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You're right adblockers are a problem, they're not addressing the cause but its expression. But at the same time and like the article, you also failed to frame

You're right adblockers are a problem, they're not addressing the cause but its expression. But at the same time and like the article, you also failed to frame the problem properly, see, it starts by telling us about a website serving 2 millions page views then goes about people wanting content for free. Content doesn't cost anything once put online, so it's not about content but rather that it is accessed 2 millions times a month which generates traffic, which has a cost. Now if it cost the same for the content to be accessed 10 or 10 millions times, then the justification/needs for ads would go away (except for newspapers' websites maybe). The problem is in fact dual, one is that the internet is designed to work as dumb pipes connected intelligence located in the network periphery not as centralized servers hosting content and the owner of the inner tubes ask money based on how much traffic goes through them. The obvious solution of distributing the content in a p2p model which would move the bill of traffic from the content provider to the content receivers. So yes adblockers are a problem because they're and additional layer of attempting to fix another problem ads and associated surveillance which is trying to fix the issue of relying on a centralized model on a network not thought for this usage imposed by a few giant companies exploiting their ownership of the architecture for profit, making a mess of layers attempting to fix each other but really attempting more problems requiring more fixing.

rgbrgb 13y ago
And how do you pay for the content to be created?
- XorNot 13y ago
  Most ad-laden websites severely overvalue themselves. They're distractions - highly replaceable ones. It turns out when you have a simple and obvious business model, it's easy to pay for content - iTunes enabled us to actually buy music (kind of, we're in the middle of screwing the artists over with bulk streaming deals and what I suspect is a lot of RIAA-contact lock ins preventing direct sales). But really, how valuable do you think your blog post about someone else's blog post is? Or a news site reporting on what happened from Twitter, or publishing articles which are taken whole-sale from bullet pointed corporate and political press releases?
  - blumkvist 13y ago
    The sites you describe are very small ones that don't make much money and don't really have problems with adblocking. Why not think about pando daily, the verge, 9to5mac?
    - strubleandecure 13y ago
      Sometimes just sometimes when a site has 100-1000 times the numbers of readers compared to a mere anonymous blog, they're just far more successful at generating clickbait and have more resources to waste on elaborate HTML5. Or maybe they really generate actual useful content. If we're discussing anecdotal data points everyone has a different view on a website's utility. Personally I believe if the reader base of a site is genuine and not heavily dependent on one-hit readers, they shouldn't rely on an ad-driven model. At least, not solely. Call it guilt-tripping, donation driving, paywalling, microtransactions, anything you will. As long as it's not the ad networks actually asking for dosh. It's merely crowdfunding on a more diffuse and intimate level, since the aim is for the site to exist down the line indefinitely.
    - tobiasu 13y ago
      I know nothing about the last one, but the two others I imagine lots of people can do without... This for-profit free-content model also ruins a lot of paid business models, which might otherwise be successful. We get rid of the overhead of the advertisment industry and retain more money to pay for good journalism etc.
    - XorNot 13y ago
      Actually I was thinking of most of the current newsmedia sites. You know - CNN, Fox, or locally for me - Sydney Morning Herald and others. Of course there problem has ended entirely since even the effort of reading them has lost its appeal. I literally have never heard of the 3 things you just listed.

rgbrgb 13y ago

And how do you pay for the content to be created?

XorNot 13y ago
Most ad-laden websites severely overvalue themselves. They're distractions - highly replaceable ones. It turns out when you have a simple and obvious business model, it's easy to pay for content - iTunes enabled us to actually buy music (kind of, we're in the middle of screwing the artists over with bulk streaming deals and what I suspect is a lot of RIAA-contact lock ins preventing direct sales). But really, how valuable do you think your blog post about someone else's blog post is? Or a news site reporting on what happened from Twitter, or publishing articles which are taken whole-sale from bullet pointed corporate and political press releases?
- blumkvist 13y ago
  The sites you describe are very small ones that don't make much money and don't really have problems with adblocking. Why not think about pando daily, the verge, 9to5mac?
  - strubleandecure 13y ago
    Sometimes just sometimes when a site has 100-1000 times the numbers of readers compared to a mere anonymous blog, they're just far more successful at generating clickbait and have more resources to waste on elaborate HTML5. Or maybe they really generate actual useful content. If we're discussing anecdotal data points everyone has a different view on a website's utility. Personally I believe if the reader base of a site is genuine and not heavily dependent on one-hit readers, they shouldn't rely on an ad-driven model. At least, not solely. Call it guilt-tripping, donation driving, paywalling, microtransactions, anything you will. As long as it's not the ad networks actually asking for dosh. It's merely crowdfunding on a more diffuse and intimate level, since the aim is for the site to exist down the line indefinitely.
  - tobiasu 13y ago
    I know nothing about the last one, but the two others I imagine lots of people can do without... This for-profit free-content model also ruins a lot of paid business models, which might otherwise be successful. We get rid of the overhead of the advertisment industry and retain more money to pay for good journalism etc.
  - XorNot 13y ago
    Actually I was thinking of most of the current newsmedia sites. You know - CNN, Fox, or locally for me - Sydney Morning Herald and others. Of course there problem has ended entirely since even the effort of reading them has lost its appeal. I literally have never heard of the 3 things you just listed.