1300

Mind you, bugger all people clicked through on it .

I tried clicking through on an ad the other day, but it didn't work :-( Reading DomPost hard copy can be confusing.

TracyMac

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 14:16:09 +1300

Frankly, if I WERE a child pornographer, I would sure as hell be encrypting everything up the wazoo already, and have been doing so for years. Not to mention PGPing emails and suchlike.

I think there have been papers written about how internet crime/dodginess enables certain technologies to develop…

Kyle Matthews

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 12:54:54 +1300

Are you calling Russell a pixie?

If the pointy ears fit...

Sacha

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 11:23:01 +1300

Reckon he'd quite like that. :)

Bart Janssen

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 11:04:18 +1300

written by pixies

Are you calling Russell a pixie?

Kyle Matthews

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 09:46:22 +1300

I fast forward through ads when I watch recorded TV, and I mute the TV otherwise.

And I don't go out of my way to read billboards, and I flick past the pages in newspapers that are just advertising.

But I don't expect these things not to be there and…

Rich of Observationz

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 09:13:00 +1300

After at least 20 years of child porn, bomb making and other internet scares, haven’t we had enough, for fuck sake?

I wonder if we could invite Phyllis Schafly to comment. Then again, perhaps not.

Peter Graham

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 23:31:12 +1300

Do you exercise your rights similarly with off-line content? Do you have someone blank out the ads in magazines, or hold up screens in front of bus-shelter advertising?

I fast forward through ads when I watch recorded TV, and I mute the TV otherwise.

Islander

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 21:50:15 +1300

1. Unbreakable encryption is already freely available to anyone who cares to use it.
2. Any encrypted thing must be decrypted by an end user to be useful to them. There will be traces on any end devices where this has happened. A user sufficiently clueful to eradicate such traces…

Stephen Judd

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 21:24:36 +1300

I am more troubled by the potential of unbreakable encryption to be used by paedophile rings

1. Unbreakable encryption is already freely available to anyone who cares to use it.
2. Any encrypted thing must be decrypted by an end user to be useful to them. There will be traces…

Jarrod Baker

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 20:15:38 +1300

Is it still denominated in Euros only?
Seems to be, although the FAQs say
You can turn on currency exchange in the dashboard to easily see how much it is in your local currency. Our payment companies will automatically exchange the currency when adding money.
Without having used it, it…

andin

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 20:14:42 +1300

people need to get paid.
Yep, that just raises a host of problems related to the way we live, that we arent looking at in much detail. Or are being railroaded into...

Russell Brown

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 20:04:55 +1300

I recall Russell looked into this a while ago.

Brenda Leeuwenberg looked into it more throughly than me, and concluded that it was just too difficult to use. Is it still denominated in Euros only?

I do have at least one person Flattring me, but I haven't redeemed anything yet.…

Sacha

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 17:52:46 +1300

It can get quite finely detailed – individual authors or even commenters could have their own Flattr accounts. Not sure how well it's worked so far, however.

I recall Russell looked into this a while ago.

Sacha

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 17:52:01 +1300

I'm not sure I see a problem with matching donors with recipients if you can make the donation on the page

How do people find their way to 'the page'?

Kumara Republic

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 17:40:20 +1300

Patronage is at the heart of public broadcasting – or more accurately what’s left of it – in NZ.

With a return to the unwieldy-to-enforce licence fee unlikely, a patronage/tipjar model wouldn’t rake in enough money to sustain a successor to TVNZ 6 & 7. Their fatal weakness was that a…

Tom Ackroyd

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 16:50:58 +1300

I think I/S needs content-aware GPS accelerometer-equipped AR glasses with commercial-message image-sensing pixel-replacement software. Didn't Google work with Adobe on something like this? Maybe it could also replace the heads of people he doesn't like with a big smiley.

Bart Janssen

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 16:50:32 +1300

That’s why I like patronage as a model.

You’d still need some mechanism for matching donors with recipients.

But the internet is really good for that. The problem with patronage used to be that the time spent getting the donations meant the donations had to be large to be worth…

Jarrod Baker

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 16:39:28 +1300

In this vein, Peter Sunde's Flattr has an interesting model. Content creators can put a Flattr button on their site or on individual articles, kind of like a Facebook "like" button. Content consumers pay Flattr a fixed monthly fee, then go around clicking the Flattr buttons on any content they…

Sacha

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 16:22:15 +1300

That’s why I like patronage as a model.

