We’ve had a large number of new visitors from various webmaster boards. If you’re one of them, welcome! Thanks for spreading the word.
After reading the various threads on message boards and the information here, what are your thoughts on this issue? Is it a hopeless case? Can the Adblockers be swayed to at least be clear and fair in their actions? Is this all a big non-issue?
Arms races and cat and mouse games are no fun and leave no winners, what are some lasting and permanent solutions?
{ 69 comments… read them below or add one }
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= Say NO to web ads ! Reclaim your web! =
= You have the right to block ads ! =
=================blockads@gmail.com===============
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blockads@gmail.com
Use firefox http://www.mozilla.org/support/firefox/adblock
Like in many things with commercial activities, they over-did online advertising. If they never made annoying ads, nobody would be blocking them (well, maybe a few die-hards).
This discussion, (to block, or not to block ?) is good. I know i can visit sites for free because of the ads. However, i still block ads. For exable, a site gets ads from a dedicated ad-server. Quite often, this ad-server is very slow. In that case i’ll block the server in my DNS. If the ad-server works at a reasonable speed, i won’t block it.
Someone else already started about privacy. Because i like my privacy, i decided to configure my browser to ask me permission for every cookie. I thought that maybe a few sites use tracking cookies, but about every ***** ad on a site sets it’s own cookie ! It’s really amazing. Because of that, i block all cookies, en only let them in if the site really requires is (like a webmail application). If i don’t see the function of the cookie, i reject it.
I also think google is going the wrong direction. Now, with their ad-sense text advertisements, i don’t have any compains. They load fast, are not annoying, and sometimes even usefull. But i’ve seen news that they *may* also start serving graphical ads. In that case -for me- it would mean i can block the whole google domain (i don’t use their search engine, so that’s easy).
Conclusion: If the advertising companies also thought about the user (or consumer in their perspective ?), we woudn’t have this problem.
Adblock, I somewhat agree with your idea here, and in an ideal internet, it would work – however, in an ideal internet, there’d be no need for adblockers, because anyone wanting to make a profit would use relevant text ads, or very small static images, and with moderation.
As it stands, there’s no certification process for your little downloadable badge. There’s no discernable requirements for being “unobtrusive”. A lot of idiot for-profit webmasters who are relative newbies on the online scene who see the internet as a means to their end consider popunders to be unobtrusive. They consider flash to be unobtrusive. These sentiments aren’t reflected by the online community at large, but these webmasters would feel completely justified in putting a “Don’t block my ads” banner on their pages, when in actuality they’re annoying everyone with their spamvertising and privacy-raping tactics.
Frankly, my only beef with Symantec adblock is that it’s a cheap-working HOSTS file interface, and listing stuff in HOSTS causes browser problems in some networks. I don’t see a problem with taking the initiative to block ads for folks – in all the years I’ve been working with Symantec on an end-user basis, I’ve never heard one complaint about having the ads gone, just with other problems the software causes.
John Q. User doesn’t realize that they have a choice. They hate ads, but their knowledge of blocking ads ends at popup stoppers and adware removers, for the most part. They figure that it’s just one of those things that comes with using the internet, and that’s really sad – they don’t even REALIZE they have a choice. Spreading very restrictive ad-blocking software across-the-board would be good, in my opinion, because it’s the only way to get advertisers and for-profit webmasters to realize that they don’t control the internet, and that it’s their responsibility to be good “netizens”, or we’ll just play by our own rules and remove their ads. As it is right now, there’s no incentive for webmasters to limit advertising, and the sky (or their greed) is the limit as they add several “skyscraper” flash banners, Javascript floaters, numerous text ads from every contextual affiliate out there, and then on top of it all, hard-coded HTML sponsorship messages.
Simply put: Would an across-the-board blocking of ads affect the internet? Most certainly. Would it shut down sites? Undoubtably. But in all likelihood, the internet would be a better place for users, and even potentially be more profitable as webmasters come up with ways to unobtrusively harness a profit that don’t involve blitzkreiging people’s senses or selling personal information. The most interesting and most helpful sites out there existed before online advertising became big, and would persist if it went away tomorrow.
