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Are people really that adamant about blocking ads on the web? I don't understand why people think it's a good idea to remove the primary source of revenue for c

by Flankk 5y ago

Are people really that adamant about blocking ads on the web? I don't understand why people think it's a good idea to remove the primary source of revenue for content creators. At the most it amounts to a very mild annoyance and ads also help small businesses to grow. Edit: I'd appreciate it if someone could respond to the points I made rather than simply complain about why they don't like ads.

everdrive 5y ago
We have more than too much content right now, and in my mind the tracking and ads means that the “free” content is not worth the price. I’d rather there be less content if it meant no tracking.
Ar-Curunir 5y ago
Ads consistently overwhelm main content, hijack navigation, and rely on mass collection of user data to sustain the adtech industry. They’re one of the worst products of the tech industry.
justbaker 5y ago
Are you serious?
jqpabc123 5y ago
By themselves, ads aren't the real problem --- personalized ads are the problem. The idea that they have to profile and track your every move all over the internet in order to try and sell you stuff you don't really want or need. Example: If I go to a pet supply web site, an ad for dog food is perfectly understandable --- maybe even welcomed. But just because I was profiled visiting and maybe even buying, I shouldn't be bombarded with ads for cat food all over the internet. Even worse is the fact that over time, your profile becomes incredibly detailed. They sell this info to their "affiliates" -- which is basically any data broker willing to pay for it. Next thing you know, your insurance rates are being increased based on something they found in your profile. For the individual consumer, there is nothing good about privacy invasion and personalized ads.
- ehutch79 5y ago
  No, ads are a problem. when a sprint ad walks across your browser and starts talking while in front of content, that was it for me.
  - jqpabc123 5y ago
    That is annoying ... but it could be much more detrimental than annoying if it is also reporting back to a global tracking network that sells your profile to be used against you by a multitude of other actors. The difference here is between you watching ads versus ads watching you.
    - ehutch79 5y ago
      Or both? It can do both.
- RealityVoid 5y ago
  I don't care if they have my data. My data is useless to me. Have it. I don't even think it's worth that much in the first place. I care that they make the web a crappy, unusable, annoying place. They make the browsing experience less secure. They slow down the webpages and eat bandwidth. They look ugly. It' my goddamn pc, i very well can choose what to run on it.
  - jqpabc123 5y ago
    I don't care if they have my data. You should. They're inventing new ways to use this data against you all the time. For example, there has been some effort to profile you based on the price you pay for goods on the internet. They assign you a "sucker score". Once you're classified as a sucker, the price you get offered is higher than what a "non-sucker" might receive. https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2017/05/how-online-shopping-makes-suckers-of-us-all/521448/ https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2017/05/how-onl...
    - RealityVoid 5y ago
notforsale 5y ago
Previously, ad companies made ads that were watched by people. Now they feel entitled to push ads that are watching people. That's a deal breaker.
howdydoo 5y ago
I'll reply to this comment in a minute, but before I do, have you played Raid Shadow Legends?
vimy 5y ago
I wouldn’t mind simple banner ads without tracking. The digital equivalent of magazine ads.
- jqpabc123 5y ago
  This is the model that DuckDuckGo uses. They simply show ads related to your search terms. No global tracking required.
howinteresting 5y ago
Any semi-serious security posture must involve blocking ads. The incentives in the adtech industry mean that the security issues with ads can never be fixed.
- macNchz 5y ago
  This was really what made the decision easy for me back however many years ago when I started using an adblocker. Internet ads can be irritating and the pervasive cross site tracking and profiling bothers me, but I don’t have fundamental issues with advertising generally. What is totally unacceptable is being served ads with malicious payloads on major websites. If a website wants me to take their “please disable your adblocker” popup seriously they need to make 100% sure they don’t serve ads that instantly redirect the browser to a fake facebook phishing website that breaks the back button. Until then it’s adblock everywhere and the same for all of my friends and family to whom I give computer help.
AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago
To put it as politely as I possibly can: advertisers can suck my ass. They could have been good citizens, but they've proven time and time again they'd rather be the scum of the goddamned earth and use every annoying and malicious trick in the book to fool you into paying attention to their bullshit for the second or two it takes to make their shit go away instead. Not to mention all the overhead of their shit making everything fucking slow as hell.
- sharken 5y ago
  Hehe well put, we are way past the point of wanting to put up with ads as users. The question is how far Google wants to take Manifest V3. The current path will mean a huge boost for browsers with Manifest V2 capability, e.g. Brave, Firefox and to some extent Safari.
smokey_circles 5y ago
there's nothing mild about many online ads. pages load faster and I don't use as much bandwidth. YouTube et al are ok, not so much other pages
butz 5y ago
uBlock Origin can do much more than block ads: you can block annoying live chat scripts, cookie banners, disable JavaScript for specific domains, and even limit maximum size of assets downloaded from website (e.g. huge gif files, images or videos). It's amazing how much faster browsing becomes with correctly customized uBlock Origin.
feanaro 5y ago
