6 ms·

Don't Blame Your Community: Ad Blocking Is Not Killing Any Sites

33 points by yanw 17y ago

morisy 17y ago
A great rebuttal. Ad blocks are an obnoxious business condition, but they're one that can push savvy media companies into not only doing right by their readers but also finding higher CPM's than remnant ad networks that are being triaged by more nimble ad agencies anyways, leaving publications only the most gutter of advertisements. Advertising models work. But your advertising model might not.
- michael_dorfman 17y ago
  Ad blocks are an obnoxious business condition, but they're one that can push savvy media companies into not only doing right by their readers Or, they may push savvy and not-so-savvy media companies into serving up advertising content that's more difficult to block. Like ad content embedded directly in the content. It's an arms race, and the escalation isn't going to be pretty.
deleted 17y ago
[deleted]
mbrubeck 17y ago
I like the spirit of this. Rather than argue about the ethics of ad-blockers and ad-blocker-blockers, why not focus on the implicit challenge: Can more publishers find ways to make money from ad-free content? Adblock is like Napster. People want content; the vast majority of publishers only have one business model; a lot of consumers decide to take the content without bearing the cost imposed by that model. Some people won't pay no matter what - music filesharing is still around, of course. But a lot of people did start buying music again when Amazon and Apple and eMusic changed the price structure to something they were willing to pay. There are a few sites like Ars and LiveJournal and MetaFilter that have ad-free options for paid users. Maybe this is a small niche and will never be big business. But maybe there's some way to get more people to pay directly in exchange for ad-free content.
- skorgu 17y ago
  I wonder if it's too elitist to be useful to distinguish between high-quality and low-quality content. I happily pay for the Economist, Stratfor and other similar high-quality sources of information and they seem to derive sufficient income from those subscriptions not to have to resort to asinine ads. Sites that don't provide high-enough quality content to be worth the subscription fee all get to fight over monetizing the eyeballs of their users and (I suspect) alienating the more discerning customers.
- rick888 17y ago
  "I like the spirit of this. Rather than argue about the ethics of ad-blockers and ad-blocker-blockers, why not focus on the implicit challenge: Can more publishers find ways to make money from ad-free content?" Yes, by either: 1) charging for content 2) making each article an advertisement for something they are trying to sell 3) selling their own products, which will still involve some sort of advertising It seems like the people fighting against the advertisers are against all forms of commercialism. Even non-flashing pure text advertisements like Google Adsense are blocked by default in all of the adblockers. If it really was only about annoying and flashing ads, why is this the case? "Adblock is like Napster. People want content; the vast majority of publishers only have one business model; a lot of consumers decide to take the content without bearing the cost imposed by that model." What an elegant way to put the reality of the situation: Some users feel they are entitled to free content. It's an emerging trend that is starting to happen in many industries (music, movies, books, software, and advertising). If I, as a content provider know many people are using an adblocker, I will try to find a way around it (or start charging for content). If people stop going to my site because of bad advertisements, I will make any effort to remove the offending ads. It reminds me of passive-aggressive children. They are pissed at a site/company and instead of telling them about it, they just decide to block ads and go there anyway. If the movement was really trying to make the Internet a better place (with better ads), they would actually be making an honest attempt at notifying the offending site. "Some people won't pay no matter what - music filesharing is still around, of course. But a lot of people did start buying music again when Amazon and Apple and eMusic changed the price structure to something they were willing to pay." We aren't talking about paying money. The only thing people have to do is view a simple advertisement. It takes almost no effort.
jessor 17y ago
finally! this was the post on the ad blocking topic i was waiting for.
- lanstein 17y ago
  is this account some sort of experiment to see what happens if you post blog-spam content to HN?
  - jessor 17y ago
    hu? i don't see why i would create that impression. if my comment was too short, i apologize. the article just expressed my thoughts on the topic and i wanted to state that.
Semiapies 17y ago
I sympathize with this view, but how exactly are advertisers supposed to come up with more "creative" and "compelling" concepts that somehow will work when users fundamentally don't want the thing they make - ads? In a broader sense, it's very questionable to say "Gee, content sites should be profitable!" and cheerfully avoid explaining just how, especially right after you've finished explaining how every known method of monetizing content just won't work.
