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How Wired Is Going to Handle Ad Blocking

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Re: How Wired Is Going to Handle Ad Blocking

#321

Post by zekevermillion »

ljoshua wrote: post #238

As has been mentioned elsewhere, my exact problem with this/Forbes approach/elsewhere is that there is no way that I want to suddenly start managing several new monthly subscriptions for all these outlets. I enjoy Wired, but the thought of adding yet another subscription to my monthly credit card statement is too great a cognitive load for me to want to make the jump. Also, if you were to subscribe to the dead tree v…

Publisher network with a single sub is a workable idea. This could happen, but from publisher's perspective may lead to further commoditzation of jouranlism as "content" to throw against subs. This is basically what cable TV is now, and I've noticed there's a bit of a race to the bottom in cable TV journalism, as well as advertising.

Re: How Wired Is Going to Handle Ad Blocking

#322

Post by Lawtonfogle »

chrischen wrote: post #212
thirdsun wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed. I think Wired, as well as other publishers, are missing the point here. I don't have any issue with ads in general - but if we're talking about ads that Wired has no control over and just fetches from a network, it's a whole different story. The same applies to ads that significantly increase page load times, bandwidth usage (I'm forced to use a metered LTE connection) or privacy concerns. Simple static ads w…

But most people who block ads just don't want to see ads. Your technical concerns are in the minority.

But I don't care enough to wipe out static in page ads, especially since those don't have the added cost of tracking me anymore than visiting the site does. In short, I still wouldn't like those adds, but I would like them a lot more than the ads I currently block.

Re: How Wired Is Going to Handle Ad Blocking

#323

Post by a3n »

fencepost wrote: post #65

I'm generally not inclined to fully whitelist anyplace because even if everything it loads today is safe, who's to say what's going to be loaded after the site gets hacked. That said, I tried to go through and do some allowing of requests and scripts for places I recognized, including whitelisting the site in Ghostery to keep it from interfering. After adding 19 separate exceptions in uMatrix for both whole domains a…

tl;dr: Their attack surface is huge. They probably don't even know at any moment why a page is pulling everything it pulls.

No thanks.

Re: How Wired Is Going to Handle Ad Blocking

#324

Post by fencepost »

sedatk wrote: post #164
fencepost wrote: post #65

I'm generally not inclined to fully whitelist anyplace because even if everything it loads today is safe, who's to say what's going to be loaded after the site gets hacked. That said, I tried to go through and do some allowing of requests and scripts for places I recognized, including whitelisting the site in Ghostery to keep it from interfering. After adding 19 separate exceptions in uMatrix for both whole domains a…

> who's to say what's going to be loaded after the site gets hacked when a site gets hacked, you get malicious content regardless you block ads or not.

That depends on whether they hack the site to actually feed the malicious content or just get enough of a foot in to get it linked from an actual hosting location. If what they have is a database hack where they can inject some content but don't have full control, they may be pushing links while trying to get further access.

Re: How Wired Is Going to Handle Ad Blocking

#325

Post by toyg »

elorant wrote: post #293
mikro2nd wrote: post #271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd buy into your idea with one addition: A "Refund" button at the bottom of the article that I can click to get my money back if the content ended up being low quality. That's a "No questions asked, no arguments given" refund, and it is my sole judgement as to what constitutes crappy quality. That might buy the publisher (a) some credibility, and (b) an incentive to publish decent quality articles and not clickbait…

The refund option isn't fair for the publisher. When you visit a restaurant do you get a refund if you don't like the food? Or a theater? I don't need a refund, if I pay for a few articles and they prove to be crap I won't visit the medium again. Besides we're talking about cents here, it's not like you bought a Picasso only to realize after a couple of months that you don't really like it.

> When you visit a restaurant do you get a refund if you don't like the food? Or a theater?

Weeeell, some people do exactly that (and have done since the beginning of time, as popularized in folk songs). The iOS AppStore does that, and that's also "pennies". Amazon does that. It's no small part of their success.

It's a question of self-belief. A seller who is confident about the quality of his delivery will not mind guaranteeing refunds, because chances are that very few people will take him up on it. Considering your costs are pretty much the same whether you serve 10,000 or 1,000 webpages, it doesn't really matter if you get 9,995 or 995 refunds.

Re: How Wired Is Going to Handle Ad Blocking

#326

Post by a3n »

Good. I've been waiting for sites to stop whining, grow a pair and refuse me and my fellow blockers. I can get along without them, the quality of my life won't suffer a single decimal place, and they'll gain ... well, I don't know what they'll gain other than "winning," but whatever.

But I guess one thing to consider is, even if I block, people who I send links to may or may not block. There's some math that probably needs to be worked through.

Re: How Wired Is Going to Handle Ad Blocking

#328

Post by fencepost »

thirdsun wrote: post #154
fencepost wrote: post #65

I'm generally not inclined to fully whitelist anyplace because even if everything it loads today is safe, who's to say what's going to be loaded after the site gets hacked. That said, I tried to go through and do some allowing of requests and scripts for places I recognized, including whitelisting the site in Ghostery to keep it from interfering. After adding 19 separate exceptions in uMatrix for both whole domains a…

Agreed. I think Wired, as well as other publishers, are missing the point here. I don't have any issue with ads in general - but if we're talking about ads that Wired has no control over and just fetches from a network, it's a whole different story. The same applies to ads that significantly increase page load times, bandwidth usage (I'm forced to use a metered LTE connection) or privacy concerns. Simple static ads w…

I don't even require that they be static - I find ads relevant to the content I'm looking at useful sometimes, and particularly for searches I may end up going with something advertised in the results (generally on DuckDuckGo, occasionally on Google and Google Shopping).

What I object to is the cesspool of unidentifiable tracking and god-knows-what-else crud.

Re: How Wired Is Going to Handle Ad Blocking

#329

Post by CaptSpify »

elorant wrote: post #293
mikro2nd wrote: post #271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd buy into your idea with one addition: A "Refund" button at the bottom of the article that I can click to get my money back if the content ended up being low quality. That's a "No questions asked, no arguments given" refund, and it is my sole judgement as to what constitutes crappy quality. That might buy the publisher (a) some credibility, and (b) an incentive to publish decent quality articles and not clickbait…

The refund option isn't fair for the publisher. When you visit a restaurant do you get a refund if you don't like the food? Or a theater? I don't need a refund, if I pay for a few articles and they prove to be crap I won't visit the medium again. Besides we're talking about cents here, it's not like you bought a Picasso only to realize after a couple of months that you don't really like it.

I think you have a good point, but I would liken it to: If I go to a restaurant, and they give me raw chicken, then no, I'm not going to give them my money.

I guess, it's a bad analogy, as food that makes you sick is easier to discern than "shoddy article with no journalistic integrity"

Re: How Wired Is Going to Handle Ad Blocking

#330

Post by exodust »

For argument's sake, imagine there were 1,000 people using adblock on Wired.com. They read 10 articles per week, some of which they actually enjoy.

Suddenly, they disable their adblockers.

Now, how much weekly ad revenue does Wired earn from those 1,000 visitors? There's no way it's $1,000 worth of ad revenue.

In which case, you could be forgiven for thinking this move by Wired is not about solving the website adblock problem, but more a subscription drive.

As an occasional reader I want a better deal on the subscription. Say, 20 cents per week. Apply a quota, cap my plan, all good. But $1 per week is not happening, and whitelisting the site is not happening. That's just me.

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