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The ethics of modern web ad-blocking

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Re: The ethics of modern web ad-blocking

#91

Post by fweespeech »

RodericDay wrote: post #7

What I really can't understand, that permeates this whole discussion, is plenty of people that try to sell the idea that ads let us have content "for free", and that all we have to tolerate is "a little annoyance". It's insane. If companies are buying ad-space, it's because they expect to get more business in return. This means that someone out there is being influenced by said ads, so that if the content cost X to p…

> It's insane. If companies are buying ad-space, it's because they expect to get more business in return. This means that someone out there is being influenced by said ads, so that if the content cost X to put up online (hosting, funding its creation), someone is paying X+(ad company overhead) for it.

Yes, and if you paid directly you'd have X+(B2C payment processing overhead) which is more than B2B.

> We could pay X for the content, and not incur the overhead.

That is really not true. Have you ever tried to support N customers instead of 20 businesses?

There are some very major costs in providing any kind of support, even if its just for billing.

You are simply unrealistic if you believe that ad companies have higher overhead than providing large scale customer support. I know someone who runs a [small] ad network and his overhead is a fraction of what it'd cost me to run a similar subscription based model.

Re: The ethics of modern web ad-blocking

#92

Post by eddd »

tremon wrote: post #88
eddd wrote: post #71

The average cost for displaying and ad is 0.005$. I am assuming that 30% of that goes to publisher. Would you pay 0.005*0.3 = 0.0015$ per page view? I would.

Not without a restitution possibility. I will not pay anything for domain parking or site rehashing (sedo, quorra, expertsexchange), but I would pay for e.g. stackexchange or eurekalert.

But still, concept of paying the same (or even higher) rate for page view is not that crazy.

Re: The ethics of modern web ad-blocking

#93

Post by njharman »

reasonishy wrote: post #13
RodericDay wrote: post #7

What I really can't understand, that permeates this whole discussion, is plenty of people that try to sell the idea that ads let us have content "for free", and that all we have to tolerate is "a little annoyance". It's insane. If companies are buying ad-space, it's because they expect to get more business in return. This means that someone out there is being influenced by said ads, so that if the content cost X to p…

Advertising is the method most people use to discover new products/services. Of course these days the line is often blurred. So half the posts on HN could be adverts, and you wouldn't really know about it. In fact lots of them are adverts. But just think about how the world would work without advertising. How would you know there's a star wars movie coming out? How would you know about new products and services you m…

> Advertising is the method most people use to discover new products/services.

Prove it. I can just as easily pull out my ass "Word of mouth and browsing in-store or online is the method most people use to discover new products/services."

Re: The ethics of modern web ad-blocking

#94

Post by bediger4000 »

danielweber wrote: post #48
bediger4000 wrote: post #5

How is ad blocking an ethical issue? I get to control my computer, at least until some legislation passes that says I don't. Even if I don't control my computer entirely, how about my DNS? I have a lot of the more intrusive domains (tynt, doubleclick, etc) set up as 127.0.0.1 in my dnsmasq config. The "whose computer is it anyway" question seems key here. In order to make advertising possible, we have to take control…

"It can't be unethical because it's not illegal" is question-begging.

But we see the "You have to do this (possibly) unethical thing because it's the law" (capital punishment, imprisonment for victimless crimes, etc) all the time. Why not the opposite of "it's ethical because it's the law"?

Re: The ethics of modern web ad-blocking

#95

Post by adrusi »

Joeboy wrote: post #61

Aren't we just going to start making websites that don't serve the content until they've served the ads?

Well no, because then the page would load way too slowly and users would click away and avoid the site in the future.

But suppose publishers did go this route. Adblocking software would just evolve to match it. They would fetch the ads from the server, possibly via a proxy, run their scripts, feeding bogus statistics to the trackers, and then not display the ads.

Users have the right to control their computers however they want. Trying to limit how the user can use their computer to have better control over your content is DRM. And, in fact, the only effective way of preventing adblockers would be to use traditional DRM software, since we have laws saying that users can't circumvent them.

Re: The ethics of modern web ad-blocking

#96

Post by SilasX »

codezero wrote: post #64
SilasX wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Similarly, I've wondered why advertisers don't just change how they do the ads: if the ads are non-standard size, are non animated, and link back to a legit landing page from non/shady domain, what adblocker covers that? Wouldn't that just look like ordinary site content? Or do they really update them that quickly and narrowly?

Most ads are served by an ad network which requires third party involvement. Adblockers block those. It's not manageable to post individual ads.

But why can't they arrange some alternate setup where the main site serves the ads (relaying the ads from another server) rather than the ad network? It would be roughly the same effort from the site owner.

Re: The ethics of modern web ad-blocking

#97

Post by seanconaty »

I'm glad someone wrote this article. I used to work at an ad network and for that reason, I've ethically chosen not to use an ad blocker. But I do agree that consolidation of tracking, over-abundance of ad spots and nasty performance have reached new lows that I've considered using one.

I think it would be nice if publishers just went back to tags. Script tags and iframes and flash give to much power and result in lots of performance issues.

You can still track and consolidate with an img tag but the tracking is limited to what's in the http headers.

Re: The ethics of modern web ad-blocking

#98

Post by otis_inf »

arenaninja wrote: post #86

I whitelist ads on websites now, and I wish I could do the same on my phone. I think someone here or on reddit mentioned, and I had the same experience, trying out IE Edge and it being a decent browser, but as soon as the autoplaying video ads start, I downloaded FF, added uBlock and didn't look back. I use the same browser setup on my phone, and now and then I use some apps that emulate a browser (like Reddit is Fun…

Why whitelist ads at all? Ads are evil, the ad agencies track you, you run the risk of viruses / malware (like the recent 0-day exploit on a russian news site through ads), and there's zero gain for the person visiting the site.

Re: The ethics of modern web ad-blocking

#100

Post by njharman »

bediger4000 wrote: post #5

How is ad blocking an ethical issue? I get to control my computer, at least until some legislation passes that says I don't. Even if I don't control my computer entirely, how about my DNS? I have a lot of the more intrusive domains (tynt, doubleclick, etc) set up as 127.0.0.1 in my dnsmasq config. The "whose computer is it anyway" question seems key here. In order to make advertising possible, we have to take control…

You're making the wrong argument. You get to control what you are subjected to. If you don't want to be bombarded by psychologically manipulative propaganda, it is just, correct, ethical, and legal(for now) not to be.

If you produce ad burdened content hoping that I will allow myself to be advertised to. I'm glad to crush that hope. You can charge for your content, stop producing it, etc. What you can't do is demand I endure you're fucking advertising.

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