I personally don't care about "content creators". I create a lot of content for free because it's useful for me in other ways and interesting on its own. Modern ads are surveillance tech and I want to see that die at any cost. Ads would then either have to adapt to stop being surveillance-based or the most interesting "content creators" would adapt to monetize in other ways. I really don't see a future in which interesting "content" just stops existing just because tracking ads don't exist. If people want things, they will appear and eventually will be able to be monetized in some way.
- whimsicalism 5y ago
  > If people want things, they will appear Yeah, which explains why journalism has pretty much collapsed in the past few decades.
Wowfunhappy 5y ago
I'm going to back up the GP on this! HN users tend to get annoyed by (1) ads, (2) paywalls, and (3) articles without enough research (aka time aka money). I'm cognizant of the fact that HN isn't a hive mind, and so these complaints aren't necessarily coming from the same people—but some certainly are. Well, which is it? Or do we expect content creators to work for free? If we have to pick a poison—and, well, I think we do—the ad model has one major advantage: accessibility. If we want to make information available to as many people as possible, an ad-supported model is the way to do it. Paywalls lock out everyone at the lower end of the income bracket, and force everyone consume content from only a smaller number of sources (since subscribing to every website is impractical). This isn't to ignore all of the negative social consequences of advertising. The question isn't whether ads are bad, because they absolutely are—the question is whether they're worth the cost of accessible journalism.
- corobo 5y ago
  > Well, which is it? Or do we expect content creators to work for free? "we" don't care either way. Their business model is their business In any case there's plenty of people not blocking ads. It looks like everyone uses adblock if you look at a tech audience because they are a tech audience, not because everyone is using adblock
- simion314 5y ago
  > If we want to make information available to as many people as possible, an ad-supported model is the way to do it There are alternatives, a good one I see used in Ptreon, the supporters get early access to content, the rest will get it a month later. Let me try find the pros and cons Cons: - you need first to find supporters, so for a while you need to work hard to get them - some supporters might feel entitled to stuff, you need to make sure to be clear about what being a supporter means - you need to be very clear and transparent , some supporters will not tolerate delays or low quality/quantity updates Pro: - you have a predictable revenue model, you don't depend on an algorithm - you mostly don't have to censor your content (there are exceptions true, but there are alternatives) - you don't have to promote scams like VPNs, shit games with loot boxes, crypto scams - you are not forced by an algorithms to release on a certain text/video length , a certain schedule , use certain shitty thumbnails or click-bait titles - if you make public your content after a month or week etc, your fans that don't have money still get it and will promote it, also influencers will promote it because they know it will be free after a time interval. This patreon model does not solve everything, just wanted to mention that there are alternatives to shity ads that track and manipulate you. Other alternative would be honest contextual ads, like if you search for printer ink from city A then Google/Bing could show you an ad from a local shop that refils ink cartridges.
Bayart 5y ago
To me, browsing without ad-blocking is absolutely impossible. I've got a very low threshold of tolerance for those things. And I frankly couldn't care less whether people can earn money off advertising or not. I don't consider it making an honest living. If their businesses failed because of it, so be it. I feel the same about data collection and tracking. As far as I'm concerned, we'd all be better off if that entire industry was nuked off the face of the Internet.
- bambax 5y ago
  Absolutely agree.
sieabahlpark 5y ago
You're going to be hard pressed to find many people who are going to agree with your premise that ads are only a "mild" annoyance. Nobody wants to hear the stupid jingles on YouTube every 5 minutes (yes, I've had them every 5 minutes). I'm sick of lazy loading ads shifting content and then when I interact with the main content spring to life with that interaction and start playing audio. I don't want ads at all, period. Their abusive history is enough reason for that. I do not care if the website owner goes broke, if they want to live off of it charge for it. If people don't want to pay then a lot of people need to realize their content isn't all that valuable in the first place. It is great that small businesses can use ads, but unfortunately the market has ruined it for everyone by being so lax with the experience as a whole. Ads lie and sell you shit, so everything that shows up is probably shit.
sennight 5y ago
Is it my responsibility to help "content creator" small business growth regardless of how ridiculous their revenue model is? Here is a tip: put some thought into the sustainability of tossing that responsibility over the wall to Google - if you want money, do the work. There was a time, not very long ago, when you could pretty easily control the amount of marketing you exposed yourself to.
arthur6667 5y ago
Firstly 'very mild annoyance' for you maybe, I'd rather eat bricks then watch the endless ads and popups. Now a good old advertisement, like you'd get in magazines, target based on context are fine. Even some TV commercials are fine, I'd rather not have 20 minute on the hour of them, but meh. It's all the low effort, spammy targeted crap that is the problem imo. And 'ads also help small businesses to grow' is bs if you ask me. - online ads are largely for the big business as small business gets crowded out & out-spend on search terms etc. - targeted ads do not contribute meaningfully to conversion if you look close enough. Conversion metrics are crap as they do not account for the huge selection bias involved. - marketing in general contributes nothing to society, it is all busy-work that changes nothing but maybe moving some people around between brands. It is a zero-sum game where the everybody keeps spending more and more and more for less impact & the market as whole is not impacted. - 70 to 90% of all clicks & impressions are by bots. - Content creators get jack shit for advertisements, if you pay like 1$ a month for someone's patreon or whatever you are generating more revenue then watching a thousand ads. And then there is all the nefarious uses of targeted advertising that follow from it...