- mmasnick 17y ago
  As the guy who wrote the post linked to above, I should note that in the post itself I describe multiple examples of how to come up with creative and compelling concepts that worked great. I agree that it may be more difficult, but if you read the site, we do explain the "how" regularly...
  - Semiapies 17y ago
    Many people wouldn't even consider those sorts of projects "ads". Further, I can't help noticing that you still have "actual"/conventional ads all over your site. Clearly, companies find putting ads on your site worthwhile, even if they're less creative by doing so. You, in turn, find taking their money worthwhile enough show us those ads. Which approach brings in more money? Is the truth ultimately that conventional site ads still tend to work?
    - mmasnick 17y ago
      You're right. When many people don't consider those sorts of projects ads then we're doing our job right. Good ads shouldn't be considered ads, but they should be good content. And, yes, we do have conventional ads on the site -- and I'm guessing you're not a regular Techdirt reader (which is totally cool, by the way), but we've discussed this. Having conventional ads is a way to get companies to talk to us about the other offerings that we do. They basically act as lead generation for us because so many companies only think traditionally, they contact us about advertising, and we try to steer them towards other, smarter, programs. But we still let ads go through, even if we tell them that they won't be particularly effective. If people still want to give us money for no good reason, that's their mistake. But we are careful not to take intrusive ads. And, our ad revenue is less than 15% of the site's revenue (during Q4 it goes higher). So, no, the conventional ads are a waste, and I expect them to die out over time. But, for now, they're a great way to get companies to pay us to become leads for more creative solutions.
deleted 17y ago
[deleted]
rue 17y ago
The thing that struck me about the Ars approach was the reaction to legitimate concerns about security, tracking and so on: "too bad." As in, ads are what they are: the site does not really care whether they are useful to the advertiser nor how they affect the user so long as they get paid. An unfortunate attitude to project, particularly when trying to come up with solutions to this problem could be really beneficial. Not that they have an obligation to care, of course. They did at least suggest that a monthly subscription might be forthcoming, so something good might come out of it in the end.
- mrkurt 17y ago
  I'm sorry the response sounded like "too bad" to you, because that really wasn't our intent. We do care about how ads affect users. We heavily Q&A our ads and they're vetted at multiple levels before they show up on the site. Not only that, but we have more aggressive ad policies than any comparable site I've seen. The pushdown ad that Techdirt mentioned, for instance, is against our ad guidelines because it expands without user intervention. When an ad ends up on the site that violates our guidelines, we get it removed very quickly. It's an unfortunate fact that the ad ops people will occasionally put an ad meant for GQ on Ars, so you'll end up with something that expands by itself, does a popup, etc. They're never malicious, but oftentimes violate the Ars guidelines. Part of our "solution" to this problem is better educating users about the economics of ads, the effect their ad blockers have on us, etc. It seems to be working based on a small 4 day sample.
  - rue 17y ago
    > I'm sorry the response sounded like "too bad" to you, because that really wasn't our intent. We do care about how ads affect users. We heavily Q&A our ads and they're vetted at multiple levels before they show up on the site. Not only that, but we have more aggressive ad policies than any comparable site I've seen. The pushdown ad that Techdirt mentioned, for instance, is against our ad guidelines because it expands without user intervention. I was sharpening the point a little: from what I understand, Ars does indeed have reasonably well-behaving ads when it comes to essentially the aesthetic side. The underlying privacy, security and psy-op/propaganda problems remain, though, and the sense I got from staff comments was that those were simply the Unchangeable Facts of Advertising and nothing could be done about it. These are by no means easy problems to solve, but I think projecting understanding those concerns and figuring out viable alternatives ("having a conversation" about it with the userbase, if you will) can go a long way. > Part of our "solution" to this problem is better educating users about the economics of ads, the effect their ad blockers have on us, etc. It seems to be working based on a small 4 day sample. I have no doubt! I think a big banner would have been a better way to do it to begin with, but the subsequent article addressed that part adequately. I will subscribe once the short-term version comes out.
sdh 17y ago
