Can we not have political ads on TRW?

[jagged ben]

I just saw an overtly political and partisan ad here.  I'm not gonna be able to continue visiting this site everyday if it in any way benefits from advertising from that source.  I'm not gonna say who it was and that's not relevant as others might feel the same about ads for different political positions.

Can we not have political ads on this site, please?

[wcfn100]

The best thing to do is to go into your ad settings and let them know what you want to see.



Jason

[CBQ Fan]

The railwire is not your personal safe space!

[Dave V]

I could be wrong, but I'm not certain that Tommm Mannnn or the software have any control over the advertisements.  Generally when we have conversations about what ads we're seeing, we find that the advertisements are more related to our other internet activity.

Generally if I've shopped for something online, those are the ads I'm seeing.  Like I'm seeing ads for Sountraxx decoders and vitamin supplements and stuff that I've recently shopped for or searched for.  Are you searching things online for this person's opponent?  The advertising software may not be smart enough to differentiate your political affiliation, just that you've recently looked at political stuff.

Of course if you've done NOTHING political at all online, I have no explanation other than the software is shooting in the dark.

As much as we may not like it, targeted advertising is a part of life now.

[wcfn100]

As much as we may not like it, targeted advertising is a part of life now.

But I think each ad company gives you some control over what you see.  Amazon let's you get ads based on your history.  Google lets you define categories.   At a minimum, you can usually flag a certain ad that you don't want.

I think this should get you to you Google settings - https://adssettings.google.com/

I this one your Amazon setting - https://www.amazon.com/adprefs

Otherwise, just click the blue triangle in the ad and see what options you might have.

Jason

[C855B]

Tom mentioned a while back he does have the ability to block ads, but IIRC it was specific ads on a one-by-one basis, not a category, and you had to supply the click link. IOW, more trouble than it's worth considering you probably wouldn't see that exact ad again, and there's the strong possibility that the click link has a serial number assigned to your specific session to identify the who, when and where.

... As much as we may not like it, targeted advertising is a part of life now.

Yes and no. I rarely see targeted ads, it's only on the phone and I can usually tie those to browsing TRW on the phone. It's a lot more difficult to block trackers there. Since 99% of my online activity is on the desktop - real keyboard and big screen, thankyouverymuch - simply using DuckDuckGo for a search engine, not giving in to social media (apologies, Dave, we've had this discussion), and some light firewalling (FB tracker and widget blockers) seems to keep the targeted stuff out of my online life.*

Frankly (again, apologies), FB is the biggest offender in this. Even those great pictures you post here have FB trackers attached. The mere act of allowing them to display on the page is an added "affinity point" in FB's digital dossier on each of us. We might not be able to totally control it, but we can at least kink the hose in the data flow from our personal lives to their marketing monster.

* EDIT - Exception came to mind - I do get geographic targeting. These are based on IP block location, for me it's retailers 30-40 miles away, obviously the head-end location for our cable company's connection to the backbone.

[John]

I just saw an overtly political and partisan ad here.  I'm not gonna be able to continue visiting this site everyday if it in any way benefits from advertising from that source.  I'm not gonna say who it was and that's not relevant as others might feel the same about ads for different political positions.

Can we not have political ads on this site, please?

Sorry -- Tom does not control what ads are served up by google .. you could try clearing your browser cache and elimiate all trackers ..  you can also install add blocker software ..

[tom mann]

Actually I have some control and I explicitly disable religion and politics. If you've seen one, I'm sorry but you're not supposed to.  My guess is that in these times something slipped through.

[Chris333]

I've got a ton of e-mails lately with something related to coronavirus in the subject line. And I know that ads on TV are suddenly all about it too. Pretty easy to go from that to political. 

[jagged ben]

Actually I have some control and I explicitly disable religion and politics. If you've seen one, I'm sorry but you're not supposed to.  My guess is that in these times something slipped through.

Thanks Tom.  If it is more than a one off I'll let you know.

[jagged ben]

The railwire is not your personal safe space!

I come here to relax and have fun.  I do not need to be here if it's unpleasant.  It is not that important to me.

[wazzou]

I come here to relax and have fun.  I do not need to be here if it's unpleasant.  It is not that important to me.

Honestly, I don’t even notice adds regardless of what they are.

[CBQ Fan]

I come here to relax and have fun.  I do not need to be here if it's unpleasant.  It is not that important to me.

Maybe next time send a message to Tom or another mod instead of wasting our time with your intolerance for viewpoints other than your own. This is not the first time you have done this.

[mu26aeh]

Honestly, I don’t even notice adds regardless of what they are.

The only time I seem to notice is when bathing suit ads pop up.  Then I wonder why bathing suits ads pop up when I don't search for them or anything close to them.

Open page, fixate on where your topic is and click.  Scroll on, scroll on

[tom mann]

We don't need this to go on.