38 ms·

Should I Block Ads?

151 points by notriddle 6y ago

Hamuko 6y ago
How many people actually disable their adblockers when sites don't allow you to access them if you have one enabled? It's just much easier to close the tab.
- ivanstame 6y ago
  Yep, just close the tab :D
- Aachen 6y ago
  I don't remember ever disabling my blocker in response to such a request. What I do do is look for donation options when it's a valuable resource, but it's often hidden or nonexistent.
  - kevin_thibedeau 6y ago
    They will still show ads. Paying users are more valuable and the ones you actually want to show ads to.
    - notriddle 6y ago
      There's no rule saying I can't pay them money, and continue to use an ad blocker as well.
      - kevin_thibedeau 6y ago
        Assuming they'll still let you see content with an active blocker. Once you have a business relationship they can set any terms they want.
        notriddle 6y ago
        If I'm giving them money, and they still insist on screwing with me like that, then I won't stay a customer for very long unless I actually HAVE TO.
- derefr 6y ago
  I do use my adblocker disable button, but not in response to sites pleading for me to do so. I just find that sometimes it helps when a web app is being wonky. (Usually, the adblocker has misidentified one of the app’s main first-party JS files as an ad script and prevented it from loading.) Of course, since we’re talking about web apps, no ads usually result from this.
  - ComputerGuru 6y ago
    Usually. But Fidelity loads bootstrap.js from the ensighten CDN on some pages, so it’s not a mistaken first party domain blocked but a tracking third party you need to allow.
    - ThePowerOfFuet 6y ago
      Then it sounds like you might be in the market for a new stockbroker.
- discardable_dan 6y ago
  I am almost never in a situation where the content is worth the trouble of disabling my ad-blocker. Information is so-readily available that is it laughable that a website would be essential enough for me to bother turning my ad-blocker off, and the few times I've had it has nearly-universally resulted raw clickbait. Furthermore, that sort of behavior displays an arrogance from the publisher that makes me question the overall integrity of the article I was trying to read in the first place.
- goda90 6y ago
  I've done it for a small number of sites that I frequently visit and they ask nicely. If a site outright blocks me, then I never get to the point of frequently visiting them anyway.
- jjkaczor 6y ago
  Well - all of my ad-blocking is through a Pi-Hole - and I am not in the habit of logging into it's management interface and whitelisting sites unless absolutely necessary. So... tab gets closed, site loses my eyeballs completely.
- deepspace 6y ago
  Back in the day, Forbes was one of the first sites asking users to disable their ad blockers. I whitelisted them, seeing that they asked nicely. But then it came to light that they were not screening the ads, resulting in users being served with pop-under malware. Ever since then, I just close the tab when a sites asks me to unblock. It is not worth the risk.
- arendtio 6y ago
  If you find turning off your ad-blocker, just install a second ad-blocker. Having to turn off two ad-blockers, makes it a whole lot harder ;-) uBlock Origin + DuckDuckGo Privacy Essentials is the combination I am using.
  - taborj 6y ago
    I use DNS hijacking to redirect known adhosts to a black hole (basically a pi-hole, but done on OpenBSD with Unbound). You think disabling two ad-blockers is a chore, wait until you have to SSH into another box, tweak a .conf file, and reload a daemon...
- mrspeaker 6y ago
  I have the same approach to sites that require JavaScript. If a page loads blank, or contains a single line of text "this applications requires javascript", it's an insta-close. The unintended benefit of this is I nearly always realize I was procrastinating when I clicked the link anyway... so now I regard NoScript as a productivity tool!
- Animats 6y ago
  Right. There's usually a site just as good without ads.
- pesfandiar 6y ago
  It's still worth it for them to ask if a non-zero number of people turn it off (and make them some money rather than none).
  - MereInterest 6y ago
    Option A: Decrease the amount your site is shared by X%. Get ad revenue from 100% of viewers. Option B: Maintain current number of visitors. Get ad revenue from Y% of viewers. Depending on the values of X and Y, the ad revenue may go up or down as a result of requiring unsafe browsing. Your conclusion assumes that X is always equal to zero.
- madeofpalk 6y ago
  Today i finally disabled Adblock for Twitter.com because scrolling the Timeline is way too wonky as Twitter and Adblock fight over dynamically adding and removing ads as I scroll.
  - Hamuko 6y ago
    Really? I've never noticed any issues with uBlock Origin and Twitter.com.
- inetknght 6y ago
  > How many people actually disable their adblockers when sites don't allow you to access them if you have one enabled? It's just much easier to close the tab. Some sites intentionally break if you're using an adblocker. It's really easy to argue to not use those sites. But... What about government sites? Government sites don't work with strong ad blockers. What about bank sites? Bank sites don't work with strong ad blockers. What about your work related sites? My employer's HR site doesn't work with strong ad blockers. Many of my employer's internal sites don't work with strong ad blockers. Yeah it's much easier to just close the tab. Unless the site is literally required for your continued living.
  - EForEndeavour 6y ago
    Anecdotally, I can't recall a single time my adblocker (uBlock Origin, AdBlock Plus before that) ever interfered with any of my online banking websites, ANY government website, or employers' websites. And if they ever do, well, most people only use a small number of such sites. Whitelisting them would be easy enough.
  - saagarjha 6y ago
    I try my best to send a polite email to sites that don't work but I need to use.
  - bostik 6y ago
    > What about bank sites? Bank sites don't work with strong ad blockers. For these sites I use anonymous mode in a different browser. I don't disable my adblocker. I wouldn't go walking around dark alleys blind drunk in Mexico City at 2:30 in the morning either.
  - hardlianotion 6y ago
    Thankfully, UK government sites don’t have this misfeature.
  - collyw 6y ago
    I have used a few different bank sites and they all work with ad blockers.
- XCSme 6y ago
  I had to disable adblocker to view my old Yahoo mail inbox. I didn't find a way yet to safely switch from Yahoo to Gmail without potentially missing out on emails or lose access to sites registered using that email. I did disable it. I am not proud.
  - thewebcount 6y ago
    Really? I have an old Yahoo mail account I give out for companies I know will spam me. I use an ad blocker and have not had any problems with Yahoo mail. I don't use it daily, and it's not my main email client, but it works just fine. I'm on Safari with 1Blocker.
    - XCSme 6y ago
      If you disable ad-blocker they force you to use an outdated interface where you can't even format the text. So they offered two options: disable ad-blocker or switch to the old interface. Yahoo mail keeps get worse and worse every year.
  - ThePowerOfFuet 6y ago
    Enable forwarding of your Yahoo inbox to Gmail, or enable Gmail's periodic fetching feature from the Yahoo mailbox.
    - XCSme 6y ago
      On mobile I can use the Gmail app to add Yahoo accounts. It's possible to also have the same thing for the web app?
- xzel 6y ago
  Depends on how annoying they are. If it is a simple overlap I'll delete the element. If that doesn't work I'll trying google cache or something similar if I really want to access it. I also run the bypass paywalls app so I don't run into that problem on most news sites anymore. I do pay for a small number news sources I read consistently but still want to read articles posted on HN / Reddit outside of those. I don't think bypass payways is the most ethical solution but I'm not really sure there is a great solution right now.
- collyw 6y ago
  Some sites ask you to do it voluntarily, and if its something I value enough I will do. If it's forced I will sometimes try a workaround, sometimes just close it.
- slowmovintarget 6y ago
  It depends. If I'm trying to refill my prescription on my pharmacy's web-site, or complete the paying of road tolls through my state government site, I turn it off... Temporarily... for that site. If it's to read an article, see a video, or find information: never. Also: Firefox with Multi-Account Containers is great.
- CM30 6y ago
