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The Devastating Effect of Ad-Blockers for Guru3D.com

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Re: The Devastating Effect of Ad-Blockers for Guru3D.com

#291

Post by 13thLetter »

icebraining wrote: post #289
13thLetter wrote: post #285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Yes, the current ad system is inefficient, regularly disruptive and even occasionally destructive. But it's here and it's redistributing, Talk about fallacies! Based on that kind of argument, you can defend any awful, destructive policy if it benefits someone, somewhere. > as someone who lives in a country where credit cards are rare and the average wage is under $15k/y, it's not as abstract to me. I'm sorry, but I…

You seem to be assuming a lot from my posts; please don't. I'm not saying we should keep the existing system, and I'm not saying you should have to accept tracking. What I'm saying is that bad_user has a point regarding redistribution, and that anti-advertising advocates should deal with it instead of whistling and pretending it'll only affect Buzzfeed, like the post I originally replied to did.

> What I'm saying is that bad_user has a point regarding redistribution

Sure, and what I'm saying is that it's not a good point for the reasons I've stated already. I'll add that if you deliberately wanted to turn people against redistribution of wealth, you could hardly do better than to associate it with the intrusive web advertising that everyone hates!

Re: The Devastating Effect of Ad-Blockers for Guru3D.com

#293

Post by M2Ys4U »

mozumder wrote: post #188
robgibbons wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't need to justify my right to privacy. All you need to know is that I don't want my browsing habits tracked and correlated across virtually every site I visit, by a small handful of companies that have nothing to do with the content I am seeking. The burden is not on me to justify why I disagree with these practices.

The burden is on you to justify your right to privacy. Otherwise it just makes you look bad, as if you're trying to defend indefensible actions. Remember, you're visiting THEIR sites. They aren't visiting your sites. They have something you want when you visit their sites, and you have to offer something in return. If you're unable to justify yourself, then companies (both advertisers and media publishers) will proce…

>The burden is on you to justify your right to privacy.

Privacy is a human right. I am the only one who gets to decide what information I divulge about myself, except in the very small set of circumstances where my right to privacy has to be balanced against the human rights of others.

Nobody should ever have to justify one's right to privacy.

Re: The Devastating Effect of Ad-Blockers for Guru3D.com

#294

Post by analog31 »

icebraining wrote: post #225
analog31 wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's true in a sense for me. I originally installed an ad blocker because I'm annoyed by the ads, and by the bandwidth that they were consuming. I wasn't even aware of the security and privacy issues at first. When I became aware of those issues, I installed additional blocking software even though I was already not seeing any ads. In my defense, content blocking has been around since time immoral. The first browse…

* time immemorial

You caught me. ;-)

Re: The Devastating Effect of Ad-Blockers for Guru3D.com

#295

Post by pdkl95 »

imgabe wrote: post #137
jhall1468 wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's exactly this kind of attitude that is going to lead to paywalls for virtually every type of content on the Internet. And the people that use the most heavy-handed approaches with ad-blocking are going to be the same people that are screaming "NOT MY PROBLEM" while the ship goes down. Their business model doesn't require changes to reality. Their business model requires the end-user to accept reality for what it…

Most content is worthless. Content that has actual monetary value to someone, market research data for instance, has no trouble finding people willing to pay for it. The fact is most "news" and other article type sites do not serve a purpose other than satisfying some idle curiosity or passing time. Very little of it has a material impact on anyone's day to day life. The purpose can easily be filled by some alternate…

> Most content is worthless.

I would suggest that quite a bit of so-called "content" is actually negative value. Consumption of this negative value is done for a variety of reasons (paying a minor cost for an indirect social benefit, for example ("I wanted to participate when people talk about #{current_pop_culture}")). These negative values are only worthwhile when the cost is small enough, and we've recently seen advertising raise those costs past important thresholds.

The initial reaction is an attempt to lower the cost by installing an ad blocker. In the long run, this will simply lead to a re-evaluation that the rising costs outweigh the benefits.

Any attempt to "monetize" something that was previous done for free is by definition imposing a cost on the people involved. This current trend of "ad supported" stuff is really just a complicated type of rent seeking. Rents are only justifiable when scarce resources are involved, so it should be obvious that most interactions on the internet cannot be monetized (anything that has effectively zero marginal cost is not scarce).

