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Adblock buying ads to advertise Adblock

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Re: Adblock buying ads to advertise Adblock

#31

Post by uptown »

painki11er wrote: post #29

I don't understand how ad-blocking is even legal. It's like stealing - stealing content for free, IMHO there's no difference between stealing MP3s and news or any other content. There's some kind of user agreement between websites and its users - "you can use our site for free, but you have to watch the ads". Adblock violates this agreement. The people responsible for this should be in prison, they're thieves. And I'…

If you choose not to read billboards displayed alongside highways, is that also stealing?

Re: Adblock buying ads to advertise Adblock

#32

Post by mcintyre1994 »

painki11er wrote: post #29

I don't understand how ad-blocking is even legal. It's like stealing - stealing content for free, IMHO there's no difference between stealing MP3s and news or any other content. There's some kind of user agreement between websites and its users - "you can use our site for free, but you have to watch the ads". Adblock violates this agreement. The people responsible for this should be in prison, they're thieves. And I'…

Do you feel that violating any user agreement should be illegal and those who do it "should be in prison"? Furthermore, where the user agreement isn't specifically given (eg a mandatory ToS), do you feel that any agreement the site owner can claim was implied (use the site for free, watch our ads) should be legally binding?

Re: Adblock buying ads to advertise Adblock

#33

Post by Kudos »

philliphaydon wrote: post #24
ErikHuisman wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Plus if Adblock is actually successful and the online advertising industry collapses, then they will be putting themselves out of business." Even worse. Some of these companies (not adblock) are asking protection money from big advertisers to be whitelisted. Mafia style.

A free service putting itself out of business... Can someone explain to me how that works?

> A free service putting itself out of business...

Are you suggesting a free service can't make enough money to operate a business? Man, how am I getting away with not paying for that Wikipedia subscription.

Adblock operates on donations and if it were to eliminate advertising, its current product would become useless.

Re: Adblock buying ads to advertise Adblock

#34

Post by dylangs1030 »

painki11er wrote: post #29

I don't understand how ad-blocking is even legal. It's like stealing - stealing content for free, IMHO there's no difference between stealing MP3s and news or any other content. There's some kind of user agreement between websites and its users - "you can use our site for free, but you have to watch the ads". Adblock violates this agreement. The people responsible for this should be in prison, they're thieves. And I'…

That's a little extreme...there's no law against blocking advertisements. And you're not seeing this from the perspective of AdBlock users.

They don't give a shit. To them the ads are just annoying and they're getting rid of them. They don't even read TOS agreements, let alone agree to some implicit contract where advertisements are required.

Also: nitpick. The people who created adblock aren't thieves in the same way the founders of the Pirate Bay aren't necessarily pirates. They themselves aren't stealing anything, just mass-producing a method whereby it's possible (in your opinion). I'm not trying to argue semantics, but if they were charged for something, it wouldn't be thievery.

Re: Adblock buying ads to advertise Adblock

#35

Post by kailuowang »

ErikHuisman wrote: post #17
dm2 wrote: post #13

How likely would advertisers be to refuse to allow the Adblock ads? I don't really have a problem with ads on websites, experienced users can easily block them, but I see no problem with providing ads for a free service. Many organizations only have three methods to generate revenue, either show advertisements, have paid memberships, or take donations. Google shows advertisements, Apple has paid memberships, Wikipedi…

"Plus if Adblock is actually successful and the online advertising industry collapses, then they will be putting themselves out of business." Even worse. Some of these companies (not adblock) are asking protection money from big advertisers to be whitelisted. Mafia style.

I think that's the only way add block remain operational

Re: Adblock buying ads to advertise Adblock

#36

Post by Kudos »

uptown wrote: post #31
painki11er wrote: post #29

I don't understand how ad-blocking is even legal. It's like stealing - stealing content for free, IMHO there's no difference between stealing MP3s and news or any other content. There's some kind of user agreement between websites and its users - "you can use our site for free, but you have to watch the ads". Adblock violates this agreement. The people responsible for this should be in prison, they're thieves. And I'…

If you choose not to read billboards displayed alongside highways, is that also stealing?

That's not exactly the same as the billboards effectively not existing for you like with adblock. You still see absorb the advertisement passively.

Re: Adblock buying ads to advertise Adblock

#37

Post by dylangs1030 »

ponyous wrote: post #22
jkhaxxe wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because I'm paying for the bandwidth, and because I'm there for the content, not the adverts, and because I can - it's my computer, I can decide what it does.

It's not your site, you cannot decide what it does. I mean really, blocking regular ads won't get us anywhere. It's like receiving free news every morning, but you have ordered a kid who delivers them to cut out ads.

Actually, you are explicitly allowed to decide what the site does, insofar as display is concerned. If it's client-side, you can do what you want. And blocking ads does get people somewhere - a less annoying internet.

As for your analogy...again, you're allowed to do that.

Re: Adblock buying ads to advertise Adblock

#38

Post by jonknee »

mjolk wrote: post #16
k_bx wrote: post #11

I'd understand the use of adblock that only blocks annoying ads, like pop-ups or animation / sound. But why would sane person block regular ads?

I'm not sure that I qualify as 'sane,' but I do it to block tracking/breadcrumb JS. I don't want to pay extra cash for a flight because airlines know that I've been looking extensively over the last few hours.

You can also just use an Incognito tab (or similar in your browser). AdBlock alone may not be enough to keep you out of tracking for comparison shopping.

Re: Adblock buying ads to advertise Adblock

#39

Post by adrianb »

painki11er wrote: post #29

I don't understand how ad-blocking is even legal. It's like stealing - stealing content for free, IMHO there's no difference between stealing MP3s and news or any other content. There's some kind of user agreement between websites and its users - "you can use our site for free, but you have to watch the ads". Adblock violates this agreement. The people responsible for this should be in prison, they're thieves. And I'…

Your TV's remote control should also not work during commercial breaks, otherwise you might change the channel and illegally watch the show.

Re: Adblock buying ads to advertise Adblock

#40

Post by dferlemann »

painki11er wrote: post #29

I don't understand how ad-blocking is even legal. It's like stealing - stealing content for free, IMHO there's no difference between stealing MP3s and news or any other content. There's some kind of user agreement between websites and its users - "you can use our site for free, but you have to watch the ads". Adblock violates this agreement. The people responsible for this should be in prison, they're thieves. And I'…

It's like a shopping a pantry store with a nasal smell blocker. How is that legal to block your nose while shopping here! It is stealing! Your logic is just perfect.
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