Curious -- who blocks Ads, and Why?



  • yes, we can all handle downloading videos and watching them on the computer at low quality.  However, I have never enjoyed watching a movie whose purpose was to entertain and not teach, on CHS on a TV as large as mine. 



  • Wow that's a lot of responses, dude.

    I don't block ads, i'm just desensitized to them.

    There was a poster on the first page talking about watermarks and stuff on television in the mid 90s... If you recall, stations that run original content used to have really bold, bright marks on the screen (i remember this on 60 minutes and that sunday morning show that doesn't run anymore, as well as news) A bunch of people complained that these icons were burning in to their screens, so what the networks did is make them more transparent, or they fade them in and out. this watermarking is exactly what it is... watermarking.

    The stupid animations and advertisements on the TV shows are one of the main reasons that i don't own a TV anymore. I used to have a bigscreen television and nothing is more invasive to your vision than someone doing a dance on the bottom right hand side of your screen while you're watching a movie.

    as far as internet advertising goes, websites can advertise however they want, until they start doing that double underlined link crap that somethingawful.com was doing a while back (and might still be, i stopped going to the site when they did that). The new IE blocks popups, which is fine by me, because porn popups and popunders and all that crap used to really piss me off.

    I hate advertisement because i've never really been influenced to buy anything because of it, and it annoys me that there are people so stupid that they'd believe what a commercial said and go find the product without doing any research. The main reason i have a problem with television and radio can be summed up in one commercial... the commercials in california for In & Out. If you live in southern california, you know about this fast food joint. They haven't changed their menu since they opened several decades ago (at all). What the hell is their target market? People who are here on vacation and have never heard about it?

    Anyhow this has been a rant and i didn't mean for it to be. I wish that i was a billionaire so i could give tons of money to all of my favorite sites to see them updated all the time and not have to see advertisements and the like... But i am just a poor guy studying for GREs and have to take breaks and see what everyone else is talking about. and if i have to see stupid ads sometimes, that's fine by me.



  • I use FF, but haven't installed AdBlock; As a CS-studying web-geek, it interests me how site owners handle the synergy of ad and content. I'm also pretty good at just ignoring ads. TDWTF's ads are pretty ignorable, without being excessively discreet. You might want to try inserting them server-side though ;-)

     As for TV, some adverts (Honda's last 3 or 4 campaigns have been amazing!) are really worth watching, whereas others (loans, mortgages, etc) just get on my nerves. I only listen to BBC Radio stations because I can't stand radio advertising.

     

     

    If you want an ad-free TDWTF, how about a £1/$2/€1.50 monthly subscription? Just enough to fund an ad-free site, but not so much as it hits my wallet too heavily :-)
     



  • I like the watermarks on TV.  I have cable TV but I don't watch it much.  Every few months the cable companies move the channels all around and send me a new channel guide, which never has a starting date or an expiration date.  So if I want to tape the Westminster dog show (tonight and tomorrow, as I write this -- I used to have a Newfoundland dog and my friend has a Rottweiler and now because of unforeseen circumstances I have a Newfweiler (hence the name) which is unfortunately not a recognized breed) I have to find a channel guide, hope it's recent, find the channel number for USA, turn it on and wait only a few minutes for the logo to turn up in the corner.

    By the way, way back in 1906 American Biograph put their "AB" logo into the background of every scene.  The problem they were having was that fly-by-night studios would copy American Biograph movies and distribute them as their own.  AB did this only for about a year, so either it was ineffective or they solved the problem in some other way, or maybe the set designers stopped going along with it.

     



  • I can't stand the annoying ads.  Big flash animations overlaying content.  I generally make efforts to block those.

    But I'm still a firm believer that free content remains free only as long as ad money comes in, so I don't actively try to block *all* ads.

    Recently I've started blocking JavaScript out of security concerns/paranoia, and that has the side-effect of blocking a lot of ads.  I feel somewhat guilty about blocking them, but advertisers should be smart enough to make their (tasteful) ads show up whether I have JS on or not. 



  • if an ad doesn't show up when you turn on javascript then the ad maker needs to rethink the ad if you ask me.



  • I block popup ads and those javascript ads that put double-underlines on body text.  I also sometimes block Flash ads if they jump out over the page, or make noise.

    Why?  Because they interfere with my browsing experience.  The ads you have on this site are fine in that regard.

    Advertisers who set cookies really really bother me, but it's too much work to block the cookies one-by-one, and I like to support the sites I use, so I don't put a blanket block on the ads.

    I've probably only clicked a web ad about twice in the past 10 years, though. 



  • I don't block internal page ads, however, I do block pop-ups

     

    I have something to say reguarding most advertising:

    It's becoming too abrasive, Most pop-up advertisers ruined it for themselves as they forced too many on people for too long, of course if something that is meant to be a good thing (paying for a site's bandwidth), but it is abused, (i.e. spread out everywhere, making a mess, screaming at website visitors); Given a way people will correct it so it is more visually appealing, be it pop-up blockers, ad-server filtering at firewalls, etc.

    Email advertising is the same way, it abused bulk mailing to the point people started calling it things like spam, and it got a bad rep. It pays for stuff. just like webpage ads do, But I bet even you, Alex hate spam. Just like some people hate webpage ads, therefore block it.
     
    Too much of ANYTHING is a bad thing, and once it gets abused, most people will not be very forgiving on that technique and try to find ways to circumvent it.