We shouldn't take the experience of publishers like Ars and techdirt as indicative of the whole industry. Both of those publishers have very tech savvy audiences who are not the best demographic for display ads. While the effectiveness of display advertising is not as high as other channels (email for instance) it is still effective. The "american idol" demographic clicks on lots of ads.
mrkurt 17y ago
It's an unfortunate fact that the 40% of our users who block ads also block almost any kind of "advertising that doesn't annoy them". For instance, every user who saw blank content on our site when we decided to have a little fun was running EasyList for Ad Block Plus. You can see the global blocks here: https://hg.adblockplus.org/easylist/file/d4e0b55077bb/easylist_general_block.txt https://hg.adblockplus.org/easylist/file/d4e0b55077bb/easyli... You'll note that adsense is specifically blocked by that list. The list also catches The Deck ads. Both of these ad types are things we hear people say "we won't block ads if you run them like this"... but they block them anyway. The title is right, though, Ad blocking isn't killing any sites. We didn't really say it was either. This whole exercise is really the result of not being able to rehire people who were laid off last year specifically because our ad inventory is being hammered by ad blockers.
- mmasnick 17y ago
  "Ad blocking isn't killing any sites. We didn't really say it was either." Did I miss something or did Ken specifically say: "Ad Blocking is devastating to the sites you love" That seems to be the same thing, no? And when you say "the result of not being able to rehire people who were laid off last year specifically because our ad inventory is being hammered by ad blockers." You're still missing the point. You're blaming your readers who chose to use adblock rather than focusing on ways to build a better business model. Come on, you guys know this. You've covered the RIAA/MPAA doing the same exact thing over and over again. Don't blame your users and the choices they make. Focus on providing more value.
  - mrkurt 17y ago
    But ignoring readers and the choices they make (and more importantly, why they make those choices) is every bit as much a part of building a better business model as "do something else you dumbasses". It turns out that the vast majority of our readers block ads without thinking about it, because they think it doesn't matter, or by mistake (seriously). The vocal ones are a vast, vast minority. We spend more time than we should addressing them, but articles like the one we ran are more an attempt to reach the casual blockers. The difference between us and the RIAA/MPAA is that we're not justifying our lobbying efforts to reform copyright control. We're simply experimenting with technical means of keeping content bundled with ads and social means of educating users who might actually give a shit. The moment one of us goes to congress and says you need to legislate our ability to serve ads alongside our content is the moment you come gripe to me, and we laugh together because I've already quit my job.
RyanMcGreal 17y ago
I hate ads. I never ever ever click on them. I get pissed off when I see an ad in the way of content I'm trying to read and tend not to stay on the page. AdBlock on my browser does absolutely nothing to reduce the amount of money that websites I visit can earn from my.
- natrius 17y ago
  "AdBlock on my browser does absolutely nothing to reduce the amount of money that websites I visit can earn from my." Yes it does. Not all ads are pay-per-click.
- Willie_Dynamite 17y ago
  Big sites gets paid for just displaying ads, not just per click.
pavel_lishin 17y ago
As a part of that, there would be an ad at the top that temporarily "pushed down" the content for a few seconds, before pulling back up. Nothing was covered. Nothing prevented readers from getting the content. And the "pushdown" ad only showed once per visitor and never again. This is precisely why I use an ad-blocker. I don't really mind animated gifs - I've learned to tune those out. But ads - flash ads are the usual guilty party - that actually fuck with the content actively piss me off, and they are why I have both adblock and flashblock.
- mrkurt 17y ago
  And this is why we (Ars) specifically prohibit ads that fuck with content. :) Advertisers are increasingly demanding about those, though, which is one of the reasons we worked so hard to make "no ads" a feature of our subscriptions.
hockeybias 17y ago
hmmm...
AlisdairO 17y ago
I posted this on Reddit when I saw this article there: I'd really love a process by which you can automatically say 'I block these types of ads', and the site can choose to serve you content or not based on that. What we have at the moment, where a lot of people get harangued by malicious advertisements, and a lot of people block even the most harmless ad content, is a really unfair to both sides. A way to auto-negotiate what you're willing to 'pay' would be excellent. As things stand, I don't block ads, but I'd really like to be able to block the worst of them without screwing people over. This would also separate out the people who are legitimately concerned about malware and excessively intrusive ads from those (sadly, I suspect, the majority) who simply don't want to pay for others' work.

