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Why It’s OK to Block Ads (2015)

blog.practicalethics.ox.ac.uk

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Re: Why It’s OK to Block Ads (2015)

#91

Post by mmcgaha »

IvanK_net wrote: post #66
RajT88 wrote: post #34

As long as malvertising campaigns are a thing, you should block ads. The online ad industry AFAIK still has not got their shit together.

I guess you always pay in cash. The amount of information which banks and card issuers collect about you is just tremendous. And unlike web ads, they know your real name, your address, your age ...

Credit/debit card companies have more of some information but they know less about my psyche. They may know that I buy guns but they don't know that I like single action revolvers. They may know that I eat out but they don't know that I am allergic to shellfish. They may know that I went to the doctor but they don't know that I have some weird pimple on my butt. They may know that I watch porn but they don't know that I am into pygmy doggy style. The web trackers know all of this about me and probably some weird stuff that I am too ashamed to share.

Re: Why It’s OK to Block Ads (2015)

#92

Post by BLKNSLVR »

IvanK_net wrote: post #66
RajT88 wrote: post #34

As long as malvertising campaigns are a thing, you should block ads. The online ad industry AFAIK still has not got their shit together.

I guess you always pay in cash. The amount of information which banks and card issuers collect about you is just tremendous. And unlike web ads, they know your real name, your address, your age ...

Those institutions are a fair bit more regulated than 'big ad tech'.

It's a good point though, and to add to it: mobile comms companies' ability to track device, and therefore individual locations.

Re: Why It’s OK to Block Ads (2015)

#93

Post by throwawayacc2 »

chii wrote: post #44
horsawlarway wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The quid pro quo of the site is you pay nothing to see this, but you look at the ads that pay for the site. But this isn't the fucking model. The model is: We created compelling content that draws lots of views, and companies will pay us to plaster their name/products on it. There is literally zero contract with the person being shown the ads at all. They can do as they please. If companies don't like that... move…

> move to a different model - stop showing your stuff for free. what if that model was a contract to the viewer, wherein the viewer agrees to see all adverts? Currently this contract is assumed, or implied, but not enforced. What if it changes in the future? For example, youtube could require that you have a webcam, and run a trusted-computing-module DRM code which forces your webcam to be on and recording your face…

> For example, youtube could require that you have a webcam, and run a trusted-computing-module DRM code which forces your webcam to be on and recording your face to view their videos?

I propose a mandatory integration with Alexa devices. Whenever the DRM module detects the consumer failing to fulfil the contractually required viewing quota, the Alexa device will be notified to emit loudly the message “Resume viewing!”. Furthermore, if available, it will cause the Hue lights to turn red and flash in order to amplify the gravity and importance of the message.

In addition to the mandatory Alexa integration, I believe it is paramount advertisers be allowed to enforce contractual viewing quotas in order to prevent financial losses. To that end, failure to resume viewing within 30 seconds should result in immediate freezing of bank accounts, immediate blocking of the self driving car from working and immediate locking of the house smart lock - To prevent the consumer from escaping the contractually enforced duties.

One more idea I can add is this. It is unfair for the advertisers to incur loss and costs due to non compliant consumers. In order to rectify these losses, interest in the form of viewing time should be applied to time spent not watching adverts. A standard 12.5% time interest should suffice. For example, a consumer failing to resume watching for 10 minutes should have 1 minute and 15 seconds added to the viewing quota.

Re: Why It’s OK to Block Ads (2015)

#94

Post by noelsusman »

throwaway22032 wrote: post #42

I find the idea that anyone, a single person, could consider blocking ads to be wrong to be hilarious. I've never met such a person. I can only imagine them to be barely human. What other bizarre opinions, internal or external, would they have? I don't think that I could trust them with literally anything.

To be blunt, this comes across as incredibly small minded. Barely human? Really?

It's not difficult to imagine an argument against ad blockers. Ads pay for the content you consume on the Internet. If you don't like the ads, then your recourse is to leave the site and go elsewhere. You're not entitled to just block the ads and consume the content for free.

I don't personally subscribe to that theory, but I wouldn't describe it as an insane opinion to have.

Re: Why It’s OK to Block Ads (2015)

#95

Post by jefftk »

muttled wrote: post #88
jefftk wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think running an ad blocker is freeloading, the same as using paywall-bypassing software. There are worse things people regularly do, but I do think it's minorly wrong and I don't run an ad blocker. I would be fine with ad blockers that only blocked ads, as long as publishers could chose to refuse service to users running ad blockers or ask them to turn their ad blocker off. But uBlock Origin etc don't just block a…

I think my biggest issue with paywalls is that I wouldn't mind it if they showed the search engine only what the viewer can see as well. Then the search engines can try to prioritize the content that the user actually wants to see. As it is now, though, sites will often show the search engine different content than what's revealed to the user. Which is against the terms and conditions of most search engines (known as…

Sites are usually quite careful about this because they don't want to get banned. Google's rules, for example, are quite complex, allowing the search engine to get the full content of every article but with users seeing a small number of free articles and then a paywall after that: https://developers.google.com/search/docs/advanced/appearanc...