You'd still need some mechanism for matching donors with recipients.

Sacha

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 16:21:16 +1300

Same applies to Kim Dotcom who creates nothing for me hence I don’t want my earnings to be tracked to him.

Like Apple, Google and others, he's providing a shared distribution and revenue-sharing platform. That also has to be paid for somehow.

Anthony Behrens Esq

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 16:19:48 +1300

Not an advertising solution to dying media – but [www.nsfwcorp.com] – a great and innovative news and comment outfit based in Las Vegas seem to be doing well with a combination of good content, design and a VERY reasonable subscription model – 3 bucks a month when I last checked.…

Bart Janssen

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 16:12:04 +1300

the crux of the problem is everyone wants to get paid….

No. It’s that creators of content want to feed their children and buy them Christmas presents and go out to dinner and pay for school uniforms and …

Consumers of content, particularly on the internet, often forget that there…

Graeme Edgeler

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 16:02:39 +1300

(And as for ethically: my screen, my eyeballs, my brain. Absolutely I get to control and filter my inputs however I like. Your rights as a creator do not extend to parasitizing my brain space, or to dictating how I experience and interact with your product)

Do you exercise your…

Jarrod Baker

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 16:01:47 +1300

do you have any examples
One example might be how Daring Fireball handles sponsorships – only one is available each week, and (when I've noticed them) they're generally relevant and unobtrusive.

Rich of Observationz

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 15:51:10 +1300

I guess you've got different models and motivations. I/S I guess is happy to run his site as a community participation without reward (and in turn benefits from Google's caring more about territory than dollars). Similarly the Standard. Other sites (including most of my job) are paid for by government…

Russell Brown

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 15:24:47 +1300

Russell, by way of consolation I have been pleased to shop at Felt a number of times.

I’m delighted for Lucy at Felt that that’s the case, although I’m not actually sure we even get any more for that one :-)

And just like Geoff I’m happy to send cash.…

Russell Brown

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 15:23:19 +1300

Whoa – I am part of this community and purchased a banner ad on PA .

Good onya!

Admittedly only a grand’s worth.

That's heaps!

Mind you, bugger all people clicked through on it .

Clickthrough is a problematic measure of performance, especially on this site.

Richard Aston

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 15:21:22 +1300

I think there’s a place for thoughtful human-curated advertising. You just don’t often see it.
Jarrod do you have any examples , links . I think its an interesting side topic .

Richard Aston

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 15:11:45 +1300

When we started taking advertising, I really thought that we’d get a lot more bFM -level advertising – ads from people who were part of the same communities as the readership – but that has never really happened

Whoa – I am part of this community and purchased a banner…

richard

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 14:34:33 +1300

Sure. Just sign up with Mega and wait.

sallyr

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 14:19:12 +1300

Russell, by way of consolation I have been pleased to shop at Felt a number of times.

And just like Geoff I'm happy to send cash.

Keir Leslie

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 14:06:49 +1300

At some point the crux of the problem is that people need to get paid.

bob daktari

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 13:57:35 +1300

the crux of the problem is everyone wants to get paid....

Rob Stowell

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 13:53:32 +1300

if they want to stay in business, its up to them, not me, to come up with an alternative
That's a bit nihilistic/solipsist.Why take any responsibility for anything worthwhile?
Payment for digital content creation is a grand puzzle. Not saying it's easy. (But maybe it is. Maybe we just need…

Brent Jackson

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 13:51:11 +1300

I use an ad blocker, but I only block ads that have movement in them. Any static ads are fine. Ads that have anything moving get blocked. On sites such as public address, if any ad served up by google has movement, I block it, but after awhile I get…

Keir Leslie

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 13:46:24 +1300

Hey I/S have you heard of the public good problem?

Idiot Savant

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 13:43:10 +1300

You’re not about to bring down anything by using an ad-blocker as an individual – but if everyone took the same stance as you, there wouldn’t be any Scoop to rely on. You may wish to consider parallels with, say, taxes and resource use. Or at least come down from…

Sacha

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 13:38:51 +1300

we need to provide money to people who provide quality content

Agreed. The old business arrangements in creative industries funneled income and control largely to intermediaries like record companies and movie studios.