33 points by yanw 17y ago

A great rebuttal. Ad blocks are an obnoxious business condition, but they're one that can push savvy media companies into not only doing right by their readers but also finding higher CPM's than remnant ad networks that are being triaged by more nimble ad agencies anyways, leaving publications only the most gutter of advertisements. Advertising models work. But your advertising model might not.

michael_dorfman 17y ago
Ad blocks are an obnoxious business condition, but they're one that can push savvy media companies into not only doing right by their readers Or, they may push savvy and not-so-savvy media companies into serving up advertising content that's more difficult to block. Like ad content embedded directly in the content. It's an arms race, and the escalation isn't going to be pretty.

deleted 17y ago

[deleted]

mbrubeck 17y ago

I like the spirit of this. Rather than argue about the ethics of ad-blockers and ad-blocker-blockers, why not focus on the implicit challenge: Can more publishers find ways to make money from ad-free content? Adblock is like Napster. People want content; the vast majority of publishers only have one business model; a lot of consumers decide to take the content without bearing the cost imposed by that model. Some people won't pay no matter what - music filesharing is still around, of course. But a lot of people did start buying music again when Amazon and Apple and eMusic changed the price structure to something they were willing to pay. There are a few sites like Ars and LiveJournal and MetaFilter that have ad-free options for paid users. Maybe this is a small niche and will never be big business. But maybe there's some way to get more people to pay directly in exchange for ad-free content.

skorgu 17y ago
I wonder if it's too elitist to be useful to distinguish between high-quality and low-quality content. I happily pay for the Economist, Stratfor and other similar high-quality sources of information and they seem to derive sufficient income from those subscriptions not to have to resort to asinine ads. Sites that don't provide high-enough quality content to be worth the subscription fee all get to fight over monetizing the eyeballs of their users and (I suspect) alienating the more discerning customers.
rick888 17y ago
"I like the spirit of this. Rather than argue about the ethics of ad-blockers and ad-blocker-blockers, why not focus on the implicit challenge: Can more publishers find ways to make money from ad-free content?" Yes, by either: 1) charging for content 2) making each article an advertisement for something they are trying to sell 3) selling their own products, which will still involve some sort of advertising It seems like the people fighting against the advertisers are against all forms of commercialism. Even non-flashing pure text advertisements like Google Adsense are blocked by default in all of the adblockers. If it really was only about annoying and flashing ads, why is this the case? "Adblock is like Napster. People want content; the vast majority of publishers only have one business model; a lot of consumers decide to take the content without bearing the cost imposed by that model." What an elegant way to put the reality of the situation: Some users feel they are entitled to free content. It's an emerging trend that is starting to happen in many industries (music, movies, books, software, and advertising). If I, as a content provider know many people are using an adblocker, I will try to find a way around it (or start charging for content). If people stop going to my site because of bad advertisements, I will make any effort to remove the offending ads. It reminds me of passive-aggressive children. They are pissed at a site/company and instead of telling them about it, they just decide to block ads and go there anyway. If the movement was really trying to make the Internet a better place (with better ads), they would actually be making an honest attempt at notifying the offending site. "Some people won't pay no matter what - music filesharing is still around, of course. But a lot of people did start buying music again when Amazon and Apple and eMusic changed the price structure to something they were willing to pay." We aren't talking about paying money. The only thing people have to do is view a simple advertisement. It takes almost no effort.

jessor 17y ago

finally! this was the post on the ad blocking topic i was waiting for.

lanstein 17y ago
is this account some sort of experiment to see what happens if you post blog-spam content to HN?
- jessor 17y ago
  hu? i don't see why i would create that impression. if my comment was too short, i apologize. the article just expressed my thoughts on the topic and i wanted to state that.

