What a galactic move! As of today, Korean consumer electronics manufacturer Samsung has started to pay AdBlock Plus (ABP) for blocking Microsoft ads. This is an answer to Microsoft themselves paying ABP to have their ads unblocked, which was the reason for Microsoft ads surfacing even when your AdBlock was active.

No word has been received from Microsoft. Rumor has it though that they are considering additional payments to ABP as well as integrated Microsoft ads in their new Spartan browser.

Samsung is well known for their unusual methods when it comes to advertising. Besides producing video ads that are so bad that you basically must watch them, the Koreans are apparently trying to subliminally redefine what a standard smartphone actually is. Recent photos of Samsung advertising one-hand-operation as a feature for a smartphone (the Galaxy S3 Mini, precisely) support this theory.