New techologies allow a more direct connection between creators and audiences, but the business models have not caught…

Sacha

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 13:34:39 +1300

Your rights as a creator do not extend to .. dictating how I experience and interact with your product

Actually, copyright has always done that as one of its functions.

Sacha

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 13:33:19 +1300

that would actually be Karajoz and Eden Coffee, and Orcon

and I reckon the latter has done really well by a more active partnership in the Blend events.

Idiot Savant

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 13:31:24 +1300

And so my right to decide what’s displayed on my site, next to my work, is unimportant? Good to know.

Pretty much. Adblock. Killfiles. "If you don't like it, don't read it". This is the way the internet has always worked, both culturally and as a practical reality. Substituting content…

Kyle Matthews

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 13:28:08 +1300

Because I pay for a good broadband connection I expect to be able to fashion my web experience exactly as I want it, not as anyone says I should see it – and that includes ads, within reason. For example, I use pop-up blockers but not ad blockers, but recently…

Russell Brown

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 13:26:47 +1300

True. The advertising partnerships PA had for People’s Coffee and Slingshot were something different and got their brands across, I think.

Tragically, that would actually be Karajoz and Eden Coffee, and Orcon ...

Dylan Reeve

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 13:15:53 +1300

To be honest, I am more troubled by the potential of unbreakable encryption to be used by paedophile rings and the like

This bothers me hugely and I've seen it in relation to Mega a number of times.

This argument, taken to it's logical conclusion, basically applies to the whole…

Rich of Observationz

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 13:03:31 +1300

True. The advertising partnerships PA had for People's Coffee and Slingshot were something different and got their brands across, I think.

Yamis

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 12:54:59 +1300

Another question is what sort of advertisers would buy space that had been, um, liberated from Google? Am predicting it will be all classy stuff – you know, Make Money From Home, Free iPods, Cheap Viagra, Meet Your New Russian Girlfriend, Machines in Your Basement to Make Free Energy, One…

Jarrod Baker

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 12:09:50 +1300

Maybe this comes from being a (reformed) marketer, but I actually quite like some web advertising. If it's nicely designed, and the site owner is carefully curating which ads get posted, ads can be at worst inoffensive and at best of actual value to me (aside for the value inherent…

Rich of Observationz

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 11:49:11 +1300

The actual business model:

– launch the site
– make massive revenues and lose > 100% on every dollar
– recruit a former All Black, a National party politician and a senile ex-businessman
– take the firm public and raise billions from NZ's huge retard community (sorry, __ Mom and…

Kumara Republic

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 11:13:18 +1300

It is very vulnerable to fraud, manipulation and blocking – which in my mind makes it worth…just about nothing.

In particular, there's a certain pyramid investment model – "I make $x a day!" – that resorts to Twitter hacking and fake news websites. In fact, when [[https://twitter.com/RodOramNZ/status/265150872667955201|Rod Oram's Twitter account…

Tom Semmens

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 10:53:45 +1300

I don’t have a dog in this fight so I can see both sides of the mega-key and ad-blocker yay/nay argument. To be honest, I am more troubled by the potential of unbreakable encryption to be used by paedophile rings and the like than KDC’s grab for ad revenue via…

Russell Brown

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 10:07:17 +1300

Meanwhile, Chris Keall's Mega launch report for Ars Technica has this at the end:

Onstage, Dotcom talked up two new services that will follow Mega in around six months time. First is Megabox, which will offer music, cutting in artists on profits. The second is Megakey, which will allow people…

Hadyn Green

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 09:35:22 +1300

Yeah this was way back on page one but...
Sorry, but its my screen, not yours, and I'll decide what I see there thanks.
Hahahahahahahahahaha! Shit that's funny.