*shrug*
These so-called “consumers” want to block all ads, so be it.
Know what, we people runinng sites should wake up. We’re businesspeople.
These freeloading mooches want to block our ads that bring them a free service, WHATEVER.
Well, Consumers have money. Let them pay fees for everything.
Take your adblockers. Enjoy them. Sure – your screens will be nice and shiny, free of ads. WOW, ZOMG THE NET NEVER LOOKED THIS GOOD!
And it’s never cost that much either.
Sure, it’s your connection, you pay for it, you’re holding the ball there –
… but if you’re using free sites, um, you’re missing the point of ADVERTISMENT BASED SERVICES.
My suggestion -> Ultra duty stats tracking, and possibly some way to detect ad blocking software. Make future versions of adblock report – just like good behaved bot does. If you visit an advertisment driven free site, deny the client access to the site.
You know – the webmasters PAY FOR THEIR CONNECTION TOO – JUST LIKE CONSUMERS DO. When you block their revenue – that is, ads – you’re killing them. Is that right?
Of course it is, I mean, come on! They should be working 24/7 so YOU can enjoy their site, right? Maybe you should have them come over your house and be your personal slave for the rest of your life.
Give me a break.
Hey, Kyan, be my guest.
You know how many sites have gone the pay-for-services route and just nosebombed? Go ahead and make all your sites pay-per-use. My guess is that you don’t offer anything earthshattering that people are willing to shell out any money for. Whoops, another codemonkey goes into complete e-obscurity!
Consider this: you take advantage of free things provided to you every day. Using JPEG’s? Then you’d better pay a fee to the folks who designed the format. Using HTTP? You didn’t design it, so where are you assigning credit? How about FTP, or PHP, or anything like that? Do you even KNOW who came up with them? Probably not.
The best things online have been free. You can’t stop it, primarily because the people who have been offering free content from the beginning are much smarter than you and can circumvent your annoying bullshit.
People like you have no pride in your ideas or work. You expect to be compensated for everything, yet you constantly use “free” (read: no cost to YOU) technologies and software to further your simplistic commercial greed. Guess what? It’s not going to fly, and as more and more users become educated because you piss them off to no end, you’re going to drive yourself right out of a market.
I’ve used adblock extensions since they were offered and before that I modified mozilla to allow a crude form of adblocking.
I pay for the bandwidth, electricity, hard-disc cache, and CPU time. I would posit that gives me the ultimate right to decide what information I allow my browser to share and what I request to be downloaded.
This means animated GIF’s, and MacroMedia (I use an OS that doesn’t have support for Flash so I block *any* .swf), as well as “counter” images that are invisible on the page, and the links that go through multiple referral sites.
We do not ask for web pages to be littered with images hawking wares or services we don’t want or need. We do not ask for unsolicited faxes or phone calls.
I believe advertisers have made themselves a bed of thorns and an increasingly annoyed and cynical public has begun to put it’s hands over it’s collective ears.
My point is that whilst adverti$ing has helped proliferate some aspects of the web more rapidly, it has in general vastly degraded the quality of information therein.
If advertisers can stop using animated gifs and stop providing links that visit several referral sites before finally getting to the target then there may be some ground regained.
Since marketing is so fiercely competitive, whatever is not illegal, will be used as a tactic to get a surfer’s attention because after all … we’re talking about serious money and no legislative controls.
Thanks for the opportunity to share my views.
