Stop, Thief! Why Using an Ad Blocker Is Stealing

[shloader]

I'm (kinda) sorry but, no. All the sudden I need an F-No key on my keyboard. F-No. The top rated comment is top rated for a reason; it reflects a lot of what we're all thinking. I'd go further to point out your swinging-for-the-fenses approach with this article. This is the Mike Tyson of Op-eds, starts wild and tactless and unsustainable in the long run, and I was hooked on reading it do to the offensive nature of your approach (I really thought this was a satire article). What I anticipated the top comment to be met all expectations (we thank you, OnkeCannabia). You, Avram, intentionally make no mention of the direction taken by web ads in recent years, or the general risk involved with them. That omission is almost as bad as your other tactics... food from a child's mouth. Oh please. "Remaining content sites will be run by hobbyists"... That's a bad thing? Hey genius, that's how sites like Toms and AnandTech STARTED OUT! You're saying it could go back to that?!?! Say it ain't so. With advocates like you flying a banner for the marketers I really hope that happens.

I'm going to go tell a friend to install AdBlock on her web browser.

 

[spankmon]

I don't want to hurt Tom's. This is one of the few websites that is truly deserving of a handsome profit in my opinion. But advertisers deserve to crumble... they are the guys who pee on the toilet seats in public restrooms... they create the ugliest, most offensive graffiti in the world. Ad-blocking seems to be the most effective way of fighting these advertisers, and I'm not surrendering my most powerful weapon against them.

Would I subscribe to Tom's if it were vacant of ads? Probably, if the price was fair. Would I donate to Tom's if they provided a button? Probably not. Tom's shouldn't have to beg for money to feed their children. The advertisers are the villains, not me, not Tom's. Tom's is just dumb for over-doing the ad graffiti.

 

[XaveT]

While I understand Tom's position on this issue, I have to agree with the many commentators before me. Ads are annoying, and annoying things should be blocked. I loved the phrase "Every time you block an ad, what you're really blocking is food from entering a child's mouth." This is completely hogwash, and I really think everyone knows it. I actually laughed out loud when I read that. Exaggerate much?

The problem is that on most online sites, the content isn't worth paying for, so why would we look at it if it isn't free? So you develop ads to try to make money. I've been to so many sites that are 90% ad, 10% content. Adblock makes these sites more useful. If you want ad revenue, be awesome, and people will whitelist you if you matter. If you don't, you'll die. Ad blockers aren't going away.

Ads do not make a site. Ads try to make lots of money for doing nothing save existing. Stop complaining.

 

[amonkey]

Toms Guide has quickly turned into click bait trash, with the quality of articles at this calibre.
Please explain why blocking an ad is theft when no monetary or goods are stolen?

 

[aborto]

Yea, I have some sympathy, not for the advertisers, they can all go bankrupt for all I care but the website operators don't have many good options.

Unfortunately that sympathy does not extend to me letting your malware ridden, performance ruining, space wasting, flashy, noisy, poor taste adverts through.

They are now by a huge margin the worst vector for malware and viruses in my experience and "just use antivirus" is terrible advice, even the best AV suites still let several percent of all infections though while blocking ads is so effective you very nearly don't need AV.

 

[aborto]

Yea, I have some sympathy, not for the advertisers, they can all go bankrupt for all I care but the website operators don't have many good options.

Unfortunately that sympathy does not extend to me letting your malware ridden, performance ruining, space wasting, flashy, noisy, poor taste adverts through.

They are now by a huge margin the worst vector for malware and viruses in my experience and "just use antivirus" is terrible advice, even the best AV suites still let several percent of all infections though while blocking ads is so effective you very nearly don't need AV.

 

[samlarz13]

Hey with this mentality owning a DVR is like stealing from every major TV show producer in the world. You know, because you're like stealing their ad revenue and fast forwarding through the ads. Or having sun visors in your car to block out the view of billboards is theft. C'mon, like seriously? You're going to act like web pages are going to starve out. This is ridiculous propaganda. In fact, it only invokes more hatred for the use of ads and more infatuated with my ad blocker.

 

[Curls]

Why is it our fault? Advertisements pushed us into using AD-Block. I'm using AD-Block to avoid my computer from receiving viruses, spyware, and other pesky things that'll damage MY pc, the item that I PAID FOR. Of course I'm going to use AD-Block to protect my computer. Since AD-Block is so "dangerous" then lets write an article about how virus protection programs is ""theft"" or """illegal.""" Stupid article. And then, you add about how blocking advertisements causes children not to have food in their mouth. Stupid. If you want us to stop using AD-Block how about providing advertisements that won't slap us in the face and fill up a webpage with irrelevant ads in every website we go to, and providing ads that we won't have to worry about getting malware from it or spyware.

 

[somebodyspecial]

It's not a few moments of your time, it's 18-20 minutes per hour of TV. So I guess I'll steal BACK all the moments I can from here on out. Maybe you shouldn't have gotten so GREEDY with my time and I'd be more forgiving. But no you had to push it to the max to the point of wasting 1/3 of every hour I spend in front of the TV. Now I watch netflix etc...LOL. Stick it. Get a real job. Then you'll get food back in your mouth...ROFL.

 

[Kuriente]

Blocking adds is only 'stealing' in a very indirect and subjective way and I totally disagree with the implications of this article.

Simply not using an add blocker is attempting to fix a non-linear problem with a linear solution. You're thinking, "add revenue is dropping.. add block software use is on the rise.. the problem is add block software.." Wrong. You already know why people use add blockers which takes you to the root of the problem. To resolve a non-linear problem you must use a non-linear solution. You must address the root of the problem. I use add blockers because of the annoying adds you mentioned in your article. Fix THAT problem and the add block problem you experience will resolve itself.