Semiapies 17y ago

I sympathize with this view, but how exactly are advertisers supposed to come up with more "creative" and "compelling" concepts that somehow will work when users fundamentally don't want the thing they make - ads? In a broader sense, it's very questionable to say "Gee, content sites should be profitable!" and cheerfully avoid explaining just how, especially right after you've finished explaining how every known method of monetizing content just won't work.

mmasnick 17y ago
As the guy who wrote the post linked to above, I should note that in the post itself I describe multiple examples of how to come up with creative and compelling concepts that worked great. I agree that it may be more difficult, but if you read the site, we do explain the "how" regularly...
- Semiapies 17y ago
  Many people wouldn't even consider those sorts of projects "ads". Further, I can't help noticing that you still have "actual"/conventional ads all over your site. Clearly, companies find putting ads on your site worthwhile, even if they're less creative by doing so. You, in turn, find taking their money worthwhile enough show us those ads. Which approach brings in more money? Is the truth ultimately that conventional site ads still tend to work?
  - mmasnick 17y ago
    You're right. When many people don't consider those sorts of projects ads then we're doing our job right. Good ads shouldn't be considered ads, but they should be good content. And, yes, we do have conventional ads on the site -- and I'm guessing you're not a regular Techdirt reader (which is totally cool, by the way), but we've discussed this. Having conventional ads is a way to get companies to talk to us about the other offerings that we do. They basically act as lead generation for us because so many companies only think traditionally, they contact us about advertising, and we try to steer them towards other, smarter, programs. But we still let ads go through, even if we tell them that they won't be particularly effective. If people still want to give us money for no good reason, that's their mistake. But we are careful not to take intrusive ads. And, our ad revenue is less than 15% of the site's revenue (during Q4 it goes higher). So, no, the conventional ads are a waste, and I expect them to die out over time. But, for now, they're a great way to get companies to pay us to become leads for more creative solutions.

deleted 17y ago

[deleted]

rue 17y ago

The thing that struck me about the Ars approach was the reaction to legitimate concerns about security, tracking and so on: "too bad." As in, ads are what they are: the site does not really care whether they are useful to the advertiser nor how they affect the user so long as they get paid. An unfortunate attitude to project, particularly when trying to come up with solutions to this problem could be really beneficial. Not that they have an obligation to care, of course. They did at least suggest that a monthly subscription might be forthcoming, so something good might come out of it in the end.

mrkurt 17y ago
I'm sorry the response sounded like "too bad" to you, because that really wasn't our intent. We do care about how ads affect users. We heavily Q&A our ads and they're vetted at multiple levels before they show up on the site. Not only that, but we have more aggressive ad policies than any comparable site I've seen. The pushdown ad that Techdirt mentioned, for instance, is against our ad guidelines because it expands without user intervention. When an ad ends up on the site that violates our guidelines, we get it removed very quickly. It's an unfortunate fact that the ad ops people will occasionally put an ad meant for GQ on Ars, so you'll end up with something that expands by itself, does a popup, etc. They're never malicious, but oftentimes violate the Ars guidelines. Part of our "solution" to this problem is better educating users about the economics of ads, the effect their ad blockers have on us, etc. It seems to be working based on a small 4 day sample.
- rue 17y ago
  > I'm sorry the response sounded like "too bad" to you, because that really wasn't our intent. We do care about how ads affect users. We heavily Q&A our ads and they're vetted at multiple levels before they show up on the site. Not only that, but we have more aggressive ad policies than any comparable site I've seen. The pushdown ad that Techdirt mentioned, for instance, is against our ad guidelines because it expands without user intervention. I was sharpening the point a little: from what I understand, Ars does indeed have reasonably well-behaving ads when it comes to essentially the aesthetic side. The underlying privacy, security and psy-op/propaganda problems remain, though, and the sense I got from staff comments was that those were simply the Unchangeable Facts of Advertising and nothing could be done about it. These are by no means easy problems to solve, but I think projecting understanding those concerns and figuring out viable alternatives ("having a conversation" about it with the userbase, if you will) can go a long way. > Part of our "solution" to this problem is better educating users about the economics of ads, the effect their ad blockers have on us, etc. It seems to be working based on a small 4 day sample. I have no doubt! I think a big banner would have been a better way to do it to begin with, but the subsequent article addressed that part adequately. I will subscribe once the short-term version comes out.

sdh 17y ago

We shouldn't take the experience of publishers like Ars and techdirt as indicative of the whole industry. Both of those publishers have very tech savvy audiences who are not the best demographic for display ads. While the effectiveness of display advertising is not as high as other channels (email for instance) it is still effective. The "american idol" demographic clicks on lots of ads.

