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“We're considering banning domains that require users to disable ad blockers”

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131–140 of 259 posts

Re: “We're considering banning domains that require users to disable ad blockers”

#131
Yes, ban both adblock blockers and paywalls.

The first are overtly refusing to accept users' terms. The second are trying to have their cake and eat it too: viral content propogation whilst refusing to present content to those who come at it via link aggregators and discussion sites such as Reddit.

Both actively thwart Reddit's intended aim: informed discussion of an article _by having read it_. If they don't want to participate, then don't participate.

Moreover, advertising, the advertising infrastructure, and multiple aspects of it are creating a seriously problematic WWW information structure: crap content, user-hostile design, hugely excessive bandwidth usage, slow browser response, and privacy and security risks galore. At the same time, the actual creative producers and journalists responsible for primary content are hugely undercompensated.

Eliminating the existing advertising regime would allow all of these to be addressed.

That said, high-quality information has a very serious revenue problem, and I'd like to highlight that.

It's a topic I've explored in some depth, "Why Information Goods and Markets are a Poor Match" (https://np.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/comments/2vm2da/why_info...). Or if you prefer a real economist, Hal Varian's "Markets for Information Goods" (http://people.ischool.berkeley.edu/~hal/Papers/japan/index.h...).

A frequently proposed solution is micropayments. I don't see those as viable, Clay Shirkey, Nick Szabo, and Andrew Odlyzko have all written at length on why not.

Rather, a universal content tax or broadband tax seems an alternative. Phil Hunt of Pirate Party UK and Richard M. Stallman of the Free Software Foundation have suggested this, I'd made my own universal content proposal some time back (https://np.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/comments/1uotb3/a_modest...)

I've also done some back-of-the-envelope calculations on amounts. _Total_ global ad spend in 2013 was $500 billion, online was $100 billion. If _only_ the world's richest 1 billion (roughly: US, EU, Japan, Australia) were to contribute to this, the tax would be $100/year to eliminate _all_ online adverts, and $500/year for _all advertising entirely_. The money could fund existing creatives -- writers, editors, film producers, journalists, and musicians -- at roughly _twice_ today's compensation.

It's worth a thought.

Re: “We're considering banning domains that require users to disable ad blockers”

#132

Yes, ban both adblock blockers and paywalls. The first are overtly refusing to accept users' terms. The second are trying to have their cake and eat it too: viral content propogation whilst refusing to present content to those who come at it via link aggregators and discussion sites such as Reddit. Both actively thwart Reddit's intended aim: informed discussion of an article _by having read it_. If they don't want to…

"The first are overtly refusing to accept users' terms."

As they are refusing to accept theirs :)

This is just contract negotiation. I'm not sure why you have an issue with it (or would desire to ban it). You have told them "we want to change the terms'. They are saying "no". Great, so move if you don't like that supplier.

Humorously, the thing you (and reddit) want to perform by banning is known as "concerted refusal to deal": http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/concerted-refus...

Re: “We're considering banning domains that require users to disable ad blockers”

#133
This industry is ripe for innovation. I agree that the state of malware being served through Ad Exchanges is grotesque and I fully employ my ad blocker everywhere.

Here is the thing I just dont get. Why doesnt some tech savvy organization create a white label solution that companies can either slap a subdomain on and invite "Customers" to fill ad supply. Self host the curated assets through said white label solution. Moderate with sophisticated computers that are not subject to the vast majority of mal ware (excluding 0-day obviously), and move on. Im sure someone could easily serve the ads off of the main domain anyway to circumvent all of the ad blockers on subdomains.

This is a perspective from the outside looking in, but people seem to just complain about the problem instead of looking for solutions.

EDIT: BAH, so there is a conversation from last year. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10221859

Re: “We're considering banning domains that require users to disable ad blockers”

#134
post #97

Maciej (HN handle 'idlewords') has an interesting take on this that I'm struggling to find in my history right now. The basic idea is that all of the data these companies collect is still ultimately useless in practice. We still don't have advertising that is even close to being relevant. But the data retains its toxic qualities (of being a database of every action I take on the Internet and some in the real world).…

Do you use YouTube while logged in? In my experience, the content recommendation on YouTube is the best. I've been learning about electronics and watching a few videos about it. Now YouTube recommends me new content and channels that are extremely relevant. My brother is into guitars, and his frontpage is all about that.

They're not great. About 40% of the recommendations are things I'd never watch, 40% are things I've already watched.

YT has trouble figuring me out because I watch a lot of gamers that also appeal to a younger audience (eg Yogscast). I get recommended a lot of terrible stuff targeted at that audience that I have no interest in (eg PewDiePie and Markiplier).

