Domain: adblockplus.org
Stories and comments across the archive that link to adblockplus.org.
Comments · 342
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Re:If Only Popup Layers Could be Destroyed
Use this.
If you still have issues, then you are going to the wrong websites.
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Re:With adblocking this is not even an issue.
don't run the default... duh.
abp only enables easylist by default.
https://adblockplus.org/subscr...
you should run easylist+easyprivacy, any easylist specific to your country, fanboy annoyances, then whatever extras near the bottom of that list you want (nocoin, malware domains, spam404, etc).
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Re:How about giving users a choice?
The author of Adblock Plus stated that the significant changes introduced here are unfortunate but sadly unavoidable. Thankfully Adblock Latitude, ABP's fork for Pale Moon doesn't have to apply such unfortunate changes.
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Re:Adblock
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Re:AI needs some improvement
Google's WOPR won't be online until spring.
Google, the only winning move is not to play.
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They fail at blocking ad blockers
"(though the publication blocks users with adblockers)."
The "Adblock Warning Removal List" fixes this. It should be used by anyone with adblock+.
You're welcome. -
Re:AdBlock brought this upon themselves
Except that they're not just charging to allow content through. They're charging to be able to pay people to actually check the content for acceptableness. People have already compared it to the various ratings organizations charging in order to rate material into the various grades.
Hell, I'll assert that I think that it's less the fee, because most companies would be willing to accept less money where they currently get no money, than it is the content rules. Not being allowed to use flash, sound, movies, blinking images, all the other annoying 'sight pullers' results in what they think are less effective ads. This is despite said distracting ads being precisely why we install ad-blockers in the first place.
That someone was willing to pay them should be the LAST factor for whether an ad is "acceptable" and unblocked by default.
How about you review their policy? Payment is pretty far down the list.
Placement - can't disrupt reading flow
Distinction - must be able to tell it's an ad.
Size - Limited to 15% 'above the fold', IE visible on the screen when it first loads, and no more than 25% for scrolling
"Specific Rules"
Text ads designed with excessive use of colors and/or other elements to grab attention are not permitted.
Static image ads may qualify as acceptable, according to an evaluation of their unobtrusiveness based on their integration on the webpage.
In-feed ads - For ads in lists and feeds, the general criteria differ depending on: Placement requirements, Ads are permitted in between entries and feeds.Not acceptable:
Ads that visibly load new ads if the Primary Content does not change
Ads with excessive or non user-initiated hover effects
Animated ads
Autoplay-sound or video ads
Expanding ads
Generally oversized image ads
Interstitial page ads
Overlay ads
Overlay in-video ads
Pop-ups
Pop-unders
Pre-roll video ads
Rich media ads (e.g. Flash ads, Shockwave ads, etc.)From a time management standpoint, I find the above rules acceptable. If you're willing to comply with them, I'm willing to be served by those ads. Also, by allowing Adblock to manage the list, I save everybody time over having to roll my own solution, which I used to do via proximatron and hosts file, way, way, back in the day.
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Re:Cherchez le cash
True, but that is actually more the way it's been pitched by those opposed to the idea - both those that use ad blockers that feel it's somehow unethical or against the spirit of ad blocking and those that oppose the whole concept of ad blocking in general. Pitch it as some form of administration fee to ensure that the advertisers comply with the guidelines set down to meet the standards of the whitelist (such as these criteria for ABP) and don't pull a fast one by switching formats once on the whitelist then it seems a lot fairer and more legitimate. The "protection racket" notion is definitely hyperbole though; if the advertiser chooses not to pay up the fee then they don't get the "protection" of the whitelist, so that part of the analogy is right, but they are perfectly free to explore other means of raising revenue and marketing their products (including trying to circumvent ad blockers) without any fear of deliberate malice along the lines of someone from the ad blocking company coming around and burning their offices to the ground.
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OuroborosA quote from the Adblock Plus blog post in question:
This revenue allows us to hire employees to do the hard work providing that service demands. Software engineers have to maintain the whitelist, monitor it and provide customer service to each whitelisted site, whether payment is involved or not.
So they need to charge to pay for the manpower and infrastructure needed to be able to charge. A bit of a circular argument. The Easylist block list is over six times longer than the acceptable ads whitelist, yet is maintained by volunteers. I'm sure the community could maintain a whitelist if salespeople were no longer required.