  Honestly, whenever a site doesn't allow me to access it with an adblocker active, all I do is look up the right adblocker rules to remove that restriction and continue on my merry way. Usually not that tricky to do so, most rely on JavaScript and HTML elements for this stuff. Alternatively, if it's a single page, then either reader view, an archiving service, or flat out editing the offending elements with the inspector works fine.
- squarefoot 6y ago
  Some sites can be fooled using tools such as uMatrix which block elments at finer granular level, but is tedious to configure and not very friendly to non technical users. If I can't stop junk on a site that way, unless the information is really vital, I usually close the tab and forget about it.
  - gxnxcxcx 6y ago
    I think medium mode in uBO is a fair balance between granularity and usability: https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Blocking-mode:-medium-mode https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Blocking-mode:-medium...
- mcintyre1994 6y ago
  It’s way more rewarding to use ublock’s little picker to block their overlay :) if that doesn’t work though, nope - close and move on.
- asdff 6y ago
  If sites have a wall come up complaining about my ad blocker or cookies, I can usually get around it using my ad blockers content filtering to block the paywall itself. If it starts to take more than three seconds, I close the tab and move on.
sergiotapia 6y ago
Sometimes a website will break with an ad-blocker. How do you allow ads in such a site when using pi-hole?
- notriddle 6y ago
  Pi-Hole's dashboard allows you to disable the ad blocker for a short period of time. Personally, I usually disable JavaScript when a site gives me an adblock wall. That usually allows me to bypass it.
- kevin_thibedeau 6y ago
  Blocking JS across the board with selective whitelisting will defeat a lot of anti-blocking. Element zapper to dispose of divs that cover content by default.
- ViViDboarder 6y ago
  Usually I just find a new website.
lalaland1125 6y ago
I think this article downplays the downsides of ad blockers too much. If ad blockers become the norm, much of the current web will no longer be viable. Facebook, YouTube, Google, Reddit, StackOverflow, and countless other sites are fundamentally based on advertising and can't survive without it. The article tries to address this a little bit with the "Ad blockers do not block all advertising" section, but I don't think it fully acknowledges that if everyone installs uBlock Origin as the article suggests the web as we know it will collapse.
- centimeter 6y ago
  There are better, more efficient ways to monetize than ads. Ads are one of the most destructive and socially wasteful ways to monetize content; it's just technically easy. If we make ads nonviable, you can expect things like micropayments to become more common (and I'm happy to make that trade).
  - cameronbrown 6y ago
    (Disclosure: I work for Google, but not in Ads) Micropayments are generally considered to be unviable for the general population (edit: business model wise, not tech). People are unwilling to pay even pennies for an article[0], because now users are facing the burden of choice, constantly thinking about how their browsing is racking up pennies. Not to mention, it boxes you into the pay-per-article model. Sites like Twitter or Facebook don't make sense in this world. I also think it adds significant barriers to entry, since micropayments aren't accessible, at all, to younger people, or the poor. Information should be as free as possible imo. If the market decides all ads should be blocked, then sure, things will change, but please don't pretend this won't have huge ramifications - things will not be remotely like they are today. For the news at least, it'll likely just be the expensive megacorp publications that survive. [0]https://www.cjr.org/analysis/reuters_digital_news_report.php https://www.cjr.org/analysis/reuters_digital_news_report.php
    - centimeter 6y ago
      > micropayments aren't accessible, at all, to younger people, or the poor. This is a purely technological problem, not some sort of fundamental problem with the concept of micropayments. If advertising were really the only way young or poor people could generate value (this is not actually true, but for the sake of argument I'll go along with it), there could be dedicated websites where people intentionally look at ads in exchange for credit in their micropayment accounts (whatever that looks like, be it Bitcoin Lightning or some service from Square). Of course, once you phrase it this way, it becomes more clear that using ads as an indirect monetization strategy kind of doesn't make sense. It's better to have people perform mechanical turk style tasks (the monetization strategy of Captcha clones). As a parent, I'd be happy to put a few cents in my child's micropayment account so they don't have to get their brain flooded with garbage whenever they use the internet.
gfody 6y ago
I was on a fresh setup recently and caught a glimpse of the raw internet on my way to install uBlock Origin and uMatrix. There are still fake download buttons everywhere. I can't understand how the non-ad-blocking world tolerates that stuff - no choice and no voice I guess? The amount of autoplaying videos was disturbing as well.
- wlll 6y ago
  I've had this when dealing with family members computers. It's an absolute disaster.
  - collyw 6y ago
    I was cleaning up my mums computer (malware, crapware, virus scan) a few years ago and she got annoyed when I removed the emoji toolbar for Internet Explorer. It was quite a facepalm moment, I assumed it had installed itself without her asking for it, but no she wanted it there.
- 0xCMP 6y ago
  This probably an important reason people would rather browse Facebook or Instagram on their phone. It's literally a much better experience.
  - sneak 6y ago
    Those are also full of unblockable ads, and spyware to boot. I don’t think that is a better experience at all.
    - fossuser 6y ago
      It still has ads, but it is also a better experience. The web ads tend to bed more intrusive and outside the UX, more irrelevant, and more malware like. I don't like those apps either, but the UI is definitely better. I'm not sure why Firefox just doesn't build adblocking into the browser as a first class feature - maybe because they rely on the Google funding? All of the "ad-supported business model supports creators, ad-supported businesses allow more people to access to the content" just feels like after the fact rationalization. The same with how good targeting is because the ads are relevant. If your content is valuable then charge for it. If browsers actually blocked all the ads like users wanted (and made a better product) then sites that couldn't support themselves without ads would die. Wouldn't that be nice.
app4soft 6y ago
> Should I Block Ads? Yes. Permanently.
js2 6y ago
I've had better luck with AdGuard for Safari than 1Blocker. I use AdGuard on both macOS and iOS, and I just use their content-blocking Safari extensions, not any of their other products. I had paid for 1Blocker but found it increasingly let ads through. I wanted a product based off of EasyList instead (which AdGuard filters are).
- nick_ 6y ago
  AdGuard is very good. I use it on all my devices: Windows, macOS, iOS, Android.
- saagarjha 6y ago
  I used to use AdGuard until they switched to an Electron app that needs to constantly run in the background…now I just have a homegrown content blocker I whipped up once and should polish and release someday but am just too lazy to finish.
stblack 6y ago
With ad blocking, some sites present you with an overlay, preventing you from accessing content. A really nice Chrome and FF extension to scrub overlays is named Behind The Overlay: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/behindtheoverlay/ljipkdpcjbmhkdjjmbbaggebcednbbme https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/behindtheoverlay/l...
- stblack 6y ago
  Also a shameless plug for the extensible, amalgamated hosts file I actively curate: https://github.com/StevenBlack/hosts https://github.com/StevenBlack/hosts
- encom 6y ago
  For people who do not use a browser made by an advertising company: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/behind_the_overlay/ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/behind_the_ov... 90% of the time I just close the tab, if the content I want isn't immediately visible without jumping through hoops. If the content is hidden by a newsletter popup, the percentage is 100.
- tamask 6y ago