I have no idea why they recommend stuff I've already watched.

Re: “We're considering banning domains that require users to disable ad blockers”

#135
post #63

I think HN should automatically penalize the scores of paywalled sites. Although I'm not sure HN's pro-corporate politics would ever allow it.

I just disagree. It's up for the community to decide what's useful and what's not by voting on it. If you don't like the link - don't vote. If enough people like it, then it's fair for others to see it. That's how communities work, you can't change rules to please everyone because you never will.

You cannot down vote links on HN. You can flag them but doing so on otherwise legitimate articles might be frowned upon and could lead to voting penalties.

Re: “We're considering banning domains that require users to disable ad blockers”

#136
post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No one is saying "high quality" journalists should work for free (although their employers would probably prefer it), only that they can no longer depend on advertising for revenue. If companies want to remain on the web and continue making money they're going to have to be more creative, begging people to view their ads by blocking ad blockers (while understandable) probably isn't going to work in the long run.

The parent was railing against both adwalls and paywalls. If you don't want advertising and refuse to pay for content, I don't see how that's anything less than expecting free journalism.

Fair enough, but there are valid reasons to object to paywalled content being posted to a news aggregator like HN other than wanting everything free. Content not available for everyone to read leads to low quality conversations dominated by complaints about the paywall. Unfortunately, people still complain even when there is a workaround. Showing partial content then asking for payment to read the rest seems like a dishonest tactic, and it kind of is.

If people don't want to pay for anything on principle, then there's not much sites can do about that either. Paywalls are a better option than advertising but sites are still probably going to lose a lot of revenue either way.

Re: “We're considering banning domains that require users to disable ad blockers”

#137
post #15
post #6

As noted other comments, this would only apply to the /r/technology subreddit. The general feedback is in favor of blocking these types of sites. I'm pretty amazed at the current state of ads. With multiple ad exchanges, private sellers, and static brand deals, the entire serving process is a mess and users are paying for it. I don't think publishing websites are being malicious; they're incentived to make money and…

Of course they are malicious. They're serving the high-profit ads, which obviously includes malware, where they could be serving low-profit, safe (but boring) ads. That's equivalent to pharmacists selling illegal drugs (heroin, cocaine) simply because they obviously make them more profits.

You've clearly never worked with ad networks. Even Google serves up malicious ads every once in a while.

Re: “We're considering banning domains that require users to disable ad blockers”

#138
post #97

Maciej (HN handle 'idlewords') has an interesting take on this that I'm struggling to find in my history right now. The basic idea is that all of the data these companies collect is still ultimately useless in practice. We still don't have advertising that is even close to being relevant. But the data retains its toxic qualities (of being a database of every action I take on the Internet and some in the real world).…

Do you use YouTube while logged in? In my experience, the content recommendation on YouTube is the best. I've been learning about electronics and watching a few videos about it. Now YouTube recommends me new content and channels that are extremely relevant. My brother is into guitars, and his frontpage is all about that.

It's not bad, but it doesn't seem get the hint if you don't care about something, even you go out of your way and click the "No interest" option. Clicked that 20 times for a channel, it still showed me suggestions from them.

Re: “We're considering banning domains that require users to disable ad blockers”

#139
post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The parent was railing against both adwalls and paywalls. If you don't want advertising and refuse to pay for content, I don't see how that's anything less than expecting free journalism.

Fair enough, but there are valid reasons to object to paywalled content being posted to a news aggregator like HN other than wanting everything free. Content not available for everyone to read leads to low quality conversations dominated by complaints about the paywall. Unfortunately, people still complain even when there is a workaround. Showing partial content then asking for payment to read the rest seems like a d…

> Showing partial content then asking for payment to read the rest seems like a dishonest tactic, and it kind of is.

How is that dishonest? The alternative would be far worse (demanding payment without a preview of what you're paying for).

The problem with posting paywalled content isn't posting paywalled content. It's the entitled people who can't even be bothered to use well-known workarounds and instead completely derail discussions on political grounds.

Re: “We're considering banning domains that require users to disable ad blockers”

#140

All of this was started by a false accusation. The same guy that posted the tweet that went vial later said he was mistaken: http://www.ghettoforensics.com/2016/03/of-malware-and-adware... "Here is what is clear: The advertisement was not malware. Forbes is still whitelisted from my ad-blocker. We have no evidence of what exactly created this pop-up."

The bottom line, though, is that ads DO serve malware. I work for an endpoint protection company and the most common traces we get from our customers are ones that originate from ads on legitimate websites.
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