Live data from Hacker News

A note on the argument about the 'morality' of adblockers

utcc.utoronto.ca

1–10 of 227 posts

Re: A note on the argument about the 'morality' of adblockers

#2
On a broad scale, we have moved from a culture of ads as info, to ads that push you to buy whatever the factory produces. This huge supply and false demand for things we don't really need has a huge impact of consumption culture, personal distress - an ongoing feeling that you always lack something, ecological waste and people wasting their hard earned dollars on things they don't really need. God bless ad blockers.

Re: A note on the argument about the 'morality' of adblockers

#4
Kill ads using a host file. You have to update it every few weeks but it makes the web so much easier to look at.

Using a Hosts File To Make The Internet Not Suck (as much) || http://someonewhocares.org/hosts/

For backup blocking...

Adblock Plus - Surf the web without annoying ads! || https://adblockplus.org/

Re: A note on the argument about the 'morality' of adblockers

#5

On a broad scale, we have moved from a culture of ads as info, to ads that push you to buy whatever the factory produces. This huge supply and false demand for things we don't really need has a huge impact of consumption culture, personal distress - an ongoing feeling that you always lack something, ecological waste and people wasting their hard earned dollars on things they don't really need. God bless ad blockers.

But its the content creators being punished, not the ad companies. If anything ad blockers are in their interest since the type of person who blocks ads is probably the type of person to ignore them anyway.

Re: A note on the argument about the 'morality' of adblockers

#6
I envision a future where the default mode is silence, and all advertising is opt-in. If I need to buy a t-shirt, I press a button that temporarily subscribes me to a "channel" of advertisements from t-shirt brands, along with whatever relevant preferences I decide to filter the ads by. In other words, I give companies explicit permission to advertise to me. Once I buy a t-shirt and fulfill the need, I unsubscribe from the channel and it's back to silence.

The benefit to users is obvious. But there's also a lot of benefits to advertisers. After all, what can be better than a prospective customer saying, "I need to buy something, show me ads"? Instead we spend untold billions developing technologies and algorithms to predict people's behavior and end up invading their privacy and pissing them off.

Re: A note on the argument about the 'morality' of adblockers

#7
post #5

On a broad scale, we have moved from a culture of ads as info, to ads that push you to buy whatever the factory produces. This huge supply and false demand for things we don't really need has a huge impact of consumption culture, personal distress - an ongoing feeling that you always lack something, ecological waste and people wasting their hard earned dollars on things they don't really need. God bless ad blockers.

But its the content creators being punished, not the ad companies. If anything ad blockers are in their interest since the type of person who blocks ads is probably the type of person to ignore them anyway.

>But its the content creators being punished, not the ad companies.

It's both, right?

Re: A note on the argument about the 'morality' of adblockers

#8
"People are taking the piss out of you everyday. They butt into your life, take a cheap shot at you and then disappear. They leer at you from tall buildings and make you feel small. They make flippant comments from buses that imply you’re not sexy enough and that all the fun is happening somewhere else. They are on TV making your girlfriend feel inadequate. They have access to the most sophisticated technology the world has ever seen and they bully you with it. They are The Advertisers and they are laughing at you. You, however, are forbidden to touch them. Trademarks, intellectual property rights and copyright law mean advertisers can say what they like wherever they like with total impunity. Fuck that. Any advert in a public space that gives you no choice whether you see it or not is yours. It’s yours to take, re-arrange and re-use. You can do whatever you like with it. Asking for permission is like asking to keep a rock someone just threw at your head. You owe the companies nothing. Less than nothing, you especially don’t owe them any courtesy. They owe you. They have re-arranged the world to put themselves in front of you. They never asked for your permission, don’t even start asking for theirs."

Re: A note on the argument about the 'morality' of adblockers

#9
Could not agree more. And it doesn't just cover display ads, but marketing emails and social media posts too. All equally odious.

An entire industry predicated on the idea of getting me to pay for something I don't want, and using my bandwidth to do it. Every advertiser tries to justify it, too.

"We only send emails to people who want them" or other such tripe. Nobody wants to be part of a sales funnel. If the product is actually good and useful, it will sell itself by word of mouth.

Re: A note on the argument about the 'morality' of adblockers

#10

On a broad scale, we have moved from a culture of ads as info, to ads that push you to buy whatever the factory produces. This huge supply and false demand for things we don't really need has a huge impact of consumption culture, personal distress - an ongoing feeling that you always lack something, ecological waste and people wasting their hard earned dollars on things they don't really need. God bless ad blockers.

[deleted]
Post reply on HN