I truly wish you luck in reining in the hucksters and snake-oil merchants, it’s a massive job.
i am fed up of wecome to aol talk popping up every time i log on to the internet i cancelled aol talk approximately a month ago and i have phoned them about it time after time do aol ever listen to their customers can you please do something about it
sleonard320@aol.com
Grebekel, you are a part of the problem, not a part of the solution. Don’t get me wrong I hate ad bombers too, but there simply is no other revenue model in existance that is able to produce and sustain the revenue that can be acheived through advertsing. I mean Google have posted a record 1.65 billion dollar revenue from their advertising this year alone. Simple fact is without adverising revenue then a great deal of content on the Internet will simply cease to exist and future content generation will also be severely stunted. To not realise this is being extrememly short sighted. I would much rather have an Internet full of diverse and interesting content while putting up with having to view a few ads than the alternative of having to pay to view content or not having that content at all.
Although I agree with you that it is your perogative of what you view on your PC, it also could be argued that by stripping out content is a violation of copyright. Judge Posner, elucidating the holdings of WGN v. United Video (1982) among others, reasoned in Aimster that:
“[Commercial-skipping] amounted to creating an unauthorized derivative work, namely a commercial-free copy that would reduce the copyright owner’s income from his original program, since “free” television programs are financed by the purchase of commercials by advertisers.”
Now that would make an interesting case.
As of today, my favorite news source (NY Times) is charging a $50 annual subscription to access their (previously free) online columnists and a number of other services.
When I visited their site this morning, I was extremely bothered by this. Then I noticed that my Firefox / Adblock combo was letting me view their home page without a single display ad.
I’ll defend my right to block ads in order to limit my browsing annyoyances. But I need to recognize that my action also limits sites’ ability to earn money through advertising revenue. So that limits my right to complain when sites decide to adopt alternate revenue models — like paid subscriptions for things I want to read.
In other words, we need take responsibility for the results of our behavior.
wow. you’ve got bigger issues, I think.
I’m trying to make a grass roots pro microsoft website, and i want to know how to block firefox browsers.
There are many anti microsoft websites the block IE, so I dont feel like im doing anything reaaly bad.
“Dedicated site developer” mentioned it.
Thanks, Marsha
haha! I clicked on my own link and it didnt work.
im not used to typing http, in IE you just start with www.
anyways here’s the URL of those MS haters.
http://forums.mozillazine.org/viewtopic.php?t=204331&highlight=religion
and here’s symantec’s security evaulation
http://news.com.com/Symantec+Mozilla+browsers+more+vulnerable+than+IE/2100-1002_3-5873273.html
Love Marsha
We we’ve lived with ads for years some good (text ads) but most were so bad that you’d want to stop browsing. Now there’s a choice ads slowing you down and more or get a adblocking tool.
Honestly
I use FireFox
with Ad Block Plus
It’s time for us to enjoy the web…
Here’s my take on it:
-I filter ads on a case-by-case basis. If it’s obnoxious (shoot-the-monkey, animated GIF’s, appears in the middle of content), I will block ads from the entire domain. Anyone participating in that behavior well deserves it, you’re the reason for the development of ad blockers.
-I filter -ALL- Flash ads. Sound and motion have no place in Web advertising, and if you’re doing none of those, you have no need for Flash.
-I will filter -anything- that scrolls with your screen instead of scrolling with the rest of your page. This is annoying and distracting.
-I do NOT filter -STATIC- (NO MOTION) banner ads that are part of the main page, and at the top or bottom of it. Nor do I filter text ads which are obviously separate from the main page. Those are not annoying and distracting, and sometimes they’re actually relevant to something I -am- looking for.
-I filter ANYTHING that would allow me to be tracked. You have no right to track me without my -explicit- (read: OPT-IN) consent.
I was online when a 14.4 modem was fast, so don’t presume to tell me an Internet “can’t exist without ads”. It can and it did. Do those of you who -do- use obnoxious tactics such as popups and Flash want to take your ball and go home? Goodbye, and do be careful of that door on the way out, it tends to leave a bruise on the ass. We won’t miss you.
I use an -entire operating system- built by
“hobbyists”, because I grew sick of the commercial garbage. And you know what I found? It’s not as good as Windows-IT’S FAR BETTER! No DRM, no draconian EULA, just “Your computer is a tool which you purchased, and we respect your right to use it however you wish”.