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OuroborosA quote from the Adblock Plus blog post in question:
This revenue allows us to hire employees to do the hard work providing that service demands. Software engineers have to maintain the whitelist, monitor it and provide customer service to each whitelisted site, whether payment is involved or not.
So they need to charge to pay for the manpower and infrastructure needed to be able to charge. A bit of a circular argument. The Easylist block list is over six times longer than the acceptable ads whitelist, yet is maintained by volunteers. I'm sure the community could maintain a whitelist if salespeople were no longer required.
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OuroborosA quote from the Adblock Plus blog post in question:
This revenue allows us to hire employees to do the hard work providing that service demands. Software engineers have to maintain the whitelist, monitor it and provide customer service to each whitelisted site, whether payment is involved or not.
So they need to charge to pay for the manpower and infrastructure needed to be able to charge. A bit of a circular argument. The Easylist block list is over six times longer than the acceptable ads whitelist, yet is maintained by volunteers. I'm sure the community could maintain a whitelist if salespeople were no longer required.
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Re:Bad idea
I don't think so.
There are rules for acceptable ads, which will not be blocked.
for example : https://adblockplus.org/en/acc...
There are ad companies and publishers who follow that rules. The other ones will die. -
Re:Bullshit
The rules are clear :
https://adblockplus.org/en/acc...
Ad companies who do not want to change will die. That's fact. -
Re:Must be desperate to buy noted malware host SF
Here, fixed for you.
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Re:malware block plus is what I want
This is what AdBlock plus is. They're not against advertising. They're against intrusive advertising. Websites can apply to get their non-intrusive ads whitelisted from the program, so that they show up anyway. (Note: the criteria being used is much akin to the way ads were displayed in newspapers and print magazines.) An overwhelming majority of AdBlock users who responded to their survey said that this was the way to go, because everyone knows the content needs to be paid for.
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Re:Doesn't work with AdBlock
I added the Adblock warning removal list and Forbes thanked me for disabling my adblocker, when in reality I disabled their adblockerblocker with an adblockerblockerblocker.
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Re:Don't evolve your business model
I would say I guess it is more along the lines of:
Removing the dust cover, crossing out some words/sentences and selling it on. Or even possibly adding in some notes in the border. I have gotten college textbooks in that shape off the used book store before, and not really seen much issue with it.
Perhaps it is all about scale, but at least in the US, I can't see any legal rational for what this newspaper is doing.
I was being hyperbolic though, I just don't see their legal reasoning that says that a modification of their intended page is somehow illegal, especially when it is a matter of not requesting certain portions of the page that you don't want. If they succeed in this lawsuit where others have failed, it will mean a huge change in the internet. These lawsuits have plagued adblock plus as well, they have been sued and won a few time, I believe even in Germany.
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Re:To do list
Alternatively, you can just use AdBlock to block their AdBlock blocking.
According to this post, you can avoid their blocking by adding this custom filter:
@@||yahoo.com$elemhide
I can't test it since they aren't blocking my ancient Yahoo mail account, but unless they're doing some heavy server-side detection, a combination of custom AdBlock filters and/or a NoScript surrogate script should take care of things. And it's just a matter of time before the former gets added to a list like Easylist's AdBlock Warning Removal list.
Yeah I have some greasemonky scripts running that block ad-block-blockers I think if it gets more meta than that I go the Stallman way and just use wget for everything and rip out the JavaScript.
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Re:To do list
Alternatively, you can just use AdBlock to block their AdBlock blocking.
According to this post, you can avoid their blocking by adding this custom filter:
@@||yahoo.com$elemhide
I can't test it since they aren't blocking my ancient Yahoo mail account, but unless they're doing some heavy server-side detection, a combination of custom AdBlock filters and/or a NoScript surrogate script should take care of things. And it's just a matter of time before the former gets added to a list like Easylist's AdBlock Warning Removal list.
Yeah I have some greasemonky scripts running that block ad-block-blockers I think if it gets more meta than that I go the Stallman way and just use wget for everything and rip out the JavaScript.
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Re:To do list
Alternatively, you can just use AdBlock to block their AdBlock blocking.