Anthony Behrens Esq

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 09:30:54 +1300

It's not particularly nice...but we really do have to stop kidding ourselves. There is no accountability, no surety and no plan as far as web advertising goes.
Unless a publisher has TOTAL control of its pages, advertising on them is like pissing into the wind.
Media can't rely on readers…

Brodie Davis

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 09:24:40 +1300

When we started taking advertising, I really thought that we'd get a lot more bFM -level advertising — ads from people who were part of the same communities as the readership — but that has never really happened. As I said, I like the music and arts ads we carry,…

Russell Brown

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 09:18:52 +1300

Kill it off Kim or whoever…web advertising, as it stands, needs to be put out of its misery so that we are forced to find something that actually works…for readers and publishers..

Heh. While I don't particularly disagree with you about the state of internet advertising, I'm not sure that…

Anthony Behrens Esq

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 08:45:15 +1300

As someone who not only needs advertising for my website to survive, but has also paid for web advertsing, I'm all for Dotcom's Megabox.
As it stands at the moment web advertsing is buggered...there is no real business model for it and no-one has as yet come up with a…

Hebe

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 08:44:18 +1300

As someone who uses Adblock to control what I see, I have zero sympathy for advertisers getting "hijacked" in this way. Sorry, but its my screen, not yours, and I'll decide what I see there thanks.I dislike giving advertisers rent-free space in my head, BUT if I choose to read…

Hebe

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 08:14:57 +1300

Shallow must be my middle name, unlike most of the commenters. I'm a magpie when it comes to something shiny, so I often click on Discover Me and Felt to see what's about. But that is also because I know it aids PAS. As for buying through the sites, never:…

Kumara Republic

Tue, 22 Jan 2013 01:30:30 +1300

Is that another persona?

No, Barnsley and WhaleOil are two distinct people, even though they've traditionally overlapped politically.

Rich of Observationz

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 17:49:13 +1300

bFM -level advertising

Doesn't bFM pay a team of people to bang on doors and scare up those ads? It might not be on the radar of a removal firm or horticultural (ahem) supplies merchant to spontaneously place ads.

Interesting to see the biggest (US) internet advertisers. Google is prominent…

Moz

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 17:39:19 +1300

I'd be more likely to subscribe here than click an ad, I find that even the affiliate links on author sites are usually something I notice after I buy their book, rather than something that I either see and click or seek out. The ones that work for me are…

Russell Brown

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 17:25:51 +1300

Aye. I don’t think I’ve ever clicked through on an internet advert, and I fast forward through TV adverts very happily. But I recognise that they’re part of how the system works. They’re the reasonable side of making money off the internet, as compared to the spam and scams that…

Paul Campbell

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 17:24:57 +1300

The Kim Dotcom opera seems to have divided most of us down political lines with many on the left descending into breathless fanboy lapping up and faithfully regurgitating his every utterance.

Oh don't be silly – people on the left like him because he supports right wing politicians, tried to…

Kyle Matthews

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 17:14:06 +1300

Russell Brown

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 17:12:09 +1300

If Dotcom’s statement about the incentives system yesterday was true (I have no idea, I never explored it) then it was only available to premium users and only on files under 100MB. None of the pirated content I ever came across on MegaUpload was split into small chunks and imposing…

Sacha

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 17:04:47 +1300

A shared payments system across a number of sites is under discussion

Great. About time.

Russell Brown

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 16:50:47 +1300

It’s not a protest against you, it’s a protest against Kim DotCom and his ilk. I assume you don’t see yourself in that camp. But then, I also assume you look at what the common ad-blockers block and actively work around them.

Ha! I have a very long list of…

Dylan Reeve

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 16:49:42 +1300

Nobody can sensibly argue that megaupload was not a file sharing business that provided users with an alexandra library of free copyright material.

I think even that is a stretch. It was a file locker that was fairly simple to use, provided good services and was stable and reliable. As…

Russell Brown

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 16:35:01 +1300

So, once again, I register my preference for a regular auto payment to PA., like I do for Scoop. Can this be done?

A shared payments system across a number of sites is under discussion. I'll keep you posted.

Geoff Lealand

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 16:31:53 +1300

Even on this site, ads are equivalent to the full page Harvey Norman newspaper ads I use to light the fire or TVCS obliterated by the remote, I seldom notice them and never click on them.