It’s the same with the Net. You want to block adblocking scripts? I don’t care that much. There’ll be a hack out in a few days. Maybe I’ll help in creating it, and maybe not. But a cautionary tale to absolutely anyone-when you begin to deliberately do things the way you know your customers don’t want, you’ve already got a doomed business proposition.
Are you only on the Net to make money? I hope adblocking does put you out of business, and good riddance. The very best comes from those who do it out of love and offer it for free.
@ anonymous:
Your argument that stripping out content is a copyright violation is as ridiculous as saying it is illegal to rip a page from a book, a newspaper, or a magazine. Periodicals like magazines and newspapers profit greatly from advertising, but they also profit from the sale of those items to the consumers. Basically, even if you pay for the content you still get the ads, and that would probably be the case in the internet. As long as someone can profit from ad sales and someone is willing to pay for it there will always be ads.
Blocking ads is a simple security measure against risks involving Java, Javascript, Flash, and ActiveX based advertising. Since many advertisers employ extreme tactics using such technologies and many hackers find new ways to exploit them, I feel compelled block everything I want. I will block an offensive picture as fast as I will block any ad, and it is pretty common to find porn related ads in gaming sites, so why not block them all? I can block entire sites based on keywords found in the URL, and I do; is that also a copyright violation? I think not, and to think otherwise would be absurd.
I understand that it is a large market. Google, as you said, profits mostly from their ad program. Google’s ads are the least obtrusive on the web today and I don’t mind having a list of subtle ads related to what I’m searching for or reading in my inbox on the right side on the screen. Another reason why I don’t mind Google ads is because they are HTML based, so the security risk is as high as clicking on any link.
In conclusion, if all ads were like Google’s then there would be no need to block them. Yahoo also has similar ads to those of Google, although it has a different advertising system for free Geocities pages. Basically, display HTML ads or I will adblock them.
I think this is so stupid. Companies have just gotten out of hand and pathetically greedy. Forcing products on us in movies, etc… It is a load of money grubbing crud. I don’t go to movies to see some starlet holding a can of Pepsi anymore than I want to see ads on the internet for Dating Services.
Get a clue… ads are spam in the worst way – you are infringing on something I have already paid for. Make the internet free if you want to hoist your garbage about. Frankly – I don’t need panty liners and if I did I am smart enough to know where to get them. It didn’t start out that way it shpouldn’t end up that way. BTW – who backs this site the Milk advisory board?
MY RIGHTS ONLINE.
If websites must use advertisements to generate revenue than do it discretely, because right now the web is obnoxious as hell with advertisements. I will block your ads and there’s absolutley “NOTHING” you can do that will be benificial for “your” revenue. block me from your website, put more advertisements on, you still loose. unless you change your ways. My privacy , my rights, my computer, If you webmasters don’t want people blocking ads take your website down, stop wasting money on bandwidth, and regualar cost because advertising is the only way you can afford to keep your site up. oh yeah and for those who use tracking techniques on their users aswell. You go to hell.
The people who make big money off internet advertising are the internet advertising companies.
By blocking their ads, you’re actually helping to reduce their income, which may reduce the commercialization of the internet.
FIGHT ADVERTISERS, FIGHT THE MASS MEDIA.
Free your mind.
I run the AdBlock extension for Firefox and I imported an excellent filterset that blocks nearly every single ad in existance. I also run Kerio Personal Firewall which blocks not as many ads as AdBlock but its nice to have anyway.
Here’s a link to the filterset I use, I know many of you will find it useful.
http://www.pierceive.com/filtersetg/
To whoever came up with the brilliant idea for this website…congratulations! I mean, raising awareness on the topic is great but you can’t expect people to believe that leaving ads that may cause them a seizure will help in any way. I guess you are just a bunch of webmasters that aren’t getting enough income anymore from your advertising frenzies.
I will continue to block ads for as long as I live and I will encourage use of ad-blocking software to everyone I know, and you can’t do anything about it. I hold the right to filter all information that comes into my computer.
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