Mezzie 5y ago
My job requires me to spend hours online, including on a lot of news sites. I block all ads for my own mental health: The last thing I want is ads that are calculated to work me up and make me angry/upset following me around everywhere because of my job. Likewise, just because I work doesn't mean I should be forced to be a captive audience for companies/groups trying to work me up. On a larger scale, I believe the mental health harms to the general populace of incessant and emotionally manipulative advertising is far worse in consequence than some artists not earning money (and I've supported myself writing fiction, I'm not dismissing creators here). If artists earned money but it required 80% of the population to become hooked on bath salts, I'd consider that a problem. Also, I have MS and that includes some twitches/spasms + I'm slightly visually impaired so I have some accessibility stuff set up and jumping/moving ads etc. are a common issue for me, as is engaging on accident through a finger/hand spasm. Now consider how many people are elderly or have vision issues; I feel like ads are uniquely predatory to certain populations.
gpvos 5y ago
In principle I don't mind ads, but I do mind the cross-domain tracking. If sites served ads from their own domains, I'd keep them. I consider it up to web site owners to figure out how to make money from their site if that's what they want to do. Until they and the ad providers come up with an acceptable and practical way of doing that, I am willing to look at their content as long as they're willing to serve it to me. Then there are also the ads that are annoying: those with moving parts or sound. I will always block those.
jimbobimbo 5y ago
I used to not block ads, but today it's almost impossible to use any site that depends on ad revenue without an ad blocker. The amount of garbage on the page - notifications, badges, banners, popups, whatever else crap marketing people invent - is staggering. Sites are mangled to the point of being unusable. I want to support creators, but it's a two-way street.
jnwatson 5y ago
I had the same opinion, until they started delivering malware. Then, realizing how much better web pages load without ads, I was hooked.
magicalhippo 5y ago
Besides the issue of tracking and such, there's the fact that limiting arbitrary unchecked third-party executable code to run on your computer is a good thing. I use uBlock primarily as a line of defense, not just to avoid annoying ads. As an example, a few years ago the ad network of a newspaper here in Norway was hacked. Anyone visiting their site (or affiliates) would silently and without any user interaction get infected with a banking malware. The malware that time would cause bank transfers made through the online banking site of the most popular bank here to go to a different account than the one specified. It could have done something else.
syshum 5y ago
Ok, I will address what you have asked for. Tracking based Ads generated by Google Ad-words and other networks should cease being viewed by content creators as the "primary source" of revenue, creators need to get creative and come up with better, most lasting revenue sources. Many already have, from direct memberships, merch, first party ads, but I am sure there are other more creative ways to make money The lazy days of "just toss an adwords tracking cookie everywhere for the fast cash" is over, and I for one will celebrate the death of Ad words and all the other tracking ad networks
jccalhoun 5y ago
Let me give an example. I teach public speaking and I often use online-stopwatch.com as a timer for quick practice speech stuff in class. I had not installed an adblock on the computer in the classroom because I was trying to be good and give that very useful site the ad views. Then one day in the middle of class I start hearing sound coming out of the speakers which disrupted the class. The site had put an ad on it with an autoplay video. I put ublock origin on it right away.
betwixthewires 5y ago
> I don't understand why people think it's a good idea to remove the primary source of revenue for content creators. > I'd appreciate it if someone could respond to the points I made rather than simply complain about why they don't like ads. I'd say explaining to you why they don't like ads should help you understand why they think it's a good idea to remove the primary source of revenue for content creators, if that primary source is ads. Here's the worlds smallest fiddle. If your primary source of revenue is automated advertising, I don't care if you lose money. Sorry not sorry. Get some sponsorships, exclusive content, whatever. But if you want to sell my information to companies to build a profile on me and then invade my life with all manner of annoying distractions using that data, you want me to feel bad when I put a stop to it because you didn't get your penny from me? Cry about it if you want. Seriously, fuck ads. We have offered a truce to the ad companies before. Put a banner at the top. Slap a commercial in a video. But that's not good enough for them, they autoplay videos and popups and tracking pixels and 10 ads in a video. And then when we tell them where they can go stick it they act like we are stealing. So fuck them, they can go hungry, and if you intend to monetize me by funneling my attention to them, you can go hungry too. Yes, people are that adamant about blocking ads. I block all ads. I don't need my mind polluted with noise and my life to be about stepping over dogshit every step I take and I don't need spyware running in my browser.
akomtu 5y ago
I'd put it this way. Ads networks position themselves as an efficient money delivery pipeline between you and content creators. In reality, they are like a delivery company that employs junkies and is run by heroin addicts. When they take your money, they promise to not steal. But junkies are junkies, they can't not steal, so on the way to those content creators, they steal most of your money.

