No - but I do use a HOSTS file
Poll: Do you use an ad-blocker?
11–20 of 102 posts
Re: Poll: Do you use an ad-blocker?
#12Yes. Even if I didn't it's pretty easy to spot which things are ads and would never click on them.
People say it's bad to use ad blockers because the site isn't making money off of you, but you could also say now the advertiser isn't losing money on you.
Re: Poll: Do you use an ad-blocker?
#13I would vote for a third option along the lines of "I allow ads but block flash or don't have it installed." I used to have an adblocker installed, but switched to blocking Flash as soon as I discovered the ability for Chrome to disable flash components until I click on them. This lets the good sites with unobtrusive ads still get their impressions and hides all of the really bad things like ads with video or sound.…
Good idea. Done.
Re: Poll: Do you use an ad-blocker?
#14I use different mechanisms for different reasons.
I used to have Flash on click-to-play, but then YouTube feeds me flash videos, so now I've had Flash turned off for a while. I don't really miss it. The reason is that Flash drains my battery and HTML videos can be watched in a resource-saving way with VLC (or just in-browser).
I use ABP because it blocks other animated content that drains my battery. I wouldn't mind text ads. In addition, most news sites I visit regularly are unblocked because I want to support them. Interestingly, without flash there are hardly any ads left.
I block all 3rd-party cookies (have for 15 years), on my Desktop and Android Firefox, because I can, because I've never encountered anything that didn't work, and because where I surf is no 3rd party site's business. If you want statistics on me visiting YOUR SITE, just use your web server, why not?
I use Ghostery because it further blocks attempts to track me.
Re: Poll: Do you use an ad-blocker?
#15Voted 'yes,' but much less so than your average ad-blocker. I blacklist rather than whitelist, which is probably the opposite behavior of most people with blockers.
I want to support sites that I consume content from, so by default I only block tracking beacons, not ads. I turn on content-blocking (or disable plug-ins/javascript) for specific sites when their ads make the site unusable. For example, nfl.com text articles used to not load for ages while video content loaded (it got better), and currently having the SF Chronicle open in one tab will make youtube stutter in other tabs.
Re: Poll: Do you use an ad-blocker?
#16no, don't be parasite
Loading ads and not clicking or accidentally clicking on ads you have no intention of pursuing would also be parasitic behavior by that logic. The hurt party is just the advertisers instead of the webmasters.
Re: Poll: Do you use an ad-blocker?
#17I use uBlock mainly for performance reasons and not that I don't like ads, I will usually whitelist sites that are not crazy with ads and that I want to support.
Re: Poll: Do you use an ad-blocker?
#18Yes. I use Ghostery, though, rather than AdBlock.
It seems more configurable and makes it easier to allow stuff like Google Analytics while still removing most of the obnoxious ads that 1) Plague my vision and 2) cause websites to load slow on my sub-par connection.
Re: Poll: Do you use an ad-blocker?
#19Not specifically, but noScript + flashblock ends up blocking many adverts.
Re: Poll: Do you use an ad-blocker?
#20Ad blockers are easily fingerprintable, which is why I block ad trackers from my /etc/hosts file, using this wonderful list: http://someonewhocares.org/hosts/
You can also set up a cron job to periodically fetch and overwrite with an updated copy, such as once a week or so.