[freudling]

Damn I love this thing. No more 30 second YouTube commercials on a 15 second video. No more annoying flash ads that overheat my computer. No more ads, period.

[lpkmckenna]

Click2Flash is enough for me. I don't wanna deny ad impressions to every website I visit. Everyone's gotta eat.

[freudling]

Originally Posted by lpkmckenna 

Click2Flash is enough for me. I don't wanna deny ad impressions to every website I visit. Everyone's gotta eat.

It's a good point. However, Click2Flash wasn't quite enough for me, like it doesn't block ads on YouTube for example. Well it didn't the last time I used it.

[mduell]

AdBlock is an incredibly useful tool for blocking the annoying ads. I see it as counterproductive to also block the non-annoying ad units since they are the revenue source paying for your usage.

I am biased since I work for a company whose primary revenue is from publishing non-annoying* web ads.

* No pre-stitial, inter-stitial, or post-stitial, no screen takeover, no expandables, no audio without user interaction, and nothing that's visually obnoxious (punch the monkey, etc).

[freudling]

Originally Posted by mduell 

AdBlock is an incredibly useful tool for blocking the annoying ads. I see it as counterproductive to also block the non-annoying ad units since they are the revenue source paying for your usage.

I am biased since I work for a company whose primary revenue is from publishing non-annoying* web ads.

* No pre-stitial, inter-stitial, or post-stitial, no screen takeover, no expandables, no audio without user interaction, and nothing that's visually obnoxious (punch the monkey, etc).

Ya, I understand, but the problem isn't you, it's the 95% other ads. Like painfully sitting for 30 seconds watching an ad on YouTube to see a 15 second clip. It's insane. And advertising just pollutes the internet. If people really value their content, they should make a brave move to charge for it.

We're seeing a bit of this happening already.

[ghporter]

I can't think of a category of "annoying web ad" that mduell didn't specifically disclaim. Which sounds like he's talking about a firm that is in the minority, unfortunately. Few enough advertising customers (that's the people that pay to have ads created and placed) have the tiniest clue about advertising as it is; just think about how totally annoying your local TV ads are...got the picture?

My mother worked for an ad agency for 30 years, and it did not matter how good the creative staff was, how smooth and well designed the campaign design might be, local advertising customers are (in my opinion) at least 50% likely to think that they know far more about advertising than people who have worked in the advertising industry for years. On point, at least those people who pay to have their products advertised have some small clue about TV...they know nothing about the Web and Web users. If they are like many advertising customers, they will green light something made by the lowest bidder, which can be anything from "yuck" to "OMG!!! that was incredibly horrible!!!"

I have used AdBlock with Firefox for a long time. It works well, gives me enough control that I can actively block the really bad stuff and still not miss the decent/non-annoying ads, and it's pretty transparent. Gotta love that.

[lpkmckenna]

Originally Posted by freudling 

Ya, I understand, but the problem isn't you, it's the 95% other ads. Like painfully sitting for 30 seconds watching an ad on YouTube to see a 15 second clip. It's insane. And advertising just pollutes the internet. If people really value their content, they should make a brave move to charge for it.

So you would pay to see 15 second clips on YouTube? Not likely.

If you switch to HTML5 video mode on YouTube you won't see the ads anymore.

[besson3c]

I feel terribly ignorant about the methodology behind web ads. For some reason, for the longest time I thought they simply set CSS flags to hide the ads, but I guess many/most use a hybrid approach of CSS and actual network blocks to function. I might have to rethink my strategy and comfort levels.

If you can find one that only does CSS hides, those are completely harmless. I might see if I can limit myself to these.

[ghporter]

AdBlock lets you block sites, domains, and ads by specific tags in the URL. It's quite powerful, and instead of just "hiding" anything, it literally blocks the request to load the offending/undesired content in the page. Really nice.

[mduell]

Originally Posted by freudling 

Like painfully sitting for 30 seconds watching an ad on YouTube to see a 15 second clip. It's insane.

I completely agree, and any time I'm hit with video pre-roll ads I immediately close the window. There's no video content on the web worth enough to me.

Originally Posted by freudling 

And advertising just pollutes the internet.

It doesn't always pollute and it also enables large parts of the web.

Originally Posted by freudling 

If people really value their content, they should make a brave move to charge for it.

I think that's a false dichotomy. Just because it's valuable doesn't mean the transactions are a sensible amount. We also sell the content the website can access for free in ways where the transaction is valuable enough..

Originally Posted by ghporter 

I can't think of a category of "annoying web ad" that mduell didn't specifically disclaim.

Some users, notably Mac users, would say anything using Flash, since it is such a dog on OS X.

[CharlesS]

You can use those ad blocker apps, but don't act surprised when your favorite sites start putting up paywalls.

Bandwidth ain't free.

[freudling]

Originally Posted by CharlesS 

You can use those ad blocker apps, but don't act surprised when your favorite sites start putting up paywalls.

Bandwidth ain't free.

Ya, and I would accept that. Maybe the content would get better, instead of a bunch of clickity clack link whoring that's rife in today's online media.

[Wiskedjak]

Originally Posted by CharlesS 

You can use those ad blocker apps, but don't act surprised when your favorite sites start putting up paywalls.

Bandwidth ain't free.

True, though in the case of most of these sites, a pay wall would probably kill off most of their traffic.

[Wiskedjak]

I feel for the site operators who rely on ads to generate revenue and I appreciate the advertising model since the cost to the consumer is zero and the operator can sustain the site.

However, as ads get increasingly in the way of content (in some cases literally), I feel no guilt at blocking ads. I feel sorry for the sites with non-annoying ads that suffer from a blanket ad-block, they should seek consumer friendly solutions:
- buy ads from non-annoying ad producers
- pressure ad producers to make non-annoying ads
- organize with other non-annoying ad serving sites and build your own ad-filter list for AdBlock, and the publicize the hell out of it.

[CharlesS]

Originally Posted by Wiskedjak 

True, though in the case of most of these sites, a pay wall would probably kill off most of their traffic.

Yes, which is why you shouldn't be surprised to see your favorite sites simply drop off the Web either.