by Flankk 5y ago

everdrive 5y ago

We have more than too much content right now, and in my mind the tracking and ads means that the “free” content is not worth the price. I’d rather there be less content if it meant no tracking.

Ar-Curunir 5y ago

Ads consistently overwhelm main content, hijack navigation, and rely on mass collection of user data to sustain the adtech industry. They’re one of the worst products of the tech industry.

justbaker 5y ago

Are you serious?

jqpabc123 5y ago

By themselves, ads aren't the real problem --- personalized ads are the problem. The idea that they have to profile and track your every move all over the internet in order to try and sell you stuff you don't really want or need. Example: If I go to a pet supply web site, an ad for dog food is perfectly understandable --- maybe even welcomed. But just because I was profiled visiting and maybe even buying, I shouldn't be bombarded with ads for cat food all over the internet. Even worse is the fact that over time, your profile becomes incredibly detailed. They sell this info to their "affiliates" -- which is basically any data broker willing to pay for it. Next thing you know, your insurance rates are being increased based on something they found in your profile. For the individual consumer, there is nothing good about privacy invasion and personalized ads.

ehutch79 5y ago
No, ads are a problem. when a sprint ad walks across your browser and starts talking while in front of content, that was it for me.
- jqpabc123 5y ago
  That is annoying ... but it could be much more detrimental than annoying if it is also reporting back to a global tracking network that sells your profile to be used against you by a multitude of other actors. The difference here is between you watching ads versus ads watching you.
  - ehutch79 5y ago
    Or both? It can do both.
RealityVoid 5y ago
I don't care if they have my data. My data is useless to me. Have it. I don't even think it's worth that much in the first place. I care that they make the web a crappy, unusable, annoying place. They make the browsing experience less secure. They slow down the webpages and eat bandwidth. They look ugly. It' my goddamn pc, i very well can choose what to run on it.
- jqpabc123 5y ago
  I don't care if they have my data. You should. They're inventing new ways to use this data against you all the time. For example, there has been some effort to profile you based on the price you pay for goods on the internet. They assign you a "sucker score". Once you're classified as a sucker, the price you get offered is higher than what a "non-sucker" might receive. https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2017/05/how-online-shopping-makes-suckers-of-us-all/521448/ https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2017/05/how-onl...
  - RealityVoid 5y ago

notforsale 5y ago

Previously, ad companies made ads that were watched by people. Now they feel entitled to push ads that are watching people. That's a deal breaker.