According to this post, you can avoid their blocking by adding this custom filter:
@@||yahoo.com$elemhide
I can't test it since they aren't blocking my ancient Yahoo mail account, but unless they're doing some heavy server-side detection, a combination of custom AdBlock filters and/or a NoScript surrogate script should take care of things. And it's just a matter of time before the former gets added to a list like Easylist's AdBlock Warning Removal list.
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Re:To do list
Alternatively, you can just use AdBlock to block their AdBlock blocking.
According to this post, you can avoid their blocking by adding this custom filter:
@@||yahoo.com$elemhide
I can't test it since they aren't blocking my ancient Yahoo mail account, but unless they're doing some heavy server-side detection, a combination of custom AdBlock filters and/or a NoScript surrogate script should take care of things. And it's just a matter of time before the former gets added to a list like Easylist's AdBlock Warning Removal list.
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Re:No mention of ad blocking support
On the crackdown - it's not very recent, I don't know how it is now: https://adblockplus.org/blog/a....
I agree with all you said, and am somewhat in the same boat wrt to tracking on PC and phone, though I am still searching for the best balance for myself. Though to me Opera is still be best mobile browser - the main reason I use FF is tab syncing with the PC. The most glaring hole for me in FF is the absence of a top/bottom button when scrolling through a long page. Opera has a nice overlay button when you flick.
BTW it's amazing how malicious mobile browser ads become when flicking. I regularly browse some forum discussions and tend to quickly flick through the older pages. With rendering delay involved it happens regularly that an ad appears under the thumb just when about to flick, and if you are unlucky the flick is interpreted as a touch: The ad takes over your screen and it's comically an aggravatingly difficult to get to to the browser tab you were scanning.
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Re:No mention of ad blocking support
Who modded this informative?
Adblock Plus for Android only works via Wi-Fi and requires proxy configurations to install. Instead, to get ad blocking on Android, we recommend installing Adblock Browser. If you still wish to install Adblock Plus for Android, ensure that app installation from Unknown sources is enabled. To enable, open Settings and tap Unknown sources.
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Re:Nine Out of Ten of the Internet's Top Websites.
And you think Slashdot doesn't share it for some reason?
Ghostery is blocking the following on Slashdot:
Doubleclick (advertising)
Google Adwords Conversion (advertising)
Google Analytics
Janrain
Scorecard Research Beacon
TaboolaIt's on Slashdot, and everywhere else.
Here's a quote from TFA:
Most troubling is that if you use your browser setting to say 'Do Not Track' me, the explicitly stated policy of nearly all the companies is to flat-out ignore you
What we need is 9 out of 10 users to start explicitly blocking tracking and advertising, and then flat-out ignore the companies who complain about their bottom line. That article from the advertising industry group talking about how they screwed up rings a little hollow when they are obviously not interested in respecting the requests of consumers to not track them. Enabling Do Not Track is fine, but that only works with the good actors. For everyone else, see below.
https://www.ghostery.com/
https://www.ublock.org/
https://adblockplus.org/ -
For me it is way beyond advertising...
I use Ad-Block's element-hiding add-on to get rid of not merely ads, but various other elements I dislike — including the incessant newsletter sign-up invitations, footers full of legalese, persistent "navigation" menus, "share-bars" and "article-tools" (thank you, I can increase the font without your little icon), weather-widgets, "related articles", "back-to-top" (seriously, who needs these on a desktop??), "next" and "previous" arrows — all of that crap...
In fact, I'm addicted. Upon coming to a new (or recently redesigned) site, I must clean it up before reading. Web-browsing without AdBlocker is just scary nowadays. And revolting...
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Re:I really don't see the big fuss
Even if ads are hosted by the site, there are a few other heuristics other than external requests, which makes filtering usually remain easy:
1) The web people generally don't even try to obscure the ad urls. e.g. Block urls containing "/ads/" and you'll get a lot of ads blocked while getting virtually no false positive blocks. Look at the top of easylist to get some idea of how incredibly easy it is to do, with simple matching.
2) Web ad image sizes tend to come in standard sizes that are rarely used for anything else. e.g. If something is 728x90, then it's an ad. While this might require a little more sophistication and expense than the above approach (e.g. the blocker has to actually be aware of the CSS that applies to an element, or might have to actually download an image in order to measure it), it's doable these days (though the oldschool proxy-based blockers from the 1990s, tended to usually not be smart enough).
