An advertising revenue model for our mobile app would be building off of what has made the Internet a surveillance and data-collecting machine in the first place. People might be used to such an idea now because of Ethan Zuckerman’s invention of the popup ad—in fact, many might even prefer it to paying for the app or a subscription fee—but even if they are desensitized to it, from an ethical perspective, this revenue model is a form of asking a person to pay for using the app while making them think it is essentially free. We may not ask for money, but in return we take data that we can sell. With so many websites and apps already doing this, we would only be following the trend and enforcing this popular revenue model.
Our app in particular would be able to benefit from an advertising revenue model by interspersing ads with the listings of products that artists put on the platform or keeping ad banners on the page. People would inevitably view the ads while browsing items to purchase. The disadvantages of this, not taking ethics into account, would be the unprofessional look the ads would give the app and the annoyance to customers who want to freely browse only the items without ads getting in the way. Without ads, the pages would look cleaner and more unified, customers would have a smoother experience, and we as the creators of the app would feel better about our choices. This is especially so for our team because we have other revenue models as viable options (e.g., taking a cut of each transaction, a seller subscription), so we should only be considering an advertising revenue model as a last resort.
