[Softpedia]Microsoft, Google, Others Threaten to Sue Adblock Plus Creator

[Syntaxvgm]

It's wrong because the person who made the content relies on that ad for payment. If the ad don't play, they don't get paid for your view.

Put yourself in their shoes. If you busy your ass making some content and some people think the boy would rather view your content for free rather than watching a really short ad, wouldn't you be disappointed?

O you are talking morally. I'm talking legally. This suit would have no grounds. Morally, you have a point, I don't argue that. 

[Sharkyx1]

i stopped using adblock over a year ago, i don't think its fair to pick and choose who gets paid, but still use their content.

[Guest Kloaked]

O you are talking morally. I'm talking legally. This suit would have no grounds. Morally, you have a point, I don't argue that.

O i c. I'm no pro in legal so I can't comment about that, then.

[HalGameGuru]

If your provision relies on advertising its on you to either provide content that fosters watching the advertising, vetting your advertising making sure what goes through is stuff the people you are serving content to are willing to deal with, or embed it in a way it cannot be blocked or the content cannot be accessed without it. This is not hacking into a pay site, this is blocking content from somewhere other than the content you are wishing to peruse. Hardcode ads into the page or content, make them unobtrusive, or stand behind them and serve them up yourself and take the flak for when they are garbage.

 

I have no willingness to allow more drive-by malwares or data cap bursting animated ads through on my browser. If you want me not to block ads on your site make sure you are only serving ads your target audience are willing to put up with. Or dump them entirely and find a more direct avenue to monetize your content.

 

If Nick Jr. suddenly started serving up porn advertisements we'd be up in arms, but when its non-consensual downloads we turn a blind eye? What literally happens with advertising is a piece of code in a webpage you wanted to see content from starts spreading tentacles all over the web, many places other than where you want to be, many of them possibly malicious or illegitimate, forces your computer to download, execute, display, play, or otherwise force your interaction with their content. Making legal provision for this is not good business, good tech, or good legislation.

 

Do you want to see more malicious ads, animated pornographic ads, or ear bleeding audio ads proliferating? Advertising is an important leg of any industry, but just as you don't advertise porn on Nick Jr. or advertise using profanity or hate speech, content has to be acceptable to your audience, if it is not the solution is to change your advertising, not forcing people to put up with garbage.

[mc141]

I don't mind adds. It's the ads that play before a video. I hate having to watch 30+second ad when I watch I watch 20 second video. I'd rather have flashing ads or animated ads surrounding the video or top of page.

I understand it's the sites revenue source but 99.9% of the ads have nothing to do with me and they repeat 30 times in a row.

[Random Access Soda]

If your provision relies on advertising its on you to either provide content that fosters watching the advertising, vetting your advertising making sure what goes through is stuff the people you are serving content to are willing to deal with, or embed it in a way it cannot be blocked or the content cannot be accessed without it. This is not hacking into a pay site, this is blocking content from somewhere other than the content you are wishing to peruse. Hardcode ads into the page or content, make them unobtrusive, or stand behind them and serve them up yourself and take the flak for when they are garbage.

 

I have no willingness to allow more drive-by malwares or data cap bursting animated ads through on my browser. If you want me not to block ads on your site make sure you are only serving ads your target audience are willing to put up with. Or dump them entirely and find a more direct avenue to monetize your content.

 

If Nick Jr. suddenly started serving up porn advertisements we'd be up in arms, but when its non-consensual downloads we turn a blind eye? What literally happens with advertising is a piece of code in a webpage you wanted to see content from starts spreading tentacles all over the web, many places other than where you want to be, many of them possibly malicious or illegitimate, forces your computer to download, execute, display, play, or otherwise force your interaction with their content. Making legal provision for this is not good business, good tech, or good legislation.

 

Do you want to see more malicious ads, animated pornographic ads, or ear bleeding audio ads proliferating? Advertising is an important leg of any industry, but just as you don't advertise porn on Nick Jr. or advertise using profanity or hate speech, content has to be acceptable to your audience, if it is not the solution is to change your advertising, not forcing people to put up with garbage.

The world's smallest violin.

[zacRupnow]

If I ever lose ad-block, I'll just find a way of re-adding it some other way.

 

@Juganog Actually adblock is on there, I download it from there daily at school. (All the shit on em gets cleared over night.)

I have a dmg copy for each browser I use so if it ever gets removed I just copy and install manually

[XTankSlayerX]

Cool, let's develop our own and put it up on Github anonymously. Who they are going to sue?

Github, That's who they're going to sure

[Guest]

This is so messed up....

I would just find a way to get around adds anyway

I only unblock it on sites that I support, like this one.