Both of these could be countered, but AFAIK most webmasters don't bother. No serious conflict has really started yet, so blockers have kept their advantage. Maybe the reason people are getting their panties in a bunch about iOS9 is that they think things are about to change, and webmasters are going to start to fight back?
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Adblock Plus/Edge are good if configured well
Download a filter lists and store it locally.
Within the filter lists remove every line containing a @@Modify the header of those lists like
https://easylist-downloads.adb...
To block ABP's internal functionality to get data for possible updates of this list.[Adblock Plus 2.0]
# Title: EasyPrivacy
# Last modified: 07 Jul 2014 08:41 UTC
: Expires=400000000000
#
# Please report any unblocked tracking or problems
# in the forums
# or via e-mail
#
#-----------------General tracking systems-----------------#Then add this local filter list using a file URL via "Add filter" - "Another filter"
Example for a file URL:
file:///c:|/Documents/myfilterlist.txt
As a result this filter will be detected as coming from 127.0.0.1 and ABP cannot overwrite it with it's own list that still contains a whitelist. Additionally you can add your own entries permanently.
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No surprise
Marco loves drama. He'll say or do something "controversial", a ton of tech sites will run with it, he gets all the attention and then two days late he expresses regret for saying or doing whatever he said or did. A recent example is here, with backpeddle here.
Peace is no different. Drama for two days followed by backpeddle.
The stupid thing is that the whole "issue" he had could have easily been solved with a pre-loaded whitelist of advertisers. He could have even called it "Acceptance Ads".
But then that wouldn't have generated quite as much drama and attention would it?
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Re:Who cares about Flash now that HTML5 is here?
I want to support my free web services by allowing reasonable advertising on websites, but not when they take over the resources on my computer.
Adblock Plus has a setting which allows unobtrusive through. It's their business model.
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Re: Now I won't feel guilty about using Adblock
Nice that you include default. The first thing I do when I install it click on the radio button that disables the default "show acceptable ads". (second sentence)
... Whereas I really like this feature and make sure it is on. I do believe advertising could have been an acceptable way to pay for content, but it is a tragedy of the commons thing where some advertisers abused it to the point of ruining it for everyone. Every once in a while I find a site that uses responsible advertising practices and I am fine with supporting them this way. This is one part of that, but I even unblock ads on some sites, believe it or not.
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Re: Now I won't feel guilty about using Adblock
Dear coward
Jesus Christ don't use AdBlock Pro. They do some pretty shifty shit to try and get paid to let ads around their filters on default configuration.
What "shifty shit" do "they" do. A current citation would be informative.
Nice that you include default. The first thing I do when I install it click on the radio button that disables the default "show acceptable ads". (second sentence)
Use uBlock.[...].
Interesting. You say that. A lot. Is that out of altruism?
Which uBlock are you promoting? There are two. uBlock Origin (or uBlock) and uBlock.
I tried both uBlocks, and found they had a number of failings for my use case. I'll reassess my reasons for not using or recommending it if you show me which reasons are incorrect:-
- It didn't block as many ads, or pop ups - so it's not as fit for it's stated purpose. That's clearly stated in the documentation - they support the majority of ads in the ABP filters.
- Neither uBlock support regex filters, which I use a lot.
- The uBlocks don't support $sitekey
- ABP removes social buttons
- ABP stops most tracking
- ABP has Typo Protection (it has to be added as an extension in Firefox)
Caveats: I use ABP in Iceweasel (Firefox) on Linux, all my boxen have >2GB of RAM. I add a lot of extra blocking to the standard filters (and some specifically for
/.).Balance - I have no interest in support for Chrome. I'll happily trade a few extra MB of RAM usage, or a few microseconds of page load time for improvements in blocking. Not seeing ads, seeing relatively more content, customisability, exploit blocking, and decreased data transfer are high priorities for my use case.
For people that need something simple for Chrome to block some ads, and run an OS that chews up most of their RAM, and only want to block ads - uBlock Origin is probably the best choice.
Also use https everywhere.
I use NoScript - which makes HTTPS Everywhere redundant while giving me extra valuable features. I'd add FlashBlock to the minimal recommended extension - if someone has Fffflash installed.
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Re:Now I won't feel guilty about using Adblock
OK, here's my addition as a would-be advertiser:
1) Use AdBlock Plus. It will help Web pages to load more quickly.