So, once again, I register my preference for a regular auto payment to PA.,…

Bart Janssen

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 16:17:57 +1300

What I find most disturbing about Megabox and I guess to a similar degree Google et al., is that the discussion is all about the rights of the advertisers and perhaps sometimes to a limited extent about the rights of the viewers.

For me, I can turn off the ads…

bob daktari

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 15:50:35 +1300

According to what I've read Megabox will only replace a "small percentage" of existing ads with those from Megabox, which is still intrusive imo – so instead of from fk all to zero its perhaps more accurate to say from fk all to sweet f**k all from a revenue point…

Moz

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 15:44:26 +1300

Try not to get too high and mighty about it. Ad-bloacking's not exactly a highly-committed form of protest.

It's not a protest against you, it's a protest against Kim DotCom and his ilk. I assume you don't see yourself in that camp. But then, I also assume you look at…

Sacha

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 15:41:14 +1300

Is that another persona?

Russell Brown

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 15:35:51 +1300

bit more nuanced than than, Cameron

It's Barnsley Bill. Hello, Bill.

Russell Brown

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 15:33:16 +1300

When I see Russell say that he gets effectively nothing out of that misappropriation that makes me even more inclined to block ads.

To clarify, AdSense is basically a washout for us. Google can’t sensibly match our content to advertising and our readers never click on anything. It works better…

David Hood

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 15:28:43 +1300

It presents interesting legal issues though

Particularly in relation to the organizations it is close partners with. There are fairly regular cases of news organization A uses audio sourced from B in its bulletin, and uploads the bulletin to youtube. B goes to upload its original material to Youtube. Youtube's…

Moz

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 15:15:22 +1300

Nobody can sensibly argue that megaupload was not a file sharing business that provided users with an alexandra library of free copyright material.

I didn't think anyone was trying to. But the claim that by stopping MegaUpload something has been done about piracy is one that seems to be made…

Geoff Lealand

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 15:12:16 +1300

find me a left wing commentator or journo Oh, if I only could find a brace of such characters, in a New Zealand media still bedazzled by a nit-wit PM and his poor excuse of a government,

Hmmm--what name do you use when you are off-duty?

Sacha

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 15:03:51 +1300

find me a left wing commentator or journo who has not drunk the Dotcom Kool-Aid

bit more nuanced than than, Cameron

Freddie Fleetstreet

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 14:52:10 +1300

Geoff, find me a left wing commentator or journo who has not drunk the Dotcom Kool-Aid. (Russel Brown appears to have spat it out)
It is the best example of "my enemies enemy is my friend" we have ever seen in NZ.

And his using the old "I know I…

Rob Stowell

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 14:42:51 +1300

many on the left. Not sure where you got that notion,
Yeah. He's clearly a scammer, and happy to cultivate eg John Banks when it was in his personal interests. He plays the buffoon, but not so sure he's just a clown: he's also made serious money on mega ventures.…

Keir Leslie

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 14:38:22 +1300

Also paywalls.

Geoff Lealand

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 14:33:45 +1300

many on the left. Not sure where you got that notion, I think that many regard Kim D as an amusing clown, with appalling taste in music and art, but not really to be trusted as he is largely motivated by self-interest

Keir Leslie

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 14:27:14 +1300

In the long run, won't this just lead to ads that aren't easily mechanically distinguishable from content?

Freddie Fleetstreet

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 14:15:57 +1300

It is heartening to see that somebody from the left actually understands the issue. The Kim Dotcom opera seems to have divided most of us down political lines with many on the left descending into breathless fanboy lapping up and faithfully regurgitating his every utterance. That sadly is to be…

Rich of Observationz

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 13:36:56 +1300

we could expect to see it turn up in anti-virus packages.

Anti-virus morphing into copyright enforcement, hmmm. It could also be blocked by internet filters like the great firewalls of Aussie and China.

Rich of Observationz

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 13:34:18 +1300

As someone who has never, ever clicked through an ad or bought anything that's internet advertised, I actually think I'm doing the advertising industry a favour by running an ad-blocker. I'm saving them from paying nanocents of bandwidth costs for zero return.

I'm thinking that Megakey will be easily ad-blocked…

Sacha

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 13:31:08 +1300

It works if nobody talks about it

Last week's swift blocking of the first Banshee ep after word got out supports your contention.