     Another possible couple reasons people block ads:

    1. People have no money to spend on the products the ads provide, or have no interest, therefore they feel no need to view the ads as they aren't relevant to their style of living 

    2. People have extremely low bandwidth caps set by their ISPs, i.e. some ISPs limit their users to 1 GB a month, therefore they block as much unnecessary stuff as possible to make it last so when they DO want to download something, they are under quota. a 50 KB ad may not seem like much, but to those with a transfer quota, get enough of those 50 KBs and you end up with 50 MB of transfer



    Re: DRM and downloading media content:

    Digital Restrictions Management (as I prefer to call it) is basically an effort by content providers to force people to purchase the product, however, some people simply don't have the money to purchase the content or don't see it valued at what it is sold for, so what do they do? They seek it by other means.

    Too many content providers believe everyone has money to spend on the products, many do not. Therefore do not spend what they do not have. I myself am between jobs and such, and I would rather have food on my table with the sound of music playing of some nice freshly downloaded music in the background over having music but no food.

    At the risk of becoming sappy: Sometimes small things to those who don't have alot of luxuries can make their lives alot better, that's what I beleive.

    Re: patents

    To me, patents are another word for a monopoly, if someone patents something, its' because they want to monopolize upon it as they want no competition on that specific product  Patents are anti-competition, they make it so nobody can stop them from charging through the roof for the patented product. Companies see an idea nowadays, and to eliminate competition, they get a patent on it.

     

     Alex, I would like your response if you would be as kind from a publisher's point of view on the issues I present.

     



  • I block ads using the default pop-up blocker in Firefox (because I hate pop-ups as do most people), and the default ad-blocker plugin settings.  It's nothing against this site or any site in particular, the same settings apply to all sites.  I don't have anything against ads on webpages in general, but I hate hate hate ones that are bothersome by doing things like opening a flash ad over the article I'm reading or playing a sound that cannot be turned off.  Some people who own webpages totally abuse advertising and it just becomes an impediment to the viewing the site, so thus I take steps to keep them from coming up at all. 



  • On this site (and some others, but not a whole lot), I've frequently tried to click advertisements that do absolutely nothing when clicked on. These are usually Flash ads.  I'm using Opera 9.10, so you can figure out what's going on.

    If they don't work, and don't even provide their URL in the advert itself, I don't bother anymore.

    I CLICK ADS AND THEY DON'T WORK!!! Ironic enough for anyone?



  • I block ads using default firefox w/ Adblock Plus, Adblock Filterset G, & Noscript. A few sites i whitelist...yours is one of them...but i totally hate whole page ads or popups or popunders



  • @DigitalXeron said:

    1. People have no money to spend on the products the ads provide, or have no interest, therefore they feel no need to view the ads as they aren't relevant to their style of living 

    Then don't buy the product. 

    @DigitalXeron said:

    2. People have extremely low bandwidth caps set by their ISPs, i.e. some ISPs limit their users to 1 GB a month, therefore they block as much unnecessary stuff as possible to make it last so when they DO want to download something, they are under quota. a 50 KB ad may not seem like much, but to those with a transfer quota, get enough of those 50 KBs and you end up with 50 MB of transfer

    that sucks.  What country to you live in?  I don't know any ISPs in the US that do this, but I've heard of it in Australia.

    @DigitalXeron said:


    Re: DRM and downloading media content:

    Digital Restrictions Management (as I prefer to call it) is basically an effort by content providers to force people to purchase the product, however, some people simply don't have the money to purchase the content or don't see it valued at what it is sold for, so what do they do? They seek it by other means.

    Too many content providers believe everyone has money to spend on the products, many do not. Therefore do not spend what they do not have. I myself am between jobs and such, and I would rather have food on my table with the sound of music playing of some nice freshly downloaded music in the background over having music but no food.

    At the risk of becoming sappy: Sometimes small things to those who don't have alot of luxuries can make their lives alot better, that's what I beleive.

    this attitude is exactly why content providers have made DRM.  People like you who think that if they don't have the money to buy it they might as well download it for free.  If you don't have the money then don't buy the product.  But you aren't entitled to the product.  Just listen to an old CD or the radio.  Perhaps your life would be better if you could download all the free music and software that you wanted, but life isn't easy.  If you want that stuff then get a job that makes enough money to buy it all.  It's not fair to the companies for you to just steal their stuff and say "well I don't have the money to buy it anyways so it doesn't matter." 

    @DigitalXeron said:

    Re: patents

    To me, patents are another word for a monopoly, if someone patents something, its' because they want to monopolize upon it as they want no competition on that specific product  Patents are anti-competition, they make it so nobody can stop them from charging through the roof for the patented product. Companies see an idea nowadays, and to eliminate competition, they get a patent on it.

    you are just patently wrong here.  Patents are actually pro-competition and were created for that very reason.  Why would a drug company spend billions of dollars on research to create new drugs when the moment they start selling it a competitor can just copy it and start selling the exact same drug for pennies on the dollar?  Why would any company bother with R&D when another company can just wait for their product to be available and copy it extremely cheaply?  By the way, you are dead wrong about companies eliminating competition with patents.  Most large companies that get patents aren't using their patents to lock out competitors.  It is usually a very bad sign for a company if they are suing small companies over patent infringement, and the other large companies usually have their own patents.  Many patents these days are used just to stop someone from patenting an idea that a company has already made and then suing the company for patent infringement.  


Log in to reply