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There's an argument to be made that a site that permits ad blockers should command a higher price from advertisers than one that forbids them, since a user who

There's an argument to be made that a site that permits ad blockers should command a higher price from advertisers than one that forbids them, since a user who would use an ad blocker is the least likely user to ever click on an ad. If you're showing ads to a userbase that consists of a mix of users who would and wouldn't use an ad blocker if able to do it, then you're increasing your impressions by policy without increasing your conversions, compared to a site that shows ads only to users who have the chance to block ads and don't.

dspillett 3y ago
Depending on the way the site and its ads are presented, and which ad-blocked is in use, that argument often falls flat because the blocked adverts still get counted as delivered as they leave the relevant server and are blocked from rendering client-side. Obviously this is not universally true (for example DNS based blocking stops the request for the ad content going through at all so if the counting is done at that point a blocked ad won't be counted) but a lot of in-browser blocks might see the blocked impression still counted.
- fluoridation 3y ago
  >that argument often falls flat because the blocked adverts still get counted as delivered as they leave the relevant server and are blocked from rendering client-side And this counter-argument falls flat because YouTube must be able to detect which users are blocking ads in order to show them a message to disable ad blocking. If YouTube is detecting that situation and still counting blocked ads as delivered then they're cheating their customers. There are only three possibilities: 1. YouTube can't tell if user A is blocking ads, so the customer gets billed for an impression that didn't happen, but the user also can't be stopped from blocking the ad. 2. YouTube can tell when user A blocks ads, and must shoulder the cost of delivering a video without a corresponding ad impression. The argument I brought up addresses this. 3. YouTube can tell when user A blocks ads, and changes the customer anyway. In this case YT would have no incentive to stop people from blocking ads.
  - dspillett 3y ago
    > YouTube must be able to detect which users are blocking ads in order to show them a message to disable ad blocking They must be able to detect some blockers in order to show some users a message to disable ad blocking. They certainly aren't detecting mine, or are for some reason choosing not to show me the message. > If YouTube is detecting that situation and still counting blocked ads as delivered then they're cheating their customers. I'm sure they aren't cheating their customers in any way said customers can prove… In order for their customers to have any confidence that they are getting better value from allowing blocking, as the previous assertion, YouTube would have to convincingly prove that they can detect a large majority of blocking and therefore account for it in how they charge for impressions.
    - fluoridation 3y ago
      >They certainly aren't detecting mine, or are for some reason choosing not to show me the message. If they can't detect your blocking then you would fall under case #1 above. If they can detect it but choose to allow it for whatever reason then it's not part of this discussion. >In order for their customers to have any confidence that they are getting better value from allowing blocking, as the previous assertion, YouTube would have to convincingly prove that they can detect a large majority of blocking and therefore account for it in how they charge for impressions. No, my assertion was that a site that doesn't forbid ad blockers should have a better conversion ratio than one that does, all else being equal, not a better ratio than another arbitrary one. Under the assumption that total_impressions = non_blocking_users * k: total_impressions / non_blocking_users > total_impressions / (non_blocking_users + blocking_users) This is true regardless of how large blocking_users is, both in absolute terms and compared to non_blocking users. Whether you can accurately measure blocking_users also doesn't matter.
deleted 3y ago
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passion__desire 3y ago
Can we consider youtube as a publisher here? If yes, it is in favour of Google to display as many ads as possible. https://blog.google/products/adsense/evolving-how-publishers-monetize-with-adsense/ https://blog.google/products/adsense/evolving-how-publishers...
onlyrealcuzzo 3y ago
There are different types of ads. The types of ads run on YouTube have more in common with TV and aren't primarily for direct action. Unless you think everyone who installs ad blockers is going to plug their ears and look away from the screen for 5 seconds when ads come on - advertisers will be happy to advertise to them.

dspillett 3y ago

Depending on the way the site and its ads are presented, and which ad-blocked is in use, that argument often falls flat because the blocked adverts still get counted as delivered as they leave the relevant server and are blocked from rendering client-side. Obviously this is not universally true (for example DNS based blocking stops the request for the ad content going through at all so if the counting is done at that point a blocked ad won't be counted) but a lot of in-browser blocks might see the blocked impression still counted.

fluoridation 3y ago
>that argument often falls flat because the blocked adverts still get counted as delivered as they leave the relevant server and are blocked from rendering client-side And this counter-argument falls flat because YouTube must be able to detect which users are blocking ads in order to show them a message to disable ad blocking. If YouTube is detecting that situation and still counting blocked ads as delivered then they're cheating their customers. There are only three possibilities: 1. YouTube can't tell if user A is blocking ads, so the customer gets billed for an impression that didn't happen, but the user also can't be stopped from blocking the ad. 2. YouTube can tell when user A blocks ads, and must shoulder the cost of delivering a video without a corresponding ad impression. The argument I brought up addresses this. 3. YouTube can tell when user A blocks ads, and changes the customer anyway. In this case YT would have no incentive to stop people from blocking ads.
- dspillett 3y ago
  > YouTube must be able to detect which users are blocking ads in order to show them a message to disable ad blocking They must be able to detect some blockers in order to show some users a message to disable ad blocking. They certainly aren't detecting mine, or are for some reason choosing not to show me the message. > If YouTube is detecting that situation and still counting blocked ads as delivered then they're cheating their customers. I'm sure they aren't cheating their customers in any way said customers can prove… In order for their customers to have any confidence that they are getting better value from allowing blocking, as the previous assertion, YouTube would have to convincingly prove that they can detect a large majority of blocking and therefore account for it in how they charge for impressions.
  - fluoridation 3y ago
    >They certainly aren't detecting mine, or are for some reason choosing not to show me the message. If they can't detect your blocking then you would fall under case #1 above. If they can detect it but choose to allow it for whatever reason then it's not part of this discussion. >In order for their customers to have any confidence that they are getting better value from allowing blocking, as the previous assertion, YouTube would have to convincingly prove that they can detect a large majority of blocking and therefore account for it in how they charge for impressions. No, my assertion was that a site that doesn't forbid ad blockers should have a better conversion ratio than one that does, all else being equal, not a better ratio than another arbitrary one. Under the assumption that total_impressions = non_blocking_users * k: total_impressions / non_blocking_users > total_impressions / (non_blocking_users + blocking_users) This is true regardless of how large blocking_users is, both in absolute terms and compared to non_blocking users. Whether you can accurately measure blocking_users also doesn't matter.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

passion__desire 3y ago

Can we consider youtube as a publisher here? If yes, it is in favour of Google to display as many ads as possible. https://blog.google/products/adsense/evolving-how-publishers-monetize-with-adsense/ https://blog.google/products/adsense/evolving-how-publishers...

onlyrealcuzzo 3y ago

There are different types of ads. The types of ads run on YouTube have more in common with TV and aren't primarily for direct action. Unless you think everyone who installs ad blockers is going to plug their ears and look away from the screen for 5 seconds when ads come on - advertisers will be happy to advertise to them.