  I have a much simpler trick for this. As the page loads, if you start hitting Esc repeatedly really fast just at the right moment, when the content is loaded, but the overlay is not, or a little bit earlier, it might work too. Not always though. Edit: If you miss it, just hit F5, and try again. It’s a good game.
- asdff 6y ago
  If you use ublock origin you can usually just right click and block the element and peel it off layer by layer.
kgraves 6y ago
YES. I think you should block ALL ads entirely, internet and everywhere. They are time sinking distraction and you definitely don't need them in your life. A specific adblocker somebody needs to develop is podcast ad blocker, just auto-skip or have no sponsored message please.
- duck 6y ago
  You do realize that most podcasts will go away if they can't make money via advertising, right?
  - toupeira 6y ago
    None of the podcasts I listen to have ads, many use things like Patreon or have a "first hour free, second hour only for members" model.
    - shrimp_emoji 6y ago
      This and, either way, you shouldn't care. Heuristically, save yourself time and energy and snap to the game theoretical conclusion. You'll go out of your way and incur personal cost to be a good citizen and prop up this poorly-conceived system that relies on such good samaritanship, but will most people? LOL no. So it's futile anyway. Get the best deal you can and let come what may. :D If all podcasts go belly up and there'll be a post-ad-economy afterscape where all pocasts are somehow paywalled, so be it -- that would have happened anyway, regardless of what you choose to do, and it's hopefully a more resiliently-designed system which doesn't shoulder users with cumbersome ethical dilemmas.
kevin_thibedeau 6y ago
Should I invite wasted junkies into my home to use the computer as they please?
- fxtentacle 6y ago
  Most junkies will give you more privacy than what you can expect from the average ad network O_O
MattGaiser 6y ago
I have actually turned off my Adblocker for LinkedIn and Facebook ad they ads can actually be quite relevant. I would be willing to on the news sites as well if they didn’t spam them so heavily into the page and they didn’t shift content to load them. The news sites also allow a surprising number of low quality ads. I’m willing to see ads for Tide or a bank, but no fake download buttons please.
paulcole 6y ago
> Do ad blockers stop sites from making money? The honest answer to this is “Yes!”, not a 7-paragraph non-answer.
- quadrangle 6y ago
  Adblockers stop sites from making money from those third-party ads. They obviously don't stop a shopping site from selling products or from GitLab.com registering users for GitLab services etc. If the way a site makes money is by abusing the visitors, adblockers stop the abuse and the money from that* side of things, which may be all the income they get, but not necessarily. So, this is not a simple yes/no situation.
  - mharroun 6y ago
    So they need a set bushiness and tech teams to build an internal ad stack, and try to get advertisers... many who wont buy in without 3rd party tracking to mitigate fraud.
    - notriddle 6y ago
      > So they need a set bushiness and tech teams to build an internal ad stack Somebody needs to take responsibility for the malicious and broken ads. I really don't care who does it; you can contract it out, or do it internally, just as long as the work actually gets done. The work isn't getting done, right now.
    - quadrangle 6y ago
      There's better and worse in advertising, sure. But third-party ads are a compromised business model even at their best. I'm not saying businesses don't involve compromise, but the goal should be to figure out how to have the most net benefit to the world (I don't think profit as an end in itself is a respectable goal). Thus, choose the compromises that are least detracting within the scope of real-world options.
  - paulcole 6y ago
    It is quite simple and you said it yourself. > Adblockers stop sites from making money Stop right there. You don’t get to decide the site’s business model. They get to choose it, not you. And I mean duh, no kidding adblockers don’t stop online stores from letting people buy stuff. Thanks for the insight there.
paulcole 6y ago
Can I possibly be the only person here who doesn’t use an adblocker? I like buying things. I like seeing ads that interest me. I don’t care who tracks me or monetizes data about me that is 100% worthless to me. I like not paying money out of my own wallet to read websites and watch videos.
- notriddle 6y ago
  You'll notice that the essay doesn't build its argument around "ads bad" or "privacy good" or any of the typical shibboleths. It builds its argument around crap like fake download buttons, fake FBI warnings, coin miners, and ads that break the website. These are the reason why University of California and Edward Snowden recommend ad blockers, and they're the reason why I recommend them too.
  - paulcole 6y ago
    Yes but personally my enjoyment of ads outweighs things I don’t care about at all.
  - quadrangle 6y ago
    Yes, but the "ads bad" arguments hold up to scrutiny as well, even though it's not what this site focused on.
    - saagarjha 6y ago
      It's an easier argument to reply to with "you're stealing the website's livelihood", which is why it's usually worth bringing up after you explain the many other problems ads have.
      - quadrangle 6y ago
        Yes, I'm not denying the significance of tact. But just because it may be tactfully or politically harder in some cases to focus on "ads bad", that doesn't make it wrong. And how to fund creative work is indeed a complex question. However, "I won't support business model that is itself harmful" is a perfectly fair position. I can both want a website to get funded and also refuse to play along with funding it through third-party ads which are harmful even without the worst problems of deception and tacking etc. In short, I think it's really important that we not forget that ads-bad is basically true and has been since at least the old penny-papers and yellow-journalism. See for one good source Tim Wu's The Attention Merchants. A good intro is episode 16 at https://humanetech.com/podcast/ https://humanetech.com/podcast/
hpoe 6y ago
So the reason I block ads, or at least started is a book I read called Pre-suasion by Robert Caldini. In it he points out that internet ads are dismissed and ignored by our conscious mind but because of that often will produce an effect on our unconscious mind. Think like the subliminal messaging type thing. People who were shown Kodiak ads on a webpage in an experiment couldn't recall seeing any Kodiak ads simply because we are so used to internet ads we ignore them; however later for the subjects favored purchasing a Kodiak camera over competitors products. The books final chapter concluded by explaining an experiment they did where simply by showing a particular image in the background, combined with a spaced follow up and increased incentive, they were able to sucessfully manipulate people's political and voting preferences in a manner that lasted over a year. I decided at that point no one gets to screw with my subconscious but my immense amount of childhood trauma. In my mind every other reason pales in comparison to this one for why I adblock and put it on my wife's computer, and every computer a family member owns.
- sergiotapia 6y ago
  It's our responsibility as parents in tech to teach our children to block all ads. My son hasn't browser the web without an adblocker, ever. I showed him what his favorite sites look like without an adblocker and he was really surprised.
  - collyw 6y ago
    Is it? Who will pay for the internet then? I almost feel guilty for blocking them in a way, I appreciate that we need to have some naive users to fund stuff. Some smarter sites ask you to voluntarily unblock their site. If its something I value I will actually do that. If it's forced upon my often I'll try and work my way around it.
    - cpill 6y ago
      yeah the old argument: this is the current pricing model how will we survive without it. see Netflix and Spotify for examples of how that works out i.e. there will be a new model once the old fat cats roll over and are replaced with new ones. The internet existed before it had ads, it will survive again without them. note that all this malicious activity is _because_ money has been introduced to the ecosystem.
genmon 6y ago
Any views on Magic Lasso for iOS/Mac? Seen it mentioned recently. I’m on 1Blocker Legacy, it’s fine, but I’m aware it must be getting out of date.
dooglius 6y ago
This is missing what in my opinion is the biggest reason: advertisers create perverse incentives where pages are rewarded based on visits and ad-clicks rather than quality of content. This results in extreme forms of clickbait, misleading extreme headlines, and shallow low-information-density content.
