I remember when ABP started whitelisting ads as part of some twisted business model. I switched to uBlock so fast and haven’t looked back.

The way they presented this concept in the anime was amazing. Just so much color!

Yeah, you make some good points. But I’m also wondering if it isn’t the advertising companies themselves who are perpetuating the idea that all this super aggressive advertising works to sell more advertising. After all, they tout targeted ads as some new must-have evolution but as far as I am aware targeted ads haven’t been shown to be any more effective than contextual ads. And maybe not everyone has the luxury to actively avoid purchasing products that annoy them with ads. But I definitely agree that it’s never worth the sacrifice.

I can see it working when you otherwise have NO brand recognition whatsoever, but seeing ads for, say, TikTok on YouTube every 30 seconds isn’t going to convince me to get a TikTok. I’m never going to be “gee I wonder what short form video content provider I should subscribe to” and even if that somehow miraculously DID happen, I’m going to research my decision and not just arbitrarily make a decision based on a notion I might have heard about a product one time months/years ago. Maybe if I didn’t have a computer in my pocket at all times where I could get unbiased reviews on demand that would work but definitely not in modern times. But apparently I’m in the minority.

Okay, I have to wonder… what is the point of shoving ads down user’s throats all the time? Ads make me NOT want to purchase something. If I see ads for a product it just makes me hate that product. If a product pushes ads I hate that too.

Right? At best their argument is “I was too stupid to make the right decision for myself therefore no one should be able to make the decision for themselves”

The hard disk is made with discs.

Nah, seems to be an episode of The Boys with a mute character who uses sign language. So she signs i"I hate you" in a scene and it gets subtitled. But it doesn’t use the normal CC code as it’s a special case. And the code is buggy so it’s really easy for the subtitle to not clear off the screen and since it isn’t the normal subtitle/CC system it can’t be controlled that way. Fun times!

There’s a number of reasons for this like the electoral college and voter suppression.

The electoral college basically means that all of a states votes go to the winner of that state. If you’re casting a minority vote in that state it’s very easy for it to not affect the outcome in any way, unlike if the winner was determined by popular vote where every vote mattered. This is also why we see presidents elected even though they receive less votes, which further undermines the system.

Then there is rampant voter suppression, usually in Republican controlled areas. There is a strong correlation between more people voting and Democrats getting elected so Republicans try to make it as difficult as possible for people to vote, especially people who are likely to vote Democrat. So they pass voter ID laws, restrict mail-in voting, close polling places and shorten polling hours. In these areas people might have to spend hours traveling to a polling place only to stand in line for more hours before they can cast their vote.

Add in that voting takes place on a work day when it should probably be a national holiday, the two party system, and other stuff and it’s easy for people to feel lukewarm about voting.

The Fifth Element. I had NO idea what the movie was about when my cousin brought me to the theater. My nerd brain was like, “Is this a quest to find boron or something?” Became one of my all-time favorite movies.

“Your call is very important to us… but not so important that we would actually do anything about it like hiring more representatives. This message will repeat every 5 minutes until you get frustrated and hang up.”