2) ???
3) Profit!
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Re:What I wrote's nonsense dave420?
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Re:"Annoying ads"
Actually their acceptable ads (which you can turn off with a single checkbox and they even offer the option on first install) is exactly what I've been saying for years should be the only ads allowed due to security concerns,
I disagree. The "acceptable ads" rules that Adblock Plus uses allow the very thing that I object to the most about online ads: the tracking. So their "acceptable ads" are completely unacceptable to me.
Until ads stop spying on me, I will block every single one of them that I can.
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Re:"Annoying ads"
Actually their acceptable ads (which you can turn off with a single checkbox and they even offer the option on first install) is exactly what I've been saying for years should be the only ads allowed due to security concerns,
1.- Static only (no Flash or Java, but they go one further and put no animations like GIFs), 2.- No "pop up/ under" ads blocking content (which is more likely to cause the user to click to try to move it, thus making it a good target for a malware link) but again they go farther with actual size requirements, 3.- Ads have to be clearly labeled as ads (so no fake security dialog boxes or images the user might click on concealing ad links) and yet again they go farther than I came up with by rules for borders and a bunch of rules for hyperlinks.
So as long as advertisers follow these rules? The odds of an ad based malware attack drops right off the chart. All your usual threats, third party flash, fake links, etc are removed from the equation. Most of us have no problem with the sites we use having a few adverts to stay afloat but what we DO very much have a problem with is putting users at risk for the profit of website owners. the ABP acceptable ads rules seems to address this concern and goes above and beyond so ATM I can really find no fault with the system.
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Re:"Annoying ads"
Not true. You can block all ads. https://adblockplus.org/accept...
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Thinking something doesn't make it so
> "...I don't think consumers really want that."
I can, in fact, name about 300 million people who "really want that," myself included. -
Re:And the vendor response will be...
Ad Block is probably going to have to get a little craftier about running in stealth mode in the future.
Yes, I'd say what will happen is that ad blockers will end up making page scripts see an unaltered shadow DOM, but display the page with ads removed.
But this won't work with (closed) apps, which are increasingly squeezing out the (open) Web.
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Re:Blocking AdBlock
The unintended consequence there is that they're effectively forcing you TO INSTALL AdBlock, and use the AdBlock Warning Removal List - https://easylist.adblockplus.o...
and maybe also to install GreaseMonkey (in Firefox) or TamperMonkey (in Chrome) and the Anti-AdBlock Killer script and filterset - https://github.com/reek/anti-a...
in order to get around their obnoxiousness.
I suggest rewarding them by enabling as much ad-filtering as humanly possible once you've done so. -
Re:DO NOT INSTALL
It has been recompiled for WebGL already.
Link is here
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Advertisers reeling over this small fix!
Slashdotters discover cure for malware from infected ad servers from this simple tool
Advertisers & Malware writters HATE THIS!
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Re:We'd like your feedback...
> To expand on this is there any plugin which can stop all canvas pop-ups?
Not that I've seen, but if it's a site you frequent then try using the Element Hiding Helper for AdBlock Plus. Once you learn a little about HTML, enough to understand how the hiding works, I find it *very* effective at removing the popups, and anything else on a site that I want to remove for one reason or another (usually distracting sidebar stuff).
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Re:We'd like your feedback...
> Is there an extension that blocks these "We'd like your feedback" messages that seem to be popping up on every single site lately?
Not that I've seen, but if it's a site you frequent then try using the Element Hiding Helper for AdBlock Plus. Once you learn a little about HTML, enough to understand how the hiding works, I find it *very* effective at removing the popups, and anything else on a site that I want to remove for one reason or another (usually distracting sidebar stuff).
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Re:We'd like your feedback...
There is a fantastic add-on to ad-block called Element Hiding Helper.
It lets you graphically select an element of a webpage and add it to the list of things adblock stops. I use it all the time to remove crap from webpages. You can probably use it to teach adblock about those feedback popups because they probably all come from just a handful of feedback-services.
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Re:We'd like your feedback...
I've heard that "element hiding helper" can assist with this. However, it's also easy to right-click on an item in FireFox, select "Inspect Element" and then figure out a rule to hide the content (though you'll have to consult the documentation). For instance, Slashdot has a "Site Notice" that will appear at the top of every page (unless you accept the cookies/whatever to suppress showing it). I added the rule "slashdot.org##div#sitenotice" to suppress it (though it has since been added to EasyList).