howdydoo 5y ago

I'll reply to this comment in a minute, but before I do, have you played Raid Shadow Legends?

vimy 5y ago

I wouldn’t mind simple banner ads without tracking. The digital equivalent of magazine ads.

jqpabc123 5y ago
This is the model that DuckDuckGo uses. They simply show ads related to your search terms. No global tracking required.

howinteresting 5y ago

Any semi-serious security posture must involve blocking ads. The incentives in the adtech industry mean that the security issues with ads can never be fixed.

macNchz 5y ago
This was really what made the decision easy for me back however many years ago when I started using an adblocker. Internet ads can be irritating and the pervasive cross site tracking and profiling bothers me, but I don’t have fundamental issues with advertising generally. What is totally unacceptable is being served ads with malicious payloads on major websites. If a website wants me to take their “please disable your adblocker” popup seriously they need to make 100% sure they don’t serve ads that instantly redirect the browser to a fake facebook phishing website that breaks the back button. Until then it’s adblock everywhere and the same for all of my friends and family to whom I give computer help.

AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago

To put it as politely as I possibly can: advertisers can suck my ass. They could have been good citizens, but they've proven time and time again they'd rather be the scum of the goddamned earth and use every annoying and malicious trick in the book to fool you into paying attention to their bullshit for the second or two it takes to make their shit go away instead. Not to mention all the overhead of their shit making everything fucking slow as hell.

sharken 5y ago
Hehe well put, we are way past the point of wanting to put up with ads as users. The question is how far Google wants to take Manifest V3. The current path will mean a huge boost for browsers with Manifest V2 capability, e.g. Brave, Firefox and to some extent Safari.

smokey_circles 5y ago

there's nothing mild about many online ads. pages load faster and I don't use as much bandwidth. YouTube et al are ok, not so much other pages

butz 5y ago

uBlock Origin can do much more than block ads: you can block annoying live chat scripts, cookie banners, disable JavaScript for specific domains, and even limit maximum size of assets downloaded from website (e.g. huge gif files, images or videos). It's amazing how much faster browsing becomes with correctly customized uBlock Origin.

feanaro 5y ago

I personally don't care about "content creators". I create a lot of content for free because it's useful for me in other ways and interesting on its own. Modern ads are surveillance tech and I want to see that die at any cost. Ads would then either have to adapt to stop being surveillance-based or the most interesting "content creators" would adapt to monetize in other ways. I really don't see a future in which interesting "content" just stops existing just because tracking ads don't exist. If people want things, they will appear and eventually will be able to be monetized in some way.

whimsicalism 5y ago
> If people want things, they will appear Yeah, which explains why journalism has pretty much collapsed in the past few decades.

Wowfunhappy 5y ago

I'm going to back up the GP on this! HN users tend to get annoyed by (1) ads, (2) paywalls, and (3) articles without enough research (aka time aka money). I'm cognizant of the fact that HN isn't a hive mind, and so these complaints aren't necessarily coming from the same people—but some certainly are. Well, which is it? Or do we expect content creators to work for free? If we have to pick a poison—and, well, I think we do—the ad model has one major advantage: accessibility. If we want to make information available to as many people as possible, an ad-supported model is the way to do it. Paywalls lock out everyone at the lower end of the income bracket, and force everyone consume content from only a smaller number of sources (since subscribing to every website is impractical). This isn't to ignore all of the negative social consequences of advertising. The question isn't whether ads are bad, because they absolutely are—the question is whether they're worth the cost of accessible journalism.

