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Only Thieves Block Pop-Ups
aurelian writes "It's official: using browsing the web while blocking pop-up ads and other such exciting website enhancements is theft. Anti-leech.com are offering to protect your site from browsers blocking pop-ups (or 'theft tools' as they call them) - just try stealing from them with your favourite pop-up free browser. (I picked this up on the phoenix discussion forum...)"
If a site doesn't want me then they can %^&* off. There's no shortage of sites that haven't resorted to pop ups.
A long while back, in a little debate here on Slashdot, someone called me a thief for blocking pop-ups ads. If I recall, I think I stumped them by asking if Lynx users were thieves since their browser didn't support pop-ups.
Anyway, I didn't sign any contract to view pop-ups, and there is no guarantee I will support any soft of technology when I browse the web, so they take a chance in using it knowing it may not work. Same with Flash, other javascript, or even images.
changing the channel when a commercial break starts is a major fellony too!
"The majority is always sane, Louis." -- Nessus
http://slashdot.jp
...we'll all slashdot the site, and we won't have to worry about idiots like them anymore.
bandwidth theft?.. they're stealing OUR bandwidth by polluting our pakets with junk
Telling me not to block pop-ups because the website needs the pop-up income is bad motivation.
No website is worth wading through hundreds of pop-ups.
If their only source of income is pop-ups, they aren't long for the web anyway.
Pop-up income is a bad way to "earn" money, and everyone knows it. (except classmates.com)
Oh my. We're going to have to improve pop-up stoppers to defeat this technology.
Well, I'd better free up 45-50 minutes for coding sometime in the next week.
What can I do on the internet that isn't illegal these days?
Soon there will be warning messages when connecting to the internet: "You have connected to the internet. This is in violation of blah blah blah. Disconnect now"
"Go into the hall of mirrors and have a bloody hard look at yourself" - HG Nelson
Aside from the semi-FP issue (I bet I'll be post # 104 or so by the time I finished writing :-), I don't really see how this differs from M$ browsers (and Netscape 4.x) refusing to render my site correctly. So there.
"We can confirm that Debian does *not* ship the version with the trojan horse. Our version predates it." [CA-2002-28]
What are they going to do if browsers just *hide* the popup windows/banners, still loading the ads in the background?
I've never worked out how much bandwidth popup ads have sucked out of me over the years, but until recently, I had to pay for 'x' amount of MB's over my monthly limit (crap monopolistic ISP).
The people that block popup ads are the same people who would *NEVER* click on a popup ad and purchase something, so I'm sorry, but I can't really see what their problem is. Surely we are saving THEM bandwidth?
-- 7 string electric violin + live loop samplers
Click here to bypass thier test.
Kinda funny, This browser had failed the test and been blocked from using the site. Found a direct link past the tester and was able to load up thier page.
Just goes to show you, everything is just a measure that is able to be bypassed.
Do you Gentoo!?
showing pictures of naked, shaved pussy.
So, I'd imagine the next version of their software has safeguards for the /. effect :)
dennis
this isn't a troll post, but isn't it obvious? the stuff you browse on the web isn't exactly completely free of charge. there're bandwidth costs to be paid, servers to be bought and maintained, and some of the information you read doesn't just appear there; someone had to do research and type it out.
the websites let you browse their sites for free, and all they're asking in return is for you to do you part and look at those ads. some may interest you, most do not. in the cast of the latter, just close the pop-up window and go on. is it that big of an inconvenience? is it too much to ask for? i think not.
in effect, you're "paying" to see the websites' content by seeing those ads. if you disable pop-ups then yes, you are in effect stealing the right to see the content on those websites.
Since we've also recently been told that going to the loo when the ads are on is theft, this latest mob can go screw themselves. If a site doesn't let me view it through Proximitron (will test when I'm on my own PC) then there are plenty of other things I can be doing with my time.
I'm using Netscape7 in Linux, and I do not block popups, however their site blocked my access!?
If I really even cared, I guess I would be pissed.
This is a clear example of "Just because you can do somthing (block users who block you) doesn't mean you should"
This will fail miseriably
You must block ads, or avoid those sites entirely.
.. wait for it .. CHARGE MONEY.
/. subscription.