Russell Brown

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 13:25:15 +1300

If Fox claims and monetises Simpsons episodes and clips are they then breaking their licensing contracts with overseas broadcasters who likely have various rights to exclusivity etc?

I think the YouTube model is pretty flawed as well.

Ssssshhhh. It works if nobody talks about it.

That's how we can have…

richard

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 13:18:52 +1300

Maker or taker, parasite or host?

Dylan Reeve

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 13:16:11 +1300

For music- remarkably so!
I’m not so sure about visual content (film, tv, etc).

Also works pretty well with video (although usually by using audio as the primary cue).

It presents interesting legal issues though. If you, as a rightsholder, choose to monetise uploaded content on YouTube are you then…

Tim Michie

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 13:12:52 +1300

IT security has got a lot more important. Yes, very much this.

Rob Stowell

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 13:06:55 +1300

Well it’s entirely NZ registered and based, so it’s unlikely to be skirting tax like Facebook and Google do here.
Yeah, so maybe we'll get 30 pieces of silver to agonize over :)
Still sounds like a dangerous hack I wouldn't want near my browser. Annnnd- what's the bet Chrome…

Rob Stowell

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 13:03:52 +1300

YouTube’s content detection is pretty impressive.
For music- remarkably so!
I'm not so sure about visual content (film, tv, etc).

Russell Brown

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 13:02:51 +1300

No way any smart sys-admin will allow it on any remotely sensitive computers.

Good point. I think we could expect to see it turn up in anti-virus packages.

Dylan Reeve

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 13:00:45 +1300

It’ll be interesting to see how much NZ (and other) tax Mr Dotcom pays on this new venture, and how the benefits pan out.

Well it's entirely NZ registered and based, so it's unlikely to be skirting tax like Facebook and Google do here.

jeremy gray

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 12:59:12 +1300

This seems like such a bad idea. It is a throw back to bonzi buddy and free internet providers that showed ads in exchange for dial up.

Since those days I think IT security has got a lot more important. Is anyone really going to trust a program dedicated to…

Stephen Judd

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 12:59:00 +1300

Is my page with Mega's ads injected into it an unauthorised derivative work, I wonder?

Russell Brown

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 12:58:43 +1300

I think Mr Dotcom may be commenting on the pervasiveness of ‘pirated’ content on youtube

I think you'd be surprised how much of that is there on a claim-and-monetise basis. YouTube's content detection is pretty impressive.

This does not, of course, excuse Google's gaming of tax systems.

Rob Stowell

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 12:55:26 +1300

Google is the largest index of pirated content in the world and they don’t pay any licence holder
I think Mr Dotcom may be commenting on the pervasiveness of ‘pirated’ content on youtube (and maybe other ventures from the past, like google books). I am fond of google for reasons…

Russell Brown

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 12:50:40 +1300

I love what Mega could offer as a content distribution platform – imagine being able to purchase content and have it immediately transferred to your Mega account for download whenever and wherever – excellent idea.

Yep, that's cool. Like an expanded version of what Amazon already does.

Russell Brown

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 12:49:21 +1300

As someone who uses Adblock to control what I see, I have zero sympathy for advertisers getting “hijacked” in this way. Sorry, but its my screen, not yours, and I’ll decide what I see there thanks.

And so my right to decide what’s displayed on my site, next to my…

Dylan Reeve

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 12:44:34 +1300

But MegaKey as a funding model is a terrible idea. I'm not sure what other…

Jason Kemp

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 12:41:00 +1300

If MegaBox is still going to be launched then it needs to be reviewed separately from the circus around Kim. He is a fun guy but there are always consequences and while some of them might be unintended they still need to be evaluated.

Any redirection of the sort mentioned…

Idiot Savant

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 12:38:55 +1300

As someone who uses Adblock to control what I see, I have zero sympathy for advertisers getting "hijacked" in this way. Sorry, but its my screen, not yours, and I'll decide what I see there thanks.

What does worry me is that it suggests that the new model of internet…

Sacha

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 12:36:39 +1300

Great to see you commenting here. #kiaora

Rochelle Furneaux

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 12:29:03 +1300

Your last paragraph ; YES!!

Public Address

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 12:29:03 +1300

Discussion from blog post.