Comments on: If you can’t handle bidirectional text, don’t show bidirectional text http://www.ordinarynothing.org/blog/2008/07/if-you-cant-handle-bidirectional-text-dont-show-bidirectional-text/ "A man can stand anything except a succession of ordinary days" -- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Fri, 03 Sep 2010 23:29:44 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 By: Yaron http://www.ordinarynothing.org/blog/2008/07/if-you-cant-handle-bidirectional-text-dont-show-bidirectional-text/comment-page-1/#comment-497 Yaron Tue, 22 Jul 2008 23:05:09 +0000 http://www.ordinarynothing.org/blog/?p=425#comment-497 On-line ads are, as surprisingly as it seems sometime, not completely worthless. Otherwise companies would have stopped paying for them long ago. We had the phase where most websites were supported by ads, and then everyone figured out that ads were worthless, nobody would pay for them, and this business model will collapse. Now, years later, the model still seems to be working pretty good, and there are many sites and companies who survive very nicely on ads, or who make a lot of money from ad networks. And this means there are still a lot of companies willing to pay for these ads. If they were really worthless, nobody would have kept paying for them for so long. In any case, my problem isn't specifically with the ads. It's with the main concept of someone who badly screws up their core business, causing damage to their customers by providing a worthless service in exchange for their money. And no, screwups don't help. There is such a thing as bad publicity. After all, if they couldn't bother to do <em>this</em> right, why assume they bothered to do their main product right? Most of the time it would have been ignored. But this way, it's hard to read even if you are among the potentially interested few. On-line ads are, as surprisingly as it seems sometime, not completely worthless. Otherwise companies would have stopped paying for them long ago.
We had the phase where most websites were supported by ads, and then everyone figured out that ads were worthless, nobody would pay for them, and this business model will collapse. Now, years later, the model still seems to be working pretty good, and there are many sites and companies who survive very nicely on ads, or who make a lot of money from ad networks. And this means there are still a lot of companies willing to pay for these ads. If they were really worthless, nobody would have kept paying for them for so long.

In any case, my problem isn’t specifically with the ads. It’s with the main concept of someone who badly screws up their core business, causing damage to their customers by providing a worthless service in exchange for their money.

And no, screwups don’t help. There is such a thing as bad publicity. After all, if they couldn’t bother to do this right, why assume they bothered to do their main product right? Most of the time it would have been ignored. But this way, it’s hard to read even if you are among the potentially interested few.

]]> By: Ted L | California Lemon Law Attorney http://www.ordinarynothing.org/blog/2008/07/if-you-cant-handle-bidirectional-text-dont-show-bidirectional-text/comment-page-1/#comment-493 Ted L | California Lemon Law Attorney Sun, 20 Jul 2008 23:22:37 +0000 http://www.ordinarynothing.org/blog/?p=425#comment-493 Your taking marketing WAY to seriously. The main thing being that the ad was worthless to start with. The copy could be right side up or down or sideways. It's called "impression advertising." It's mostly a way to waste ad money with no monitoring of results anyway. And if they screw up the text? It works even better because 99% of the time it would have been ignored. Because it's backwords it gets noticed as much as 5 times more. And 1/2 of the time, the impression is not a turn off, so because the value was near 0 to start with, screwup's help. Your taking marketing WAY to seriously. The main thing being that the ad was worthless to start with. The copy could be right side up or down or sideways. It’s called "impression advertising." It’s mostly a way to waste ad money with no monitoring of results anyway. And if they screw up the text? It works even better because 99% of the time it would have been ignored. Because it’s backwords it gets noticed as much as 5 times more. And 1/2 of the time, the impression is not a turn off, so because the value was near 0 to start with, screwup’s help.

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