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Re:Don't use an Adblocker that accepts bribes
there is NO SUCH THING as an acceptable ad.
I agree, but that's no reason to use a poorly maintained fork. All you have to do is remove the checkmark in Adblock Plus. It's just an extra whitelist. Completely open source and transparent, except that it should be opt-in.
If you find it immoral to "use an Adblocker that accepts bribes", then you shouldn't use Edge either because all the adblocking code in Edge comes from Plus.
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Re:Company does exactly what it says it does...
They accept money for their time taken to go through the process of checking that you're actually compliant with their "acceptable ads policy". They don't actually just allow you to pay money to be put on a list of unblocked stuff. Your ads still have to meet the criteria of "acceptable". Personally, I'm not really that much against it. I don't mind some ads, as long as they are not animated/noisy/misleading/inappropriate/fills-the-entire-screen. Web sites need money to survive, and ads are a decent way for obtaining money. Ad Block probably has to do a fair amount of work to run, and to ensure that advertisers stay compliant. I would rather they charge the advertisers than me for the money they need to operate. If they get enough people using their product, then they basically hold the keys, and can make advertisers behave, and make some money in the process.
They don't seem to agree with your justification, according to them "Adblock Plus is only as good as its filters. The elements Adblock Plus blocks by default are defined in filter lists which are maintained by voluntary contributors. By constantly updating them, this community ensures that Adblock Plus blocks all annoying ads on every website."
So they describe their filter list as a product of voluntary labour. If they're really spending the money on evaluating Google's ads then why don't they mention that? And if it is just volunteer labour then where does the money go?
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Re:Company does exactly what it says it does...
They accept money for their time taken to go through the process of checking that you're actually compliant with their "acceptable ads policy". They don't actually just allow you to pay money to be put on a list of unblocked stuff. Your ads still have to meet the criteria of "acceptable". Personally, I'm not really that much against it. I don't mind some ads, as long as they are not animated/noisy/misleading/inappropriate/fills-the-entire-screen. Web sites need money to survive, and ads are a decent way for obtaining money. Ad Block probably has to do a fair amount of work to run, and to ensure that advertisers stay compliant. I would rather they charge the advertisers than me for the money they need to operate. If they get enough people using their product, then they basically hold the keys, and can make advertisers behave, and make some money in the process.
If this practice is so fair and just then why don't they mention it? If they're trying to make some money then why do they ask for donations while saying "nobody profits directly from it[ad blocking]".
According to both you and their site misleading ads are unacceptable. How is this undisclosed source of revenue from major advertisers not misleading?
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Re:Company does exactly what it says it does...
They accept money for their time taken to go through the process of checking that you're actually compliant with their "acceptable ads policy". They don't actually just allow you to pay money to be put on a list of unblocked stuff. Your ads still have to meet the criteria of "acceptable". Personally, I'm not really that much against it. I don't mind some ads, as long as they are not animated/noisy/misleading/inappropriate/fills-the-entire-screen. Web sites need money to survive, and ads are a decent way for obtaining money. Ad Block probably has to do a fair amount of work to run, and to ensure that advertisers stay compliant. I would rather they charge the advertisers than me for the money they need to operate. If they get enough people using their product, then they basically hold the keys, and can make advertisers behave, and make some money in the process.
If this practice is so fair and just then why don't they mention it? If they're trying to make some money then why do they ask for donations while saying "nobody profits directly from it[ad blocking]".
According to both you and their site misleading ads are unacceptable. How is this undisclosed source of revenue from major advertisers not misleading?
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Re:Opt-out
I'd assume (without further info) that this is about the "allow some non-intrusive advertising" checkbox you get in the filter options. It's on by default, but when you install adblock (as I did a few days ago) it one of the things you go through when the configuration dialog pops up.
It links to: https://adblockplus.org/en/acc...
It's not perfect in that it's on by default, but it's easy enough to disable. Perhaps they could improve it by tying this checkbox to your "do not track" preference?
And strangely enough there are people who WANT to see non-intrusive, correctly targeted ads. I'm not one of them, but my wife is. I'd have to call this one a feature, albeit not properly explained in the setup.