nishnik 6y ago
Firefox running add-ons on Android made me switch to it on the mobile phone. It makes the mobile experience way better than Chrome and Brave.
- TechniKris 6y ago
  If you'd like to run decent ad blocking extensions (or any extensions) on the Chromium side of things, give Kiwi a shot. Afaik the current Play Store/XDA Labs release is out of date on the security patches' side of things, but the developer is currently working on catching up. Also, the project went open-source not too long ago and apparently the dev's been working together with some devs of a different browser, so you can expect more Chromium browsers to implement support for extensions in the near future. https://kiwibrowser.com https://kiwibrowser.com And, well... There's also Yandex with their extension support, they deserve at least a mention. iirc uBO is broken there, but Nano works fine
galfarragem 6y ago
Niche blogger here. For some time I tried to fight the tide by continuing to publish ads and not using an adblock myself. By being an amateur blogger, I understand that even beer money helps to keep the moral high. However a couple of years ago I gave up and just embraced reality: deactivated adsense and started to use an adblock. I finally acknowledged that nobody likes ads - myself included - specially the ones not related with the content. Did my blogging suffered with it? Certainly it did.
laurentdc 6y ago
I just disable them via /etc/hosts because I can't tolerate any more useless javascript putting load on my CPU. My workstation (E5-2640) has seen multiple generations of operating systems, video editing software, DAWs. Browsers and web browsing in general is the only thing that I can tell it's getting consistently worse year after year. I know it's an odd metric but 10-15 seconds to fully render a newspaper homepage is more than it takes for my full DAW setup (Cubase + FL Studio as VST plugin) to fully come up with tracks loaded and play button ready. I don't even recall dialup being this bad.
- qppo 6y ago
  Funny because I feel this way about Cubase, it consistently gets worse. My projects take much longer to load than any webpage, fwiw.
908087 6y ago
The answer to this question on the modern web is always yes, and advertisers brought it upon themselves.
duck 6y ago
I wish instead of calling them "ad blockers", we had used something like "tracking blockers". The tracking/automation of ad networks is what the issue is, not the ads, yet we've made it more confusing for those that don't understand how these things work.
- effingwewt 6y ago
  Not at all. I hate ads with a visceral passion. They are a theft of my time/attention for which I am not compensated. No website has a right to exist, same with businesses. Nor do they have a right to my attention. People all cry 'the world will die without ads!'... no. Some of us have been around since the Internet started. All sites were free and no ads (banner ads came later, and were mostly static)-the sites full of passion, hours poured in for no financial gain. The difference is that now we have a generation of young people who feel entitled to make money off everything. Now, the tracking is most definitely an issue, but first and foremost for myself and many others is the hatred of any and all ads. Life really is different without them. If someone comes up with an ear/eye implant to block all ads (tv, radio, billboards all of it) I'd pay whatever it cost.
- frosted-flakes 6y ago
  They're commonly called "content blockers", because they can block more than ads.
bit_logic 6y ago
Ad blocking is a security issue now. When the ad networks started serving malware, what were the websites response? Basically nothing, they just said it's not their problem and pointed the finger at the ad networks. Ad blocking is now vital to having a safe web experience. This is not some trivial issue. Computers and the web are critical for modern life now. The same computer that people use for browsing news sites is also used to do online banking, pay bills, apply for unemployment, do work with sensitive data (for example a work laptop), and so many other things. And computers are also used by minors. Some of these ads are really disturbing and not something minors should see. Again, when this started happening, how did the websites respond? They did nothing.
- dillutedfixer 6y ago
  This x10000.
thewebcount 6y ago
This is a really well put-together site with very reasonable arguments describing the problem with web ads. I'm glad they put this together. It's refreshing to see something in this space that just has the facts without being preachy or screechy.
butz 6y ago
Aren't we at the point where displaying rich media ads, especially ones with video, costs more energy than they actually earn?
hckr_news 6y ago
To add to that HTTPSEverywhere and Privacy Badger are quite useful too
- notriddle 6y ago
  Both of those add-ons are quickly becoming irrelevant. Privacy Badger, because Firefox and Safari have tracker blocking built-in, and HTTPS Everywhere, because HSTS preloading is standard in all of the major browsers.
kgwxd 6y ago
I don't block ads, I block third-party scripts and trackers, the ads just happen to not be visible without those, which is not my problem.
causality0 6y ago
It's a pretty simple equation for me. If you're too lazy to curate ads and rely on a third party service to show any random ad to your users and run any random javascript in their browsers, your ad is probably on an adblock list and will therefore be blocked on my devices. If, however, you give half a shit about your users and therefore choose what ads they see, it probably won't be on a blocklist and won't be blocked on my devices. It's simple, either both of us care or neither of us do and it's up to the content provider which path they take with me.
jsingleton 6y ago
If anyone is interested in how to set up a network-wide tracker blocker then I've written some guides on how to configure Pi-hole as a router and Wi-Fi range extender. This means you can force all traffic through your custom DNS, even devices from Google and Amazon that don't respect DHCP. https://unop.uk/pi-hole-extended-part-1/ https://unop.uk/pi-hole-extended-part-1/ https://unop.uk/pi-hole-extended-part-2/ https://unop.uk/pi-hole-extended-part-2/ It's still worth installing privacy add-ons to Firefox but this helps with some profiling intrusions in mobile apps and Chromecasts etc. It also helps protect your less technical family members a little, although it obviously can't keep them completely safe from surveillance. Education is an important aspect too.
renewiltord 6y ago
The answer is obviously yes. You externalize the pain (lost revenue isn't a thing felt by you) and internalize the gain (no ads to view, etc.). It's just like the answer to: * Should you pirate your school textbooks? Yes, obviously. I did it all through uni and I'm a good software engineer. Oh sorry, that's not right. I meant "It's a travesty that a university I pay money to would force me to spend money on books I could just get from the previous year. The writer barely makes any money on the book anyway". * Should you pirate games? Yes, obviously. A game that's free is better than a game you pay for. If it's sufficiently cheap then the advantage of discovery and your library makes Steam or Epic worth it. "Store-bought games include intrusive DRM that messes with your system files and is a security nightmare" * Should you pirate software? Yes, obviously. That's why most paid software is SaaS now. You can't pirate SaaS. "Same DRM argument as above". Ultimately, the answer to "Should I get something for free which I would otherwise pay for" is always yes. I mean we still have DRM and shit and once upon a time people grumbled that they pirate games because they don't like always on DRM. Well, Steam is always on DRM and folks love that. To paraphrase big Bill C, "It's about the money, stupid". I could probably invent a plausible smoke screen for everything from riding on trains for free (why are cars so subsidized?) to not paying for parking (I already pay so much in road tax and income tax) to taking all the Halloween candy someone left outside in a bowl (I never had this stuff as a child, all these kids already have way more than they need).
simonblack 6y ago
Should you ever find yourself travelling in a foreign country with a monthly quota of just 2 gigs of data, you realise extremely quickly that every ad is an ad too many.
pelliphant 6y ago
How could this even be a question? Either you block ads or you don't know that you can block ads.

