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Ad blocker that clicks on the ads

dhowe.github.io

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Re: Ad blocker that clicks on the ads

#131

Post by spain »

justinpaulson wrote: post #93

"AdNauseam serves as a means of amplifying users' discontent with advertising networks that disregard privacy and facilitate bulk surveillance agendas." Is it really a privacy issue to track what ads you click and use that information to target advertisements to you later? I never understand the outrage against targeted ads. You are going to get ads no matter what. That is how "free" content works. Would you rather t…

>Is it really a privacy issue to track what ads you click and use that information to target advertisements to you later?

I found it hard to reply to this and I think its because you framed the question in a strange way. Targeted advertisement is not only based on what ads you click, but also the sites you visit and the stuff you view on them. If targeted advertising only worked based on what you'd click I wouldn't have a problem with it since I never click ads and it would be that easy to opt-out of it.

Targeted advertising itself is a whole other thing. In order for it to work, they need to gather data about you and this doesn't always happen in obvious ways (e.g. clicking on an ad) and that means you can't always opt-out of it, which makes it a breach of privacy in my book.

Re: Ad blocker that clicks on the ads

#132

Post by cousin_it »

jbigelow76 wrote: post #73
forca wrote: post #19

I realize this won't be popular, but I really have no feelings for ad networks. - They allow shoddy security on their servers - They track users against their will - Info on me is sold w/o my knowledge or consent - Ads are a poor business model since they can be blocked - There is no moral imperative for me to view ads since I've paid to access the Interwebs I block all ads, tracking cookies, beacons, all of it... I…

Out of curiousity, if you were to go to one of your favorite sites that is currently ad supported, and the site admin presented a popup that states "We've detected you're using an ad blocker, we respectfully request not visiting our site." Would you respect the request or ignore it?

In the long run, ad blockers should evolve to become undetectable by websites. I don't see any way to reliably stop that from happening, without making the internet more Orwellian.

That said, I agree that if a website respectfully asks visitors with ad blockers to leave, then leaving is the nice thing to do.

Re: Ad blocker that clicks on the ads

#133

Post by tomp »

vonmoltke wrote: post #101
tomp wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a big difference between Google's AdWords and other advertising (including Google's AdSense). I universally oppose all advertisements (in the seconds sense), I even think that billboards in public should be banned. Advertisement like that is just pollution of the mind. However, However, I don't consider AdWords or bulletin board ads "advertisement" in the same sense of the word, because it's just showing you…

So, in other words advertising you like should be allowed but advertising you don't like should not be.

No, advertising you want should be allowed, while the advertising you never requested shouldn't be.

Re: Ad blocker that clicks on the ads

#134

Post by rip747 »

this is absolutely moronic and childish

if you don't want to see ads, use adblock and be done with it. why do you now have to be a child and "one-up" the ad agencies by sending fake clicks to the them?

you do know that legitimate businesses and people advertise on these networks and the only thing you're going to be doing is draining their accounts. if you _think_ you're hurting the ad networks themselves by use this extension, you are living in a fantasy world. i'm sure the ad networks are laughing their way to the bank with an extension like this.

Re: Ad blocker that clicks on the ads

#135

Post by xefer »

I honestly feel that blocking ads is a win for both the audience and those serving the ads.

I don't mean this to sound insulting but if you're not (let's say) "wise" enough to block ads, then you're exactly the target audience for 99% of the stuff out there.

This is similar to the way Nigerian scammers purposely use bad grammar to target the less sophisticated.

It's a win for the ad network because they're not wasting bandwidth pushing an ad to someone who would never consider whatever they're selling.

Re: Ad blocker that clicks on the ads

#136

Post by snsr »

justinpaulson wrote: post #93

"AdNauseam serves as a means of amplifying users' discontent with advertising networks that disregard privacy and facilitate bulk surveillance agendas." Is it really a privacy issue to track what ads you click and use that information to target advertisements to you later? I never understand the outrage against targeted ads. You are going to get ads no matter what. That is how "free" content works. Would you rather t…

"Is it really a privacy issue to track what ads you click and use that information to target advertisements to you later?"

Ad networks track quite a bit more information than just what ads you click.

Re: Ad blocker that clicks on the ads

#138

Post by orbifold »

rebel wrote: post #96
GhostCursor wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We don't agree with ads as a means for 'paying for your hosting and content'. Charge people for your content and hosting, but this ad business doesn't work because of one reason: the user has control now. Can't be as shady anymore.

Then don't visit those websites. If you haven't paid money to access the content, immediately turn away from websites that are free and ad supported. If you don't agree with it, why do you have the right to not only "steal" the content on the website, but also needlessly shut down their revenue source just because you not only want the data for free, but you actively want to harm this person supplying the data for fr…

An imperfect analogy would be street musicians, they play in the hope that some people give them money for it. You are hosting content and each person accessing it is perfectly free to display only parts of it, you have no right to enforce that the content has to be viewed in a specific way. If I click on a link to a website, I have no way of knowing whether it would display ads or not. Since I have blocked ads for years, now I am not even aware of how awful some of the sites look with ads (piratebay / facebook come to mind).

Re: Ad blocker that clicks on the ads

#139

Post by greyman »

hagbardgroup wrote: post #94
forca wrote: post #19

I realize this won't be popular, but I really have no feelings for ad networks. - They allow shoddy security on their servers - They track users against their will - Info on me is sold w/o my knowledge or consent - Ads are a poor business model since they can be blocked - There is no moral imperative for me to view ads since I've paid to access the Interwebs I block all ads, tracking cookies, beacons, all of it... I…

This is pretty close to ad fraud. However, I agree with you that display ad networks suck. I'm also not sold on the idea that the web should be free. The happy medium is to have users pay for content, making it so advertisers don't need to track users to verify that they're real humans, and improving the web for everyone except poor people. One way that this could be done is to use bitcoin for tiny micropayments, bil…

> I'm also not sold on the idea that the web should be free.

I see it exactly the opposite way. The web IS free, it works that way (unless someone erect a paywall, which I find perfectly acceptable), and no entity is entitled that the web should "provide" it a profitable business avenue. If someone successfully exploited the web and created a business relying on ads, that's fine, but he don't have an implicit right for that. Internet users are not obliged to display data he provides through http the way the creator expects.

Re: Ad blocker that clicks on the ads

#140

Post by [deleted] »

psykovsky wrote: post #61
smcg wrote: post #6

one of the main reasons why I use adblock is to avoid malware (either from sites that are malicious that I don't know about, or legitimate sites that have been compromised to display malware ads, or legit sites that use an ad provider that has been compromised to display malware ads)... so no, I do not want to click on those ads, thank you very much.

NoScript and domain blocking using the hosts file is the best I've found to stop tracking. AdBlock is such a resource hog...

[deleted]
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