Now, you may ask, "how can we keep websites from using annoying advertisements?" One solution could be legislation which bans certain styles of adds but I'm not a fan of that approach. Not only does the government seem to overstep its role and create problems while attempting to fix others, the internet is also a multinational entity. This is not a job of a 'country'.

I prefer a more free-market approach. I imagine an add blocker which could be cloud based. If I experience problems with adds on a website I click a button to block it for a set period of time. This action could also submit my 'vote' to the cloud and if enough negative votes were received for a specific website it could fall into an auto-block list for a certain amount of time. If THAT type of add blocker was widely used it would pressure add creators and web hosts to get rid of annoying adds and for websites which aren't annoying about adds (i.e. tomshardware) there would be nothing to worry about. This solution could not only solve the problem for all of us but would help build a better internet experience in general.

 

[pocketdrummer]

One of the major problems is when sites don't vet the ads they display on their own site. If you are going to allow people to sell homeopathic remedies through ads on your site (for example), then I don't see any reason why I shouldn't block it. Same goes for "get thin fast" nonsense and the odd "the ____ don't want me to tell you this information" ads. Show quality ads that pertain to things you guys have tested and LIKE and we'll be more open to whitelisting the site.

Also, "Every time you block an ad, what you're really blocking is food from entering a child's mouth."

Really THW? You're going with the "if you don't agree with me you hate kids" approach?

Improve your ad content and more people will whitelist you. It's not an ultimatum, it's just being realistic. An Op-Ed isn't going to solve your problems. You guys need to find different ways to monetize if ads aren't working. Take Linus Tech Tips for example. He vets his ads and puts them DIRECTLY into the videos and bypasses the youtube ad system. He also keeps it short and sweet so people see the products as supporting the content they love as opposed to being a barrier to the content. Hell, I'd be more open to purchasing those products too.

 

[pocketdrummer]

Furthermore, I've noticed more sites creating EXTREMELY intrusive ads for their mobile sites to the point that 40% of the display is covered in ads. Often times the X is intentionally hard to press so you end up accidentally clicking the ad. Yes, we know it's on purpose. To make things even worse, performance is SUBSTANTIALLY impacted by these ads and it is noticeably faster once they have been removed. So, whereas I would just use Chrome because I like it, I end up using firefox with adblock installed to view those sites just so it's bearable.

 

[pocketdrummer]

Address bandwidth-cap issues by requiring ads be limited to text and occasional still pictures; there's no way to zero that, but it can be cut way down into the "tolerable" range. Finally, do not make other site functionality, including navigation, dependent on whether ads have loaded or been clicked.

I'm not sure if this is possible, but if you can detect that someone is on a cell network and not WiFi on a mobile device, you should either completely disable the ads (it still draws in readers that likely use other devices) or make sure they are extremely efficient from a data point of view. And don't make the flippin' ads STAY on the sides of the screen, let them scroll with the content. We only have 4-5" of useable screen real estate to work with!

 

[raymarv]

Can you imagine how fast the internet would be if no ads were ever transmitted?

 

[jj463rd]

Advertising makes communism sound like a much better system.
I'd rather look at statues of Lenin and Stalin than ads.

Every child that is starving (and dies) helps protect the Earth's environment.

 

[jj463rd]

Can you imagine how fast the internet would be if no ads were ever transmitted?

Our 1997 Pentium 166Mhz MMX systems would fly on dial up modem Internet access and a 486 computer would be workable.If you needed to watch Youtube or Hulu a 800 Mhz Pentium III system would be all that you would need

 

[Murdock4321]

I think this article is attempting to troll everyone... When I reinstall windows and launch a web browser, advertisements slow down the entire browsing experience. Adblock is required to enjoy the internet. I just adblock everything, and could care less about its effects on websites revenue. If someone has content worth purchasing, I would probably buy it, but the vast majority of websites are based on free, public information. Reviewing a piece of tech is hardly difficult and their are endless amounts of people who will do it for free. If tomsguide died, we would just move on to the next free website that replaces it (which will also be adblocked).

 

[fool20]

There's extensive statistics of clicks vs views, dropping prices of ads, etc. The most important stat (from the heading) IMHO, the percentage of users using adblocker is conveniently ignored. This article is a scare tactic.

 

[IQ11110002]

Adverts are intrusive and can "f" off as far as I am concerned.
I don't use use ad blocker on youtube but I do skip the damn ads, I think I will install ad blocker now.
Instead I donate/gift a small amount of money usually $5 to my youtubers I follow and also buy their t shirts and stickers to help support them!
Screw your ads they don't work on everyone. I'd rather pay/gift a small fee or buy merchandise.

 

[Elloniel]

I really dont agree with the point of view presented in this article.
It looks like a desperate call for help. You see the free market dictates, that there is always someone who can replace you. Who can do better than you. So if you as a site or person cannot adapt to the current events or trends, you will be eliminated and someone else will take your place with some other added value. So the main point is that not you but we should decide what is acceptable and what is not. If marketers were so invasive to push us to the limit, and let us prefer the ad block feature (added value in the moment for us) we will use it. If add would be less invasive (no popups, no fake stuff, no toolbars, etc.) there would be no need for us to use it. Now our mentality is set that popups and adds are bad (from a point of reader) since they disturb you. So you as a site will have to figure it out in a different way. If you will try to monetize your service, your views might drop since not everyone is willing to pay for news. So if you wont adapt maybe some other site will find a way to do it and we will shift there. And the market will stay competitive.

Ps: sorry for my bad english and
major dislike for this forced article...
Ello