151 points by notriddle 6y ago

How many people actually disable their adblockers when sites don't allow you to access them if you have one enabled? It's just much easier to close the tab.

ivanstame 6y ago
Yep, just close the tab :D
Aachen 6y ago
I don't remember ever disabling my blocker in response to such a request. What I do do is look for donation options when it's a valuable resource, but it's often hidden or nonexistent.
- kevin_thibedeau 6y ago
  They will still show ads. Paying users are more valuable and the ones you actually want to show ads to.
  - notriddle 6y ago
    There's no rule saying I can't pay them money, and continue to use an ad blocker as well.
    - kevin_thibedeau 6y ago
      Assuming they'll still let you see content with an active blocker. Once you have a business relationship they can set any terms they want.
      - notriddle 6y ago
        If I'm giving them money, and they still insist on screwing with me like that, then I won't stay a customer for very long unless I actually HAVE TO.
derefr 6y ago
I do use my adblocker disable button, but not in response to sites pleading for me to do so. I just find that sometimes it helps when a web app is being wonky. (Usually, the adblocker has misidentified one of the app’s main first-party JS files as an ad script and prevented it from loading.) Of course, since we’re talking about web apps, no ads usually result from this.
- ComputerGuru 6y ago
  Usually. But Fidelity loads bootstrap.js from the ensighten CDN on some pages, so it’s not a mistaken first party domain blocked but a tracking third party you need to allow.
  - ThePowerOfFuet 6y ago
    Then it sounds like you might be in the market for a new stockbroker.
discardable_dan 6y ago
I am almost never in a situation where the content is worth the trouble of disabling my ad-blocker. Information is so-readily available that is it laughable that a website would be essential enough for me to bother turning my ad-blocker off, and the few times I've had it has nearly-universally resulted raw clickbait. Furthermore, that sort of behavior displays an arrogance from the publisher that makes me question the overall integrity of the article I was trying to read in the first place.
goda90 6y ago
I've done it for a small number of sites that I frequently visit and they ask nicely. If a site outright blocks me, then I never get to the point of frequently visiting them anyway.
jjkaczor 6y ago
Well - all of my ad-blocking is through a Pi-Hole - and I am not in the habit of logging into it's management interface and whitelisting sites unless absolutely necessary. So... tab gets closed, site loses my eyeballs completely.
deepspace 6y ago
Back in the day, Forbes was one of the first sites asking users to disable their ad blockers. I whitelisted them, seeing that they asked nicely. But then it came to light that they were not screening the ads, resulting in users being served with pop-under malware. Ever since then, I just close the tab when a sites asks me to unblock. It is not worth the risk.
arendtio 6y ago
If you find turning off your ad-blocker, just install a second ad-blocker. Having to turn off two ad-blockers, makes it a whole lot harder ;-) uBlock Origin + DuckDuckGo Privacy Essentials is the combination I am using.
- taborj 6y ago
  I use DNS hijacking to redirect known adhosts to a black hole (basically a pi-hole, but done on OpenBSD with Unbound). You think disabling two ad-blockers is a chore, wait until you have to SSH into another box, tweak a .conf file, and reload a daemon...
mrspeaker 6y ago
I have the same approach to sites that require JavaScript. If a page loads blank, or contains a single line of text "this applications requires javascript", it's an insta-close. The unintended benefit of this is I nearly always realize I was procrastinating when I clicked the link anyway... so now I regard NoScript as a productivity tool!
Animats 6y ago
Right. There's usually a site just as good without ads.
pesfandiar 6y ago
It's still worth it for them to ask if a non-zero number of people turn it off (and make them some money rather than none).
- MereInterest 6y ago
  Option A: Decrease the amount your site is shared by X%. Get ad revenue from 100% of viewers. Option B: Maintain current number of visitors. Get ad revenue from Y% of viewers. Depending on the values of X and Y, the ad revenue may go up or down as a result of requiring unsafe browsing. Your conclusion assumes that X is always equal to zero.
madeofpalk 6y ago
Today i finally disabled Adblock for Twitter.com because scrolling the Timeline is way too wonky as Twitter and Adblock fight over dynamically adding and removing ads as I scroll.
- Hamuko 6y ago
  Really? I've never noticed any issues with uBlock Origin and Twitter.com.
inetknght 6y ago
> How many people actually disable their adblockers when sites don't allow you to access them if you have one enabled? It's just much easier to close the tab. Some sites intentionally break if you're using an adblocker. It's really easy to argue to not use those sites. But... What about government sites? Government sites don't work with strong ad blockers. What about bank sites? Bank sites don't work with strong ad blockers. What about your work related sites? My employer's HR site doesn't work with strong ad blockers. Many of my employer's internal sites don't work with strong ad blockers. Yeah it's much easier to just close the tab. Unless the site is literally required for your continued living.
- EForEndeavour 6y ago
  Anecdotally, I can't recall a single time my adblocker (uBlock Origin, AdBlock Plus before that) ever interfered with any of my online banking websites, ANY government website, or employers' websites. And if they ever do, well, most people only use a small number of such sites. Whitelisting them would be easy enough.
- saagarjha 6y ago
  I try my best to send a polite email to sites that don't work but I need to use.
- bostik 6y ago
  > What about bank sites? Bank sites don't work with strong ad blockers. For these sites I use anonymous mode in a different browser. I don't disable my adblocker. I wouldn't go walking around dark alleys blind drunk in Mexico City at 2:30 in the morning either.
- hardlianotion 6y ago
  Thankfully, UK government sites don’t have this misfeature.
- collyw 6y ago
  I have used a few different bank sites and they all work with ad blockers.
XCSme 6y ago
I had to disable adblocker to view my old Yahoo mail inbox. I didn't find a way yet to safely switch from Yahoo to Gmail without potentially missing out on emails or lose access to sites registered using that email. I did disable it. I am not proud.
- thewebcount 6y ago
  Really? I have an old Yahoo mail account I give out for companies I know will spam me. I use an ad blocker and have not had any problems with Yahoo mail. I don't use it daily, and it's not my main email client, but it works just fine. I'm on Safari with 1Blocker.
  - XCSme 6y ago
    If you disable ad-blocker they force you to use an outdated interface where you can't even format the text. So they offered two options: disable ad-blocker or switch to the old interface. Yahoo mail keeps get worse and worse every year.
- ThePowerOfFuet 6y ago
  Enable forwarding of your Yahoo inbox to Gmail, or enable Gmail's periodic fetching feature from the Yahoo mailbox.
  - XCSme 6y ago
    On mobile I can use the Gmail app to add Yahoo accounts. It's possible to also have the same thing for the web app?
xzel 6y ago
Depends on how annoying they are. If it is a simple overlap I'll delete the element. If that doesn't work I'll trying google cache or something similar if I really want to access it. I also run the bypass paywalls app so I don't run into that problem on most news sites anymore. I do pay for a small number news sources I read consistently but still want to read articles posted on HN / Reddit outside of those. I don't think bypass payways is the most ethical solution but I'm not really sure there is a great solution right now.
collyw 6y ago
Some sites ask you to do it voluntarily, and if its something I value enough I will do. If it's forced I will sometimes try a workaround, sometimes just close it.
slowmovintarget 6y ago
It depends. If I'm trying to refill my prescription on my pharmacy's web-site, or complete the paying of road tolls through my state government site, I turn it off... Temporarily... for that site. If it's to read an article, see a video, or find information: never. Also: Firefox with Multi-Account Containers is great.
CM30 6y ago
Honestly, whenever a site doesn't allow me to access it with an adblocker active, all I do is look up the right adblocker rules to remove that restriction and continue on my merry way. Usually not that tricky to do so, most rely on JavaScript and HTML elements for this stuff. Alternatively, if it's a single page, then either reader view, an archiving service, or flat out editing the offending elements with the inspector works fine.
squarefoot 6y ago
Some sites can be fooled using tools such as uMatrix which block elments at finer granular level, but is tedious to configure and not very friendly to non technical users. If I can't stop junk on a site that way, unless the information is really vital, I usually close the tab and forget about it.
- gxnxcxcx 6y ago
  I think medium mode in uBO is a fair balance between granularity and usability: https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Blocking-mode:-medium-mode https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Blocking-mode:-medium...
mcintyre1994 6y ago
It’s way more rewarding to use ublock’s little picker to block their overlay :) if that doesn’t work though, nope - close and move on.
asdff 6y ago
If sites have a wall come up complaining about my ad blocker or cookies, I can usually get around it using my ad blockers content filtering to block the paywall itself. If it starts to take more than three seconds, I close the tab and move on.