corobo 5y ago
> Well, which is it? Or do we expect content creators to work for free? "we" don't care either way. Their business model is their business In any case there's plenty of people not blocking ads. It looks like everyone uses adblock if you look at a tech audience because they are a tech audience, not because everyone is using adblock
simion314 5y ago
> If we want to make information available to as many people as possible, an ad-supported model is the way to do it There are alternatives, a good one I see used in Ptreon, the supporters get early access to content, the rest will get it a month later. Let me try find the pros and cons Cons: - you need first to find supporters, so for a while you need to work hard to get them - some supporters might feel entitled to stuff, you need to make sure to be clear about what being a supporter means - you need to be very clear and transparent , some supporters will not tolerate delays or low quality/quantity updates Pro: - you have a predictable revenue model, you don't depend on an algorithm - you mostly don't have to censor your content (there are exceptions true, but there are alternatives) - you don't have to promote scams like VPNs, shit games with loot boxes, crypto scams - you are not forced by an algorithms to release on a certain text/video length , a certain schedule , use certain shitty thumbnails or click-bait titles - if you make public your content after a month or week etc, your fans that don't have money still get it and will promote it, also influencers will promote it because they know it will be free after a time interval. This patreon model does not solve everything, just wanted to mention that there are alternatives to shity ads that track and manipulate you. Other alternative would be honest contextual ads, like if you search for printer ink from city A then Google/Bing could show you an ad from a local shop that refils ink cartridges.

Bayart 5y ago

To me, browsing without ad-blocking is absolutely impossible. I've got a very low threshold of tolerance for those things. And I frankly couldn't care less whether people can earn money off advertising or not. I don't consider it making an honest living. If their businesses failed because of it, so be it. I feel the same about data collection and tracking. As far as I'm concerned, we'd all be better off if that entire industry was nuked off the face of the Internet.

bambax 5y ago
Absolutely agree.

sieabahlpark 5y ago

You're going to be hard pressed to find many people who are going to agree with your premise that ads are only a "mild" annoyance. Nobody wants to hear the stupid jingles on YouTube every 5 minutes (yes, I've had them every 5 minutes). I'm sick of lazy loading ads shifting content and then when I interact with the main content spring to life with that interaction and start playing audio. I don't want ads at all, period. Their abusive history is enough reason for that. I do not care if the website owner goes broke, if they want to live off of it charge for it. If people don't want to pay then a lot of people need to realize their content isn't all that valuable in the first place. It is great that small businesses can use ads, but unfortunately the market has ruined it for everyone by being so lax with the experience as a whole. Ads lie and sell you shit, so everything that shows up is probably shit.

sennight 5y ago

Is it my responsibility to help "content creator" small business growth regardless of how ridiculous their revenue model is? Here is a tip: put some thought into the sustainability of tossing that responsibility over the wall to Google - if you want money, do the work. There was a time, not very long ago, when you could pretty easily control the amount of marketing you exposed yourself to.

arthur6667 5y ago

Firstly 'very mild annoyance' for you maybe, I'd rather eat bricks then watch the endless ads and popups. Now a good old advertisement, like you'd get in magazines, target based on context are fine. Even some TV commercials are fine, I'd rather not have 20 minute on the hour of them, but meh. It's all the low effort, spammy targeted crap that is the problem imo. And 'ads also help small businesses to grow' is bs if you ask me. - online ads are largely for the big business as small business gets crowded out & out-spend on search terms etc. - targeted ads do not contribute meaningfully to conversion if you look close enough. Conversion metrics are crap as they do not account for the huge selection bias involved. - marketing in general contributes nothing to society, it is all busy-work that changes nothing but maybe moving some people around between brands. It is a zero-sum game where the everybody keeps spending more and more and more for less impact & the market as whole is not impacted. - 70 to 90% of all clicks & impressions are by bots. - Content creators get jack shit for advertisements, if you pay like 1$ a month for someone's patreon or whatever you are generating more revenue then watching a thousand ads. And then there is all the nefarious uses of targeted advertising that follow from it...