[mr moose]

It's purely about compromise,  Site developers need to be mindfull that overbearing ads will turn away viewers,  viewers need to remember that site developers need to generate a certain amount from ads to keep the site going.

 

The Answer is simple,  If users don't use ad block and simply stay away from sites that have offensive ads (be that, size/amount, content or viral), then sites would adjust the ad content to a point that generated enough income without putting of viewers.  The problem is this won't work in reality because everyone is greedy, site creators want more and more and more (except Linus, thumbs up dude) and users think they should have everything for free and there way so use ad blockers etc.

 

EDIT: and of course the reason it is MS and google doing the suing is because they cannot control the website, they can only serve the ads, if people use adblock then they can't serve ads and can't make money.

I bet if google had their way all websites would be forced to block anyone using ad blocking/swapping/diverting programs.

[SImoHayha]

Well to be honest their only source of income shouldn't be YouTube because YouTube money is unstable, Google or YouTube could easily take that down so that way no content creators get any money what so ever, There is this one youtuber Darksydephil who's only source of income is only YouTube money, just that alone to pay bills for his house, grocery's etc. Neither him or his girlfriend has a real job.

 

Also most content creators start out with getting no money, as a matter of fact most Youtubers today started out by being small and creating content for fun and for free and without getting paid for it taking their own time out of their personal life's to bring content onto YouTube. 

[Tataffe]

I started using adblock because I was behind a 3 Mbit/s connection and didn't fell like spending time waiting for a page to load that was full of ads that did not meet my interest at all. Pages that were more advertisements than content. Ads that were so intrusive.

 

And no, you don't need ads to monetize your content. At least in Germany, some online newspapers have successfully implemented paid access that is ad-free. But that requires worthy content in the first place.

[mr moose]

I started using adblock because I was behind a 3 Mbit/s connection and didn't fell like spending time waiting for a page to load that was full of ads that did not meet my interest at all. Pages that were more advertisements than content. Ads that were so intrusive.

 

And no, you don't need ads to monetize your content. At least in Germany, some online newspapers have successfully implemented paid access that is ad-free. But that requires worthy content in the first place.

 

The questions begs,   why even visit a site that is more ads than content?

[Tataffe]

The questions begs,   why even visit a site that is more ads than content?

 

Good question Basically because I was yound and stupid and too lazy to diversify my sources. I would not visit that site today any more, this forum is usually a week ahead and more detailed.

[Trik'Stari]

If it's not behind a pay gate, then you aren't "illegally" viewing content. End of story.

 

Google has EVERY capability of offering their content behind a pay gate if they want to, if not then they need to depend on users like me who are so distrust-worthy of the internet that we won't download adblock, otherwise, fuck off.

 

You wanna have ads on the edges of the screen, that's fine, but they seriously need to fuck off with the interruption ads, and roll out more google fiber so I can view your content without being throttled so goddamned often. I'd pay 70 a month for google fiber, which is what I pay now for 10Mbps from century link's throttling ass

[shawno]

Wow... the world has gone crazy. Perhaps they should crackdown on billboards on freeways because some people dont look at them while commuting

Maybe they should hike the price of movie tickets if you are late and miss their preshow ads.

Or perhaps they could admit that if people simply arent wanting to view crappy ads on websites that its a bad form of advertising and they should rethink their advertising policy.

[NAP51DMustang]

-snip-

Well I could call you one considering a web ad doesn't pay out till its viewed and a print/tv ad is paid out in advance. Ergo, if you don't view the web ad, no money. Skipping comercials on TV doesn't stop the ad agency from getting its money. Hence why you comparison is completely invalid.

[Kingofpants]

I don't mind adds. It's the ads that play before a video. I hate having to watch 30+second ad when I watch I watch 20 second video. I'd rather have flashing ads or animated ads surrounding the video or top of page.

I understand it's the sites revenue source but 99.9% of the ads have nothing to do with me and they repeat 30 times in a row.

1- Google ads have a maximum of 30 seconds unskippable

2- Realistically no one watches 20 second videos.

( Feel free to rebuttal this claim with some Meaningful 20 second YouTube Videos)

3- I understand the annoyances of Constantly re appearing ads, If one is annoying you can block a distributer.*

4- I understand irrelevant ads, but the best way to get ads that are meaningful is to use interest based ads, and have a few interests.*

*Google has an very useful guide for interest base ads at

https://support.google.com/ads/answer/2662850?hl=en

[ShadowCaptain]

Wow... the world has gone crazy. Perhaps they should crackdown on billboards on freeways because some people dont look at them while commuting

Maybe they should hike the price of movie tickets if you are late and miss their preshow ads.

Or perhaps they could admit that if people simply arent wanting to view crappy ads on websites that its a bad form of advertising and they should rethink their advertising policy.