sergiotapia 6y ago

Sometimes a website will break with an ad-blocker. How do you allow ads in such a site when using pi-hole?

notriddle 6y ago
Pi-Hole's dashboard allows you to disable the ad blocker for a short period of time. Personally, I usually disable JavaScript when a site gives me an adblock wall. That usually allows me to bypass it.
kevin_thibedeau 6y ago
Blocking JS across the board with selective whitelisting will defeat a lot of anti-blocking. Element zapper to dispose of divs that cover content by default.
ViViDboarder 6y ago
Usually I just find a new website.

lalaland1125 6y ago

I think this article downplays the downsides of ad blockers too much. If ad blockers become the norm, much of the current web will no longer be viable. Facebook, YouTube, Google, Reddit, StackOverflow, and countless other sites are fundamentally based on advertising and can't survive without it. The article tries to address this a little bit with the "Ad blockers do not block all advertising" section, but I don't think it fully acknowledges that if everyone installs uBlock Origin as the article suggests the web as we know it will collapse.

centimeter 6y ago
There are better, more efficient ways to monetize than ads. Ads are one of the most destructive and socially wasteful ways to monetize content; it's just technically easy. If we make ads nonviable, you can expect things like micropayments to become more common (and I'm happy to make that trade).
- cameronbrown 6y ago
  (Disclosure: I work for Google, but not in Ads) Micropayments are generally considered to be unviable for the general population (edit: business model wise, not tech). People are unwilling to pay even pennies for an article[0], because now users are facing the burden of choice, constantly thinking about how their browsing is racking up pennies. Not to mention, it boxes you into the pay-per-article model. Sites like Twitter or Facebook don't make sense in this world. I also think it adds significant barriers to entry, since micropayments aren't accessible, at all, to younger people, or the poor. Information should be as free as possible imo. If the market decides all ads should be blocked, then sure, things will change, but please don't pretend this won't have huge ramifications - things will not be remotely like they are today. For the news at least, it'll likely just be the expensive megacorp publications that survive. [0]https://www.cjr.org/analysis/reuters_digital_news_report.php https://www.cjr.org/analysis/reuters_digital_news_report.php
  - centimeter 6y ago
    > micropayments aren't accessible, at all, to younger people, or the poor. This is a purely technological problem, not some sort of fundamental problem with the concept of micropayments. If advertising were really the only way young or poor people could generate value (this is not actually true, but for the sake of argument I'll go along with it), there could be dedicated websites where people intentionally look at ads in exchange for credit in their micropayment accounts (whatever that looks like, be it Bitcoin Lightning or some service from Square). Of course, once you phrase it this way, it becomes more clear that using ads as an indirect monetization strategy kind of doesn't make sense. It's better to have people perform mechanical turk style tasks (the monetization strategy of Captcha clones). As a parent, I'd be happy to put a few cents in my child's micropayment account so they don't have to get their brain flooded with garbage whenever they use the internet.

gfody 6y ago

I was on a fresh setup recently and caught a glimpse of the raw internet on my way to install uBlock Origin and uMatrix. There are still fake download buttons everywhere. I can't understand how the non-ad-blocking world tolerates that stuff - no choice and no voice I guess? The amount of autoplaying videos was disturbing as well.

wlll 6y ago
I've had this when dealing with family members computers. It's an absolute disaster.
- collyw 6y ago
  I was cleaning up my mums computer (malware, crapware, virus scan) a few years ago and she got annoyed when I removed the emoji toolbar for Internet Explorer. It was quite a facepalm moment, I assumed it had installed itself without her asking for it, but no she wanted it there.
0xCMP 6y ago
This probably an important reason people would rather browse Facebook or Instagram on their phone. It's literally a much better experience.
- sneak 6y ago
  Those are also full of unblockable ads, and spyware to boot. I don’t think that is a better experience at all.
  - fossuser 6y ago
    It still has ads, but it is also a better experience. The web ads tend to bed more intrusive and outside the UX, more irrelevant, and more malware like. I don't like those apps either, but the UI is definitely better. I'm not sure why Firefox just doesn't build adblocking into the browser as a first class feature - maybe because they rely on the Google funding? All of the "ad-supported business model supports creators, ad-supported businesses allow more people to access to the content" just feels like after the fact rationalization. The same with how good targeting is because the ads are relevant. If your content is valuable then charge for it. If browsers actually blocked all the ads like users wanted (and made a better product) then sites that couldn't support themselves without ads would die. Wouldn't that be nice.

app4soft 6y ago

> Should I Block Ads? Yes. Permanently.

js2 6y ago

I've had better luck with AdGuard for Safari than 1Blocker. I use AdGuard on both macOS and iOS, and I just use their content-blocking Safari extensions, not any of their other products. I had paid for 1Blocker but found it increasingly let ads through. I wanted a product based off of EasyList instead (which AdGuard filters are).

nick_ 6y ago
AdGuard is very good. I use it on all my devices: Windows, macOS, iOS, Android.
saagarjha 6y ago
I used to use AdGuard until they switched to an Electron app that needs to constantly run in the background…now I just have a homegrown content blocker I whipped up once and should polish and release someday but am just too lazy to finish.

stblack 6y ago

With ad blocking, some sites present you with an overlay, preventing you from accessing content. A really nice Chrome and FF extension to scrub overlays is named Behind The Overlay: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/behindtheoverlay/ljipkdpcjbmhkdjjmbbaggebcednbbme https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/behindtheoverlay/l...