mrkurt 17y ago

It's an unfortunate fact that the 40% of our users who block ads also block almost any kind of "advertising that doesn't annoy them". For instance, every user who saw blank content on our site when we decided to have a little fun was running EasyList for Ad Block Plus. You can see the global blocks here: https://hg.adblockplus.org/easylist/file/d4e0b55077bb/easylist_general_block.txt https://hg.adblockplus.org/easylist/file/d4e0b55077bb/easyli... You'll note that adsense is specifically blocked by that list. The list also catches The Deck ads. Both of these ad types are things we hear people say "we won't block ads if you run them like this"... but they block them anyway. The title is right, though, Ad blocking isn't killing any sites. We didn't really say it was either. This whole exercise is really the result of not being able to rehire people who were laid off last year specifically because our ad inventory is being hammered by ad blockers.

mmasnick 17y ago
"Ad blocking isn't killing any sites. We didn't really say it was either." Did I miss something or did Ken specifically say: "Ad Blocking is devastating to the sites you love" That seems to be the same thing, no? And when you say "the result of not being able to rehire people who were laid off last year specifically because our ad inventory is being hammered by ad blockers." You're still missing the point. You're blaming your readers who chose to use adblock rather than focusing on ways to build a better business model. Come on, you guys know this. You've covered the RIAA/MPAA doing the same exact thing over and over again. Don't blame your users and the choices they make. Focus on providing more value.
- mrkurt 17y ago
  But ignoring readers and the choices they make (and more importantly, why they make those choices) is every bit as much a part of building a better business model as "do something else you dumbasses". It turns out that the vast majority of our readers block ads without thinking about it, because they think it doesn't matter, or by mistake (seriously). The vocal ones are a vast, vast minority. We spend more time than we should addressing them, but articles like the one we ran are more an attempt to reach the casual blockers. The difference between us and the RIAA/MPAA is that we're not justifying our lobbying efforts to reform copyright control. We're simply experimenting with technical means of keeping content bundled with ads and social means of educating users who might actually give a shit. The moment one of us goes to congress and says you need to legislate our ability to serve ads alongside our content is the moment you come gripe to me, and we laugh together because I've already quit my job.

RyanMcGreal 17y ago

I hate ads. I never ever ever click on them. I get pissed off when I see an ad in the way of content I'm trying to read and tend not to stay on the page. AdBlock on my browser does absolutely nothing to reduce the amount of money that websites I visit can earn from my.

natrius 17y ago
"AdBlock on my browser does absolutely nothing to reduce the amount of money that websites I visit can earn from my." Yes it does. Not all ads are pay-per-click.
Willie_Dynamite 17y ago
Big sites gets paid for just displaying ads, not just per click.

pavel_lishin 17y ago

As a part of that, there would be an ad at the top that temporarily "pushed down" the content for a few seconds, before pulling back up. Nothing was covered. Nothing prevented readers from getting the content. And the "pushdown" ad only showed once per visitor and never again. This is precisely why I use an ad-blocker. I don't really mind animated gifs - I've learned to tune those out. But ads - flash ads are the usual guilty party - that actually fuck with the content actively piss me off, and they are why I have both adblock and flashblock.

mrkurt 17y ago
And this is why we (Ars) specifically prohibit ads that fuck with content. :) Advertisers are increasingly demanding about those, though, which is one of the reasons we worked so hard to make "no ads" a feature of our subscriptions.

hockeybias 17y ago

hmmm...

AlisdairO 17y ago

I posted this on Reddit when I saw this article there: I'd really love a process by which you can automatically say 'I block these types of ads', and the site can choose to serve you content or not based on that. What we have at the moment, where a lot of people get harangued by malicious advertisements, and a lot of people block even the most harmless ad content, is a really unfair to both sides. A way to auto-negotiate what you're willing to 'pay' would be excellent. As things stand, I don't block ads, but I'd really like to be able to block the worst of them without screwing people over. This would also separate out the people who are legitimately concerned about malware and excessively intrusive ads from those (sadly, I suspect, the majority) who simply don't want to pay for others' work.