Re: The Devastating Effect of Ad-Blockers for Guru3D.com

#296

Post by pseudalopex »

jhall1468 wrote: post #167
bigbugbag wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There cannot be such a happy medium as long as ads are increasingly "targeted" and "third party". "Targeted ads" means surveillance, profiling, tracking, massive privacy invasion. "Third party" means poorer performance and having no control on your main source of revenue (see the stories about google censoring content on google ads based websites). Duckduckgo makes a good case for non-targeted ads while still being p…

> Duckduckgo makes a good case for non-targeted ads while stille being profitable. So there is a happy medium and, in your opinion, it's non-targeted ads. Yet uBlock and uBlock Origin and the millions of people that use them are blocking DuckDuckGo ads. piwik is an open-source, locally installed, piece of analytic's software that is blocked by default in the above AND in adblock. So you are making an argument that is…

Sure, it's hard to imagine any objection to DuckDuckGo's ads that wouldn't apply to advertising in general. They're unobtrusive, clearly marked, at least somewhat relevant, supposedly non-targeted, and apparently served from the same domain without a bunch of extra JavaScript. Privacy is a big part of the DDG brand, so lying about targeting would be risky.

But most ads and most sites aren't like that. How are people supposed to know which are trustworthy?

Re: The Devastating Effect of Ad-Blockers for Guru3D.com

#297

Post by fromMars »

jwmerrill wrote: post #103
fromMars wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am also not a fan of annoying ads and maybe I am just a crotchety old guy, but, IMO, using an Ad Blocker and viewing content is theft. If one is concerned with privacy, there are alternative measures such as cookie blocking options, legislation, etc. If the ad formats are annoying then the right thing to do is to let the publisher know and work out a way to pay for the content ad-free or just stop using the site. I…

> using an Ad Blocker and viewing content is theft. Here's a different POV. Using an ad blocker is not theft: it's a negotiation. When I click on a link to your site from a site like HN, I have not implicitly agreed to whatever terms you would like to impose on me. I can't even really know them ahead of time. Instead, I'm sending my User Agent to negotiate fetching some resources. If I decline to fetch your ads, you…

You make an interesting point about visiting a site that you are unfamiliar with.

But, for that really to be an equitable negotiation, IMO, these ad-blockers should send a header that informs the content provider that they will be blocking ads and the site can choose whether or not to serve them content.

Re: The Devastating Effect of Ad-Blockers for Guru3D.com

#298

Post by beagle3 »

mozumder wrote: post #214
intrasight wrote: post #113

I use uBlock Origin. I don't block ads - I block 3rd party requests. People that complain about ad blocking are indeed missing the mark. I'm fine with ads - really. But if you want them seen, you are going to have to serve them yourself. There is no going backwards - for reasons spelled out by others in this thread. So if your business depends on ads, then you are in the ad business. Web sites are going to have to be…

So, they make a CMS plugin that serves ads from same origin, instead of different origin. How would that help your user experience? (it might.. dunno)

For once, they would not (easily) be correlating my data with other sites. Also, they would have more liability for choosing their ads so they do not include malware (a liability that Yahoo and friends have somehow been able to avoid, but shouldn't have)

Re: The Devastating Effect of Ad-Blockers for Guru3D.com

#299

Post by BogusIKnow »

cpeterso wrote: post #199
BogusIKnow wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not reading them is the same as blocking them. To gain moral high ground people who compare adblocking to theft are required to read every ad on every website they encounter. The moral distinction between "I do not read ads" and "I block ads" is an illusion.

> The moral distinction between "I do not read ads" and "I block ads" is an illusion. Do not some ad networks pay content providers for "impressions", regardless of whether the ads are clicked? In that case, loading the ads without reading them is not the same as not loading them.

My prediction for the future: Ad blockers will load ads but not display them as more and more websites will block visitors who block them.

Re: The Devastating Effect of Ad-Blockers for Guru3D.com

#300

Post by mozumder »

beagle3 wrote: post #298
mozumder wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, they make a CMS plugin that serves ads from same origin, instead of different origin. How would that help your user experience? (it might.. dunno)

For once, they would not (easily) be correlating my data with other sites. Also, they would have more liability for choosing their ads so they do not include malware (a liability that Yahoo and friends have somehow been able to avoid, but shouldn't have)

They could correlate with other sites with a back-end system that shares cookie data.
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