stblack 6y ago
Also a shameless plug for the extensible, amalgamated hosts file I actively curate: https://github.com/StevenBlack/hosts https://github.com/StevenBlack/hosts
encom 6y ago
For people who do not use a browser made by an advertising company: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/behind_the_overlay/ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/behind_the_ov... 90% of the time I just close the tab, if the content I want isn't immediately visible without jumping through hoops. If the content is hidden by a newsletter popup, the percentage is 100.
tamask 6y ago
I have a much simpler trick for this. As the page loads, if you start hitting Esc repeatedly really fast just at the right moment, when the content is loaded, but the overlay is not, or a little bit earlier, it might work too. Not always though. Edit: If you miss it, just hit F5, and try again. It’s a good game.
asdff 6y ago
If you use ublock origin you can usually just right click and block the element and peel it off layer by layer.

kgraves 6y ago

YES. I think you should block ALL ads entirely, internet and everywhere. They are time sinking distraction and you definitely don't need them in your life. A specific adblocker somebody needs to develop is podcast ad blocker, just auto-skip or have no sponsored message please.

duck 6y ago
You do realize that most podcasts will go away if they can't make money via advertising, right?
- toupeira 6y ago
  None of the podcasts I listen to have ads, many use things like Patreon or have a "first hour free, second hour only for members" model.
  - shrimp_emoji 6y ago
    This and, either way, you shouldn't care. Heuristically, save yourself time and energy and snap to the game theoretical conclusion. You'll go out of your way and incur personal cost to be a good citizen and prop up this poorly-conceived system that relies on such good samaritanship, but will most people? LOL no. So it's futile anyway. Get the best deal you can and let come what may. :D If all podcasts go belly up and there'll be a post-ad-economy afterscape where all pocasts are somehow paywalled, so be it -- that would have happened anyway, regardless of what you choose to do, and it's hopefully a more resiliently-designed system which doesn't shoulder users with cumbersome ethical dilemmas.

kevin_thibedeau 6y ago

Should I invite wasted junkies into my home to use the computer as they please?

fxtentacle 6y ago
Most junkies will give you more privacy than what you can expect from the average ad network O_O

MattGaiser 6y ago

I have actually turned off my Adblocker for LinkedIn and Facebook ad they ads can actually be quite relevant. I would be willing to on the news sites as well if they didn’t spam them so heavily into the page and they didn’t shift content to load them. The news sites also allow a surprising number of low quality ads. I’m willing to see ads for Tide or a bank, but no fake download buttons please.

paulcole 6y ago

> Do ad blockers stop sites from making money? The honest answer to this is “Yes!”, not a 7-paragraph non-answer.

quadrangle 6y ago
Adblockers stop sites from making money from those third-party ads. They obviously don't stop a shopping site from selling products or from GitLab.com registering users for GitLab services etc. If the way a site makes money is by abusing the visitors, adblockers stop the abuse and the money from that* side of things, which may be all the income they get, but not necessarily. So, this is not a simple yes/no situation.
- mharroun 6y ago
  So they need a set bushiness and tech teams to build an internal ad stack, and try to get advertisers... many who wont buy in without 3rd party tracking to mitigate fraud.
  - notriddle 6y ago
    > So they need a set bushiness and tech teams to build an internal ad stack Somebody needs to take responsibility for the malicious and broken ads. I really don't care who does it; you can contract it out, or do it internally, just as long as the work actually gets done. The work isn't getting done, right now.
  - quadrangle 6y ago
    There's better and worse in advertising, sure. But third-party ads are a compromised business model even at their best. I'm not saying businesses don't involve compromise, but the goal should be to figure out how to have the most net benefit to the world (I don't think profit as an end in itself is a respectable goal). Thus, choose the compromises that are least detracting within the scope of real-world options.
- paulcole 6y ago
  It is quite simple and you said it yourself. > Adblockers stop sites from making money Stop right there. You don’t get to decide the site’s business model. They get to choose it, not you. And I mean duh, no kidding adblockers don’t stop online stores from letting people buy stuff. Thanks for the insight there.

paulcole 6y ago

Can I possibly be the only person here who doesn’t use an adblocker? I like buying things. I like seeing ads that interest me. I don’t care who tracks me or monetizes data about me that is 100% worthless to me. I like not paying money out of my own wallet to read websites and watch videos.

notriddle 6y ago
You'll notice that the essay doesn't build its argument around "ads bad" or "privacy good" or any of the typical shibboleths. It builds its argument around crap like fake download buttons, fake FBI warnings, coin miners, and ads that break the website. These are the reason why University of California and Edward Snowden recommend ad blockers, and they're the reason why I recommend them too.
- paulcole 6y ago
  Yes but personally my enjoyment of ads outweighs things I don’t care about at all.
- quadrangle 6y ago
  Yes, but the "ads bad" arguments hold up to scrutiny as well, even though it's not what this site focused on.
  - saagarjha 6y ago
    It's an easier argument to reply to with "you're stealing the website's livelihood", which is why it's usually worth bringing up after you explain the many other problems ads have.
    - quadrangle 6y ago
      Yes, I'm not denying the significance of tact. But just because it may be tactfully or politically harder in some cases to focus on "ads bad", that doesn't make it wrong. And how to fund creative work is indeed a complex question. However, "I won't support business model that is itself harmful" is a perfectly fair position. I can both want a website to get funded and also refuse to play along with funding it through third-party ads which are harmful even without the worst problems of deception and tacking etc. In short, I think it's really important that we not forget that ads-bad is basically true and has been since at least the old penny-papers and yellow-journalism. See for one good source Tim Wu's The Attention Merchants. A good intro is episode 16 at https://humanetech.com/podcast/ https://humanetech.com/podcast/

hpoe 6y ago

So the reason I block ads, or at least started is a book I read called Pre-suasion by Robert Caldini. In it he points out that internet ads are dismissed and ignored by our conscious mind but because of that often will produce an effect on our unconscious mind. Think like the subliminal messaging type thing. People who were shown Kodiak ads on a webpage in an experiment couldn't recall seeing any Kodiak ads simply because we are so used to internet ads we ignore them; however later for the subjects favored purchasing a Kodiak camera over competitors products. The books final chapter concluded by explaining an experiment they did where simply by showing a particular image in the background, combined with a spaced follow up and increased incentive, they were able to sucessfully manipulate people's political and voting preferences in a manner that lasted over a year. I decided at that point no one gets to screw with my subconscious but my immense amount of childhood trauma. In my mind every other reason pales in comparison to this one for why I adblock and put it on my wife's computer, and every computer a family member owns.

sergiotapia 6y ago
It's our responsibility as parents in tech to teach our children to block all ads. My son hasn't browser the web without an adblocker, ever. I showed him what his favorite sites look like without an adblocker and he was really surprised.
- collyw 6y ago
  Is it? Who will pay for the internet then? I almost feel guilty for blocking them in a way, I appreciate that we need to have some naive users to fund stuff. Some smarter sites ask you to voluntarily unblock their site. If its something I value I will actually do that. If it's forced upon my often I'll try and work my way around it.
  - cpill 6y ago
    yeah the old argument: this is the current pricing model how will we survive without it. see Netflix and Spotify for examples of how that works out i.e. there will be a new model once the old fat cats roll over and are replaced with new ones. The internet existed before it had ads, it will survive again without them. note that all this malicious activity is _because_ money has been introduced to the ecosystem.

genmon 6y ago

Any views on Magic Lasso for iOS/Mac? Seen it mentioned recently. I’m on 1Blocker Legacy, it’s fine, but I’m aware it must be getting out of date.

dooglius 6y ago

This is missing what in my opinion is the biggest reason: advertisers create perverse incentives where pages are rewarded based on visits and ad-clicks rather than quality of content. This results in extreme forms of clickbait, misleading extreme headlines, and shallow low-information-density content.

nishnik 6y ago

Firefox running add-ons on Android made me switch to it on the mobile phone. It makes the mobile experience way better than Chrome and Brave.

