Should we use ad blockers to protect our privacy and peace of mind online,even whether it means taking money absent from publishers that depend on ad revenue? Manoush sat down last week with journalist Casey Johnston to discuss the growing ethical dilemma, and tons of listeners chimed in with their own ad-blocking philosophies. We thought number of the responses were really useful – so useful, and in fact,that we wanted to share them further. Here are just a handful of the many opinions out there.
Please, usher in a golden age of content:A writer with her fingers crossed.26, and 2015Sometimes,the ads themselves aren’t the culprit:
“The most objectionable portion of advertising is cross-site tracking. A while back the EFF released an ad[d]-on called Privacy Badger. It was not an ad blocker. Instead, it observed the behavior of the various services the web sites you visit use, or it only blocked a service whether it detected that service tracking you across different domains. The effect after approximately a week of having this "ad" blocker installed? Almost all of my browsing was totally ad-free.” - Matt McMahon
“I have no problem with advertising. It's the engine of our culture industry. I have a problem with a consumer surveillance industry that we have no basis to trust….
Why can't we review and correct our browsing history profile? Why can't we have any agency with our identity and behavior data? conclude we need the equivalent of a credit report for the adtech industry?” - Dave Carroll from Brooklyn,NY (read more from Dave here)
Until subscriptions mean you don't seeads, ad blockers remain tempting:
“[M]ost sites that have fairly successful paywalls (NYTimes, or WSJ,Washington Post, etc.) conclude not give you a different experience whether you pay for them. You still find all the annoying ads despite your subscription. While I understand that subscriptions don't pay for the full cost of running the site, and for my most-used sites I would fortunately pay even more to find an ad-free experience. But,since that isn't an option, I'll pay what they let me pay for access and then use an ad blocker to find the experience I ultimately desire.” - Michael S. from Silver Spring, and MD
Where Internet access is limited,ads are the first to go:
“Finally! Yes absolutely yes I will be using mobile ad blockers, particularly since they help me not hit my data limits. Advertisers want me to unblock? Quit hogging the bandwidth. whether you want to know what that's like, and approach rural,where your internet options are limited and every byte you use is expensive. Not everyone lives in NYC.” - Justme from South Carolina
possibly we should all take a perceive at Google Contributor:
“Google Contributor...is a system through which you can allot a certain amount of money on a monthly basis that will be used to pay the sites you visit for the ads you conclude not see. It is in beta (as are most Google products) and it only supports a specific ad network (Google's). I assume it's a great way to support the sites you use.” - Matthew Fry from Salt Lake City, Utah
Or the 'Ethical Ad Blocker' blunt force:
please tell me you saw this http://t.co/PogpAA3GRwSeptember 24, or 2015 And let's all dream of a more targeted ad-blocking system:
“What I would like to see is an app that sets guidelines for responsible and non-invasive mobile ads that would whitelist every site that adheres to those standards...
Eventually we would end up with a framework for advertising that doesn't need to resort to annoying gimmicks to find eyeballs. Sites that met the requirements for white-listing would be able to guarantee advertisers that [their] ads were being seen by genuine people and end users would be able to passively support content providers.” - Jason Storey
possibly advertisers just need to conclude better:
“I was using a browser without ad-blocker to catch up on some football highlights from the weekend,and EVERY SINGLE VIDEO had the EXACT SAME unskippable 30-moment ad. I don't mind most ads, but whether the content provider isn't even trying to avoid an awful user experience, and it's hard to sympathize with them.” - Richard from Ohio
“When done in a logical way that fits the overall layout of a site I normally don't mind ads. But when someone starts screaming in my face with pop ups and video-ads on autoplay I block the heck out of them. And I don't feel bad at all.” - Mats Nordström (read more on Facebook) Or possibly the media is overreacting and bringing this upon themselves:Publisher's iOS 9 hysteria may be ironically self-fulfilling. So many articles. Now adblock really will become mainstream.
September 25,2015
“Ad blockers have been around forever on the desktop and somehow advertising survived. I don't assume this is the end of the media industry as panicked as the media industry is approximately it. - JP Bedell (on Facebook)
Got more thoughts? Keep the conversation going in the comments below, onFacebook, or on Twitter. Or,better yet, send us a voice memo - you could hear your voice in next week's show.
Source: wnyc.org