AdNauseam: Fight Back Against Advertising Networks and Privacy Abuse

#1

Post by deletia » Tue, Dec 20, 2016, 6:52 PM UTC

AdNauseam: Fight Back Against Advertising Networks and Privacy Abuse
github.com

Re: AdNauseam: Fight Back Against Advertising Networks and Privacy Abuse

#2

Post by gcb0 » Tue, Dec 20, 2016, 7:01 PM UTC

this is so crazy it might work.

Automatically sending the click beacon for every blocked ad will increase advertising costs but it will also increase vendor profits, motivating them to add even more ads.

Until the 3rd party click validators start to filter out clicks generated by this somehow. And then we will have yet another arms-race besides the adblockers one.

Re: AdNauseam: Fight Back Against Advertising Networks and Privacy Abuse

#3

Post by mikestew » Tue, Dec 20, 2016, 8:17 PM UTC

As someone in another, related, thread said: AdNauseum users will account for X% of clicks, and advertisers/publishers will simply take clicks - X% to get the real number, and we're back to where we started. (EDIT: credit where credit is due: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13221653)

Re: AdNauseam: Fight Back Against Advertising Networks and Privacy Abuse

#4

Post by sanbor » Tue, Dec 20, 2016, 8:20 PM UTC

mikestew wrote: post #3

As someone in another, related, thread said: AdNauseum users will account for X% of clicks, and advertisers/publishers will simply take clicks - X% to get the real number, and we're back to where we started. (EDIT: credit where credit is due: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13221653 )

It would take a while for the ad industry to adapt to that. Also there might be technical limitations.

Re: AdNauseam: Fight Back Against Advertising Networks and Privacy Abuse

#5

Post by lotsoflumens » Tue, Dec 20, 2016, 8:23 PM UTC

gcb0 wrote: post #2

this is so crazy it might work. Automatically sending the click beacon for every blocked ad will increase advertising costs but it will also increase vendor profits, motivating them to add even more ads. Until the 3rd party click validators start to filter out clicks generated by this somehow. And then we will have yet another arms-race besides the adblockers one.

We are all going to need a lot more bandwidth!

Re: AdNauseam: Fight Back Against Advertising Networks and Privacy Abuse

#6

Post by eli » Tue, Dec 20, 2016, 8:24 PM UTC

sanbor wrote: post #4

mikestew wrote: post #3

As someone in another, related, thread said: AdNauseum users will account for X% of clicks, and advertisers/publishers will simply take clicks - X% to get the real number, and we're back to where we started. (EDIT: credit where credit is due: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13221653 )

It would take a while for the ad industry to adapt to that. Also there might be technical limitations.

It's essentially just another form of click fraud, which is a tricky problem but the ad industry already largely has tools in place to deal with it.

Re: AdNauseam: Fight Back Against Advertising Networks and Privacy Abuse

#7

Post by ljoshua » Tue, Dec 20, 2016, 8:25 PM UTC

I dislike ads as much as the next person (and indeed run uBlock on nearly every site), but I'd feel wrong using this because of the cost to the advertisers. It would be further lining the pockets of ad networks while increasing expenses for, at least in some cases, legitimate businesses. Sure, it's a bit of fighting fire with fire, but I'd rather not be an unnecessary expense for someone in my fight against intrusive ads.

Re: AdNauseam: Fight Back Against Advertising Networks and Privacy Abuse

#8

Post by ma2rten » Tue, Dec 20, 2016, 8:28 PM UTC

sanbor wrote: post #4

mikestew wrote: post #3

As someone in another, related, thread said: AdNauseum users will account for X% of clicks, and advertisers/publishers will simply take clicks - X% to get the real number, and we're back to where we started. (EDIT: credit where credit is due: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13221653 )

It would take a while for the ad industry to adapt to that. Also there might be technical limitations.

I was the one who made the original comment. The ad industry does not have to adopt at all, because they use a bidding system. Just advertisers have to adopt by bidding less. Sophisticated advertisers will automatically do that because they keep track of conversions.

Re: AdNauseam: Fight Back Against Advertising Networks and Privacy Abuse

#9

Post by eli » Tue, Dec 20, 2016, 8:29 PM UTC

gcb0 wrote: post #2

this is so crazy it might work. Automatically sending the click beacon for every blocked ad will increase advertising costs but it will also increase vendor profits, motivating them to add even more ads. Until the 3rd party click validators start to filter out clicks generated by this somehow. And then we will have yet another arms-race besides the adblockers one.

Not really. It mostly just devalues the ad units. Since none of these fake clicks result in any action on the advertiser's site, the per-click price the advertiser is willing to spend goes way down.

And at least in its current implementation, I would guess most 3rd party click validators already filter it out.

(disclaimer: ad-supported news sites pay my bills)

Re: AdNauseam: Fight Back Against Advertising Networks and Privacy Abuse

#10

Post by eli » Tue, Dec 20, 2016, 8:31 PM UTC

ljoshua wrote: post #7

I dislike ads as much as the next person (and indeed run uBlock on nearly every site), but I'd feel wrong using this because of the cost to the advertisers. It would be further lining the pockets of ad networks while increasing expenses for, at least in some cases, legitimate businesses. Sure, it's a bit of fighting fire with fire, but I'd rather not be an unnecessary expense for someone in my fight against intrusive…

Advertisers will just lower their bids, so it mostly hurts the publishers of the websites you visit.