TechniKris 6y ago
If you'd like to run decent ad blocking extensions (or any extensions) on the Chromium side of things, give Kiwi a shot. Afaik the current Play Store/XDA Labs release is out of date on the security patches' side of things, but the developer is currently working on catching up. Also, the project went open-source not too long ago and apparently the dev's been working together with some devs of a different browser, so you can expect more Chromium browsers to implement support for extensions in the near future. https://kiwibrowser.com https://kiwibrowser.com And, well... There's also Yandex with their extension support, they deserve at least a mention. iirc uBO is broken there, but Nano works fine

galfarragem 6y ago

Niche blogger here. For some time I tried to fight the tide by continuing to publish ads and not using an adblock myself. By being an amateur blogger, I understand that even beer money helps to keep the moral high. However a couple of years ago I gave up and just embraced reality: deactivated adsense and started to use an adblock. I finally acknowledged that nobody likes ads - myself included - specially the ones not related with the content. Did my blogging suffered with it? Certainly it did.

laurentdc 6y ago

I just disable them via /etc/hosts because I can't tolerate any more useless javascript putting load on my CPU. My workstation (E5-2640) has seen multiple generations of operating systems, video editing software, DAWs. Browsers and web browsing in general is the only thing that I can tell it's getting consistently worse year after year. I know it's an odd metric but 10-15 seconds to fully render a newspaper homepage is more than it takes for my full DAW setup (Cubase + FL Studio as VST plugin) to fully come up with tracks loaded and play button ready. I don't even recall dialup being this bad.

qppo 6y ago
Funny because I feel this way about Cubase, it consistently gets worse. My projects take much longer to load than any webpage, fwiw.

908087 6y ago

The answer to this question on the modern web is always yes, and advertisers brought it upon themselves.

duck 6y ago

I wish instead of calling them "ad blockers", we had used something like "tracking blockers". The tracking/automation of ad networks is what the issue is, not the ads, yet we've made it more confusing for those that don't understand how these things work.

effingwewt 6y ago
Not at all. I hate ads with a visceral passion. They are a theft of my time/attention for which I am not compensated. No website has a right to exist, same with businesses. Nor do they have a right to my attention. People all cry 'the world will die without ads!'... no. Some of us have been around since the Internet started. All sites were free and no ads (banner ads came later, and were mostly static)-the sites full of passion, hours poured in for no financial gain. The difference is that now we have a generation of young people who feel entitled to make money off everything. Now, the tracking is most definitely an issue, but first and foremost for myself and many others is the hatred of any and all ads. Life really is different without them. If someone comes up with an ear/eye implant to block all ads (tv, radio, billboards all of it) I'd pay whatever it cost.
frosted-flakes 6y ago
They're commonly called "content blockers", because they can block more than ads.

bit_logic 6y ago

Ad blocking is a security issue now. When the ad networks started serving malware, what were the websites response? Basically nothing, they just said it's not their problem and pointed the finger at the ad networks. Ad blocking is now vital to having a safe web experience. This is not some trivial issue. Computers and the web are critical for modern life now. The same computer that people use for browsing news sites is also used to do online banking, pay bills, apply for unemployment, do work with sensitive data (for example a work laptop), and so many other things. And computers are also used by minors. Some of these ads are really disturbing and not something minors should see. Again, when this started happening, how did the websites respond? They did nothing.

dillutedfixer 6y ago
This x10000.

thewebcount 6y ago

This is a really well put-together site with very reasonable arguments describing the problem with web ads. I'm glad they put this together. It's refreshing to see something in this space that just has the facts without being preachy or screechy.

butz 6y ago

Aren't we at the point where displaying rich media ads, especially ones with video, costs more energy than they actually earn?

hckr_news 6y ago

To add to that HTTPSEverywhere and Privacy Badger are quite useful too

notriddle 6y ago
Both of those add-ons are quickly becoming irrelevant. Privacy Badger, because Firefox and Safari have tracker blocking built-in, and HTTPS Everywhere, because HSTS preloading is standard in all of the major browsers.

kgwxd 6y ago

I don't block ads, I block third-party scripts and trackers, the ads just happen to not be visible without those, which is not my problem.

causality0 6y ago

It's a pretty simple equation for me. If you're too lazy to curate ads and rely on a third party service to show any random ad to your users and run any random javascript in their browsers, your ad is probably on an adblock list and will therefore be blocked on my devices. If, however, you give half a shit about your users and therefore choose what ads they see, it probably won't be on a blocklist and won't be blocked on my devices. It's simple, either both of us care or neither of us do and it's up to the content provider which path they take with me.

jsingleton 6y ago

If anyone is interested in how to set up a network-wide tracker blocker then I've written some guides on how to configure Pi-hole as a router and Wi-Fi range extender. This means you can force all traffic through your custom DNS, even devices from Google and Amazon that don't respect DHCP. https://unop.uk/pi-hole-extended-part-1/ https://unop.uk/pi-hole-extended-part-1/ https://unop.uk/pi-hole-extended-part-2/ https://unop.uk/pi-hole-extended-part-2/ It's still worth installing privacy add-ons to Firefox but this helps with some profiling intrusions in mobile apps and Chromecasts etc. It also helps protect your less technical family members a little, although it obviously can't keep them completely safe from surveillance. Education is an important aspect too.

renewiltord 6y ago

The answer is obviously yes. You externalize the pain (lost revenue isn't a thing felt by you) and internalize the gain (no ads to view, etc.). It's just like the answer to: * Should you pirate your school textbooks? Yes, obviously. I did it all through uni and I'm a good software engineer. Oh sorry, that's not right. I meant "It's a travesty that a university I pay money to would force me to spend money on books I could just get from the previous year. The writer barely makes any money on the book anyway". * Should you pirate games? Yes, obviously. A game that's free is better than a game you pay for. If it's sufficiently cheap then the advantage of discovery and your library makes Steam or Epic worth it. "Store-bought games include intrusive DRM that messes with your system files and is a security nightmare" * Should you pirate software? Yes, obviously. That's why most paid software is SaaS now. You can't pirate SaaS. "Same DRM argument as above". Ultimately, the answer to "Should I get something for free which I would otherwise pay for" is always yes. I mean we still have DRM and shit and once upon a time people grumbled that they pirate games because they don't like always on DRM. Well, Steam is always on DRM and folks love that. To paraphrase big Bill C, "It's about the money, stupid". I could probably invent a plausible smoke screen for everything from riding on trains for free (why are cars so subsidized?) to not paying for parking (I already pay so much in road tax and income tax) to taking all the Halloween candy someone left outside in a bowl (I never had this stuff as a child, all these kids already have way more than they need).

simonblack 6y ago

Should you ever find yourself travelling in a foreign country with a monthly quota of just 2 gigs of data, you realise extremely quickly that every ad is an ad too many.

pelliphant 6y ago

How could this even be a question? Either you block ads or you don't know that you can block ads.