It sounds like your proposed change would have the search engine use its influence to push sites away from paywall models?

Re: Why It’s OK to Block Ads (2015)

#96

Post by beej71 »

Yes. When you use ads, you naturally tune your site to maximize profit from those ads. If that's your goal, great, but that's not the web I want to use. And maybe, thinking about it, it's not the web you want to create, either.

I've made a lot of content. It's available for free with no ads. I subsidize that work with other work.

If you offer me a way to see the content without ads, I'll go for it. I've bought a lot of content. If the choice is $5 for a movie without ads or a $0 movie with ads, I'll pay every time.

Otherwise, it's the ad blocker for you. Ads are mental poison. And they greedily use my CPU and battery. :) Want a turbo button for the web? Turn on ad blocking.

I was just thinking the other day that I'd probably tolerate black-and-white static ads on a site, like in [paper] newspapers. But these attention-sucking brainwashing CPU-hogging things... Forget them.

Re: Why It’s OK to Block Ads (2015)

#97

Post by jefftk »

jgilias wrote: post #89
jefftk wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you think the attention economy is legitimate, a browser that removes the ads publishers have put on their sites and instead serves different ads to the users is pretty shady.

I was referring more to the mechanism of paying content providers directly in proportion to the time I spend on their site. Without getting tracked all over the place and being shown intrusive ads. And without an opaque middleman taking most of the cut.

Content providers would push back pretty hard on the idea that a second on every site is worth the same. A high quality news article and a listicle cost very different amounts to produce, and we don't want even more of a race to the bottom here.

Re: Why It’s OK to Block Ads (2015)

#98

Post by s_ting765 »

To me ads seem only to negatively UX more than anything. Case in point, I have began noticing a more than usual amount of ads on Twitter recently. I now get a sponsored ad after very 3 tweets compared to the one or two quick ones on every homepage load, sometimes none at all.

This has put me off the platform until they either A) Shift back to the previous acceptable amount of ads. B) Show a negligible amount of ads am willing to compromise on. C) Go out of my way to bypass the ads using a controlled client.

Only reasonable option left here would be C meaning using 3rd party clients that are limited feature-wise and give a worse UX experience than not using Twitter at all. This route in the long run hampers my Twitter experience to the extent that I would rather go back to square one and avoid using Twitter altogether.

Re: Why It’s OK to Block Ads (2015)

#99

Post by mojzu »

BLKNSLVR wrote: post #92
IvanK_net wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess you always pay in cash. The amount of information which banks and card issuers collect about you is just tremendous. And unlike web ads, they know your real name, your address, your age ...

Those institutions are a fair bit more regulated than 'big ad tech'. It's a good point though, and to add to it: mobile comms companies' ability to track device, and therefore individual locations.

I'm also uncomfortable with what these companies do with the data they collect, however I think there is a difference in that I directly entered into an agreement with these companies, signed a contract and have some avenues of recourse such as closing my account and moving to a competitor, complaining to a regulator or even going to court.

When it comes to ad companies hoovering up data wherever they can I have practically no options to do anything about it, even figuring out which companies have collected my data would be a sisyphean task

Re: Why It’s OK to Block Ads (2015)

#100

Post by throwawayacc2 »

jefftk wrote: post #51
throwaway22032 wrote: post #42

I find the idea that anyone, a single person, could consider blocking ads to be wrong to be hilarious. I've never met such a person. I can only imagine them to be barely human. What other bizarre opinions, internal or external, would they have? I don't think that I could trust them with literally anything.

I think running an ad blocker is freeloading, the same as using paywall-bypassing software. There are worse things people regularly do, but I do think it's minorly wrong and I don't run an ad blocker. I would be fine with ad blockers that only blocked ads, as long as publishers could chose to refuse service to users running ad blockers or ask them to turn their ad blocker off. But uBlock Origin etc don't just block a…

Let’s say there’s a hamburger restaurant. Now, this hamburger restaurant has an interesting business model. They way it works is, they give out burgers for free. They do that because they get money from lettuce producers to put lettuce in their burgers. It’s a pretty good model right? People get free burgers and lettuce producers get their lettuce in the peoples mouths.

I personally don’t like lettuce. I removed it from my burgers. Am I not allowed to remove lettuce from my burger? Am I forced to consume lettuce?

And before you tell me to look for another burger place, let me remind you there’s no other burger place. All burger places have this business model. All burger places give burgers for free sponsored by Big Lettuce.

So let me ask you again. Am I not allowed to remove lettuce from my own God damned burger?

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