 

Thats not the point, take your movie example, you have paid your money for the cinema ticket, whether you watch the advert or not is irrelevant, as you have still paid, so a portion of that sale is going to the advertisers, they will make their money back regardless of you seeing it

 

see what I mean?

[mr moose]

Wow... the world has gone crazy. Perhaps they should crackdown on billboards on freeways because some people dont look at them while commuting

Maybe they should hike the price of movie tickets if you are late and miss their preshow ads.

Or perhaps they could admit that if people simply arent wanting to view crappy ads on websites that its a bad form of advertising and they should rethink their advertising policy.

not really a comparison,  Billboards on free ways are a completely different thing and movie tickets cover the cost of the movie, the advertising they put in at the start is just extra revenue and possibly even helps keep the cost of movie tickets down. 

[HippY]

to be honest, the only reason why I am watching mainstream sources online, is the lack of advertising with ABP

Sometimes I use a PC with no abp, or watch TV and it just makes me sick

 

ads on TV, that are nothing else, but "BE SEXY, BE LOUD, BE PRETTY, AS THESE PHOTOSHOPPED MODELS, JUST FOR £99.99", some ads, that are just plain stupid, "I am using XY cleaning solution and it works 99.99% of the time!" and other non informative ads... so I stopped watching TV.

 

Then there is the online ads. Most of them are the same, with the occasional floating into your workspace, "Hot singles in your area!", "WIN iPhone 7 now!!!!" and other ads that are flashing in various colours and can do many things that I do not want... If I want to buy something, I will see and know and I will do my research. No need to use ads that are made to exploit you in a psychological level. 

 

If there is a way to support my favourite creators, let me know. A channel called Drive used subscription in youtube (£1.49 or something) and I enjoyed it, until I realised that they do not show the kind of content I would need, and Drive+ died out slowly.

 

but please, do not expect me to watch random advertisement that I usually do not have interest

 

On the other hand, Linus actually shows interesting ads with Hulu and dollar shave club, that actually solves real problems, like how do I shave or what I am going to watch with my bucket of icecream

[TheProfosist]

Cool, let's develop our own and put it up on Github anonymously. Who they are going to sue?

Github

[Majinferno]

Well one is that we wouldn't be blocking ad's if they weren't so bloody annoying, like ones that follow you when you scroll around and shit. Others which are hidden and in order to read the content you have to click on the page then get sent to an ad then go back and read whatever you were reading. Also many ad's don't cater to many people like I don't give a flying pie that some new tv show is coming out, either have ad's that are similar to what I do, like gaming and pc's like if there was an ad for like catalyst omega I would be interested in that or a new steam sale etc.

Or the ones that pretend to be the 'download' button

I also hate when you load the page and a video's sound starts playing. You literally have to hunt for the ad and pause the video.

[LAwLz]

not really a comparison,  Billboards on free ways are a completely different thing and movie tickets cover the cost of the movie, the advertising they put in at the start is just extra revenue and possibly even helps keep the cost of movie tickets down. 

Yeah his analogy doesn't really hold water. A better one would be something like this:

"The city you live in has built a new park. To finance this park, they put up a bunch of billboards. Anyone who enters the park HAS to look at the billboards. The put up security cameras to ensure that everyone watches the ads. Some people start wearing sunglasses to avoid looking at the ads, and now the company who built the park is hunting down the sunglasses manufacturer".

 

Now imagine if all public places were funded the same way, and you got the Internet as it is today. It's terrible.

 

What's funny is that AdBlock Plus is totally fine with ads as long as they follow some pretty good guidelines (such as no auto playing audio, making it clear that it is an ad, no misleading links (like a download button which isn't the download button you want) and so on.

In fact, if you follow these guidelines you can be added to their white list, which is enabled in AdBlock by default. The ads on the white list are not blocked, but since they are not bad ads the people who see them don't care.

You'd think that AdBlock Plus would be the last Adblocking company they would go after, since they actually allow some ads. I guess Microsoft and Google don't trust that their ads follow these guidelines.

[Misanthrope]

If it's not behind a pay gate, then you aren't "illegally" viewing content. End of story.

 

Google has EVERY capability of offering their content behind a pay gate if they want to, if not then they need to depend on users like me who are so distrust-worthy of the internet that we won't download adblock, otherwise, fuck off.

 

You wanna have ads on the edges of the screen, that's fine, but they seriously need to fuck off with the interruption ads, and roll out more google fiber so I can view your content without being throttled so goddamned often. I'd pay 70 a month for google fiber, which is what I pay now for 10Mbps from century link's throttling ass

 

You might be on to something: Google might want cheap fiber so they can blast us the fuck off with multiple 1080p video adds everywhere: it's the advertisers that want faster connections so they can get even more intrusive! well not really but the thought of it I find funny