Mezzie 5y ago

My job requires me to spend hours online, including on a lot of news sites. I block all ads for my own mental health: The last thing I want is ads that are calculated to work me up and make me angry/upset following me around everywhere because of my job. Likewise, just because I work doesn't mean I should be forced to be a captive audience for companies/groups trying to work me up. On a larger scale, I believe the mental health harms to the general populace of incessant and emotionally manipulative advertising is far worse in consequence than some artists not earning money (and I've supported myself writing fiction, I'm not dismissing creators here). If artists earned money but it required 80% of the population to become hooked on bath salts, I'd consider that a problem. Also, I have MS and that includes some twitches/spasms + I'm slightly visually impaired so I have some accessibility stuff set up and jumping/moving ads etc. are a common issue for me, as is engaging on accident through a finger/hand spasm. Now consider how many people are elderly or have vision issues; I feel like ads are uniquely predatory to certain populations.

gpvos 5y ago

In principle I don't mind ads, but I do mind the cross-domain tracking. If sites served ads from their own domains, I'd keep them. I consider it up to web site owners to figure out how to make money from their site if that's what they want to do. Until they and the ad providers come up with an acceptable and practical way of doing that, I am willing to look at their content as long as they're willing to serve it to me. Then there are also the ads that are annoying: those with moving parts or sound. I will always block those.

jimbobimbo 5y ago

I used to not block ads, but today it's almost impossible to use any site that depends on ad revenue without an ad blocker. The amount of garbage on the page - notifications, badges, banners, popups, whatever else crap marketing people invent - is staggering. Sites are mangled to the point of being unusable. I want to support creators, but it's a two-way street.

jnwatson 5y ago

I had the same opinion, until they started delivering malware. Then, realizing how much better web pages load without ads, I was hooked.

magicalhippo 5y ago

Besides the issue of tracking and such, there's the fact that limiting arbitrary unchecked third-party executable code to run on your computer is a good thing. I use uBlock primarily as a line of defense, not just to avoid annoying ads. As an example, a few years ago the ad network of a newspaper here in Norway was hacked. Anyone visiting their site (or affiliates) would silently and without any user interaction get infected with a banking malware. The malware that time would cause bank transfers made through the online banking site of the most popular bank here to go to a different account than the one specified. It could have done something else.

syshum 5y ago

Ok, I will address what you have asked for. Tracking based Ads generated by Google Ad-words and other networks should cease being viewed by content creators as the "primary source" of revenue, creators need to get creative and come up with better, most lasting revenue sources. Many already have, from direct memberships, merch, first party ads, but I am sure there are other more creative ways to make money The lazy days of "just toss an adwords tracking cookie everywhere for the fast cash" is over, and I for one will celebrate the death of Ad words and all the other tracking ad networks

jccalhoun 5y ago

Let me give an example. I teach public speaking and I often use online-stopwatch.com as a timer for quick practice speech stuff in class. I had not installed an adblock on the computer in the classroom because I was trying to be good and give that very useful site the ad views. Then one day in the middle of class I start hearing sound coming out of the speakers which disrupted the class. The site had put an ad on it with an autoplay video. I put ublock origin on it right away.

betwixthewires 5y ago

> I don't understand why people think it's a good idea to remove the primary source of revenue for content creators. > I'd appreciate it if someone could respond to the points I made rather than simply complain about why they don't like ads. I'd say explaining to you why they don't like ads should help you understand why they think it's a good idea to remove the primary source of revenue for content creators, if that primary source is ads. Here's the worlds smallest fiddle. If your primary source of revenue is automated advertising, I don't care if you lose money. Sorry not sorry. Get some sponsorships, exclusive content, whatever. But if you want to sell my information to companies to build a profile on me and then invade my life with all manner of annoying distractions using that data, you want me to feel bad when I put a stop to it because you didn't get your penny from me? Cry about it if you want. Seriously, fuck ads. We have offered a truce to the ad companies before. Put a banner at the top. Slap a commercial in a video. But that's not good enough for them, they autoplay videos and popups and tracking pixels and 10 ads in a video. And then when we tell them where they can go stick it they act like we are stealing. So fuck them, they can go hungry, and if you intend to monetize me by funneling my attention to them, you can go hungry too. Yes, people are that adamant about blocking ads. I block all ads. I don't need my mind polluted with noise and my life to be about stepping over dogshit every step I take and I don't need spyware running in my browser.

akomtu 5y ago

I'd put it this way. Ads networks position themselves as an efficient money delivery pipeline between you and content creators. In reality, they are like a delivery company that employs junkies and is run by heroin addicts. When they take your money, they promise to not steal. But junkies are junkies, they can't not steal, so on the way to those content creators, they steal most of your money.