If companies and individuals go out of business because of blocking ads, that will lead to fewer, higher-quality companies like google that can come up with ways to make ads *work*, or sites that actually
I would rather pay money to visit a handful of web sites, then to put up with this bullshit pop-up ad crap all over the place. In fact these days I don't even bother visiting more than about 5-6 web sites, since I'll just drown in ads anyway. And I paid for a
Don't take over my computer with your ads and javascript nonesense, and I won't hack into yours. Deal?
Remember folks: Advertising is not a god-given right. It just happens to work for TV and magazines. If they don't want me ad blocking, they should take down their sites.
Is it theft to get up from a TV commercial? To skip the big ad section in your magazine? No. Ads are priced by the eyeballs after the fact, you don't try and force the eyeballs to match your expectations.
Why don't we just replace the outdated WWW with X clients, and make eveyone run X servers? That way, web sites can draw whatever they want on your display. It would really eliminate all this slow javscript and HTML which requires a huge browser to interpret and render. Isn't mark-up just a kludge (tell a browser how to render pages), when you can simply render the pages directly? X is a much cleaner solution, IMHO.
The test URL refrenced is here.
:)
BTW the site works with no blockage in lynx
and what a way to scare away your visitors. :-)
weired plugins, too many popups or obligatory cookies and i'm gone.
google will help me to find an other site
what, by the way, about indexing software. wget isn't doing javascript. I wonder if 'protected' sites will be indexed correctly.
Privacy is terrorism.
By their logic, if I get up to go pee when a comercial comes on then I'm steeling. If I simply manually click and close every freaking popup, then I'm stealing (gee I didn't look at them).
Jibe!
I can call the fact that you're reading this comment a theft. It doesn't make it any more official than some totally random company calling me running ad-blocking software a theft. /. front page?
Can we PLEASE just post the news, without any sensationalist crap, on
When men used to be men
This guy's argument is that bypassing pop-ups and such means bypassing his only way to make money on what I'm sure are pretty pathetic web sites anyway.
The fatal flaw in his argument though, is people using pop-up stoppers aren't EVER going to intentionally click on a pop-up, even if thye're forced to see it. So, he's not really losing money. These are people who proactively know they don't want to see nor click on pop-ups.
Anyway, as others have said, it will take developers roughly 10 minutes to come up with a work-around for this guy's tools. Such as allowing the pop-up window and killing it a second or two after it pops up. Duh, how tough is that?
Just wondering... I haven't seen those nasty pop-unders for a while. Where did they go?
It finally happened. The word stealing has lost all meaning. Stealing used to mean physical theft, as in you stole my calculator. You stole my book. You stole my videogame. You stole my song. You stole my TV show. You stole my internet site. You stole my cable. You stole my bandwidth. Stealing = made me mad
Theft? That is insulting and offensive.
I guess you can consider these other things theft also:
Using the Lynx web browser
Any TV using Tivo or ReplayTV
Going to the bathroom during commercial breaks.
Coming to the movies a bit late for the commercials.
When sites put banners and say, please click on these links because it helps us fund the site, I usually do. Why? Because it shows respect, it's honest, and it doesn't treat me like a "leech" that needs to have measures taken against me.
If you're writing a browser, just change the behavior of the popup-blocker from actually stopping popups, to having the window open without displaying it, IE it doesn't show up on the taskbar and can't be seen. It's the same effect as not opening, really.
Of course, this probably wont work with an add-on popup blocker to IE. It's to bad M$ doesn't have the guts to put a popup blocker in IE.
I've found a simple way to prevent popups is to put frequently-visited sites (salon, the onion) that do have popup's in the restricted sites list.
Also these people are crazy. The kinds of people who would actually put this software on their pages probably aren't making pages worth visiting anyway.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
I think it would be more effective if the message it gave was this.
Kazza Lite provides a nice hosts file (under the 'supertrick' link) that will block many anoying pop-ups and other nasties. It's for windows but I cut 'n pasted it on to my firewall. And that's what I think of the morality of plocking pop-ups.
"A language that doesn't affect the way you think about programming, is not worth knowing" - Alan Perlis
It seems to me that popping up unsolicited browser windows is both theft of bandwidth and theft of system resources. I've actualy been DoS'd by multitudes of pop ups each spawning it's own pop up children. Although I don't see what their test sight was supposed to do, I didn't get any pop ups and my pop up blocker didn't do anything out of the ordinary..
Everyone is entitled to their own opinion. It's just that yours is stupid.
I'm a hard-core ad-filterer, been doing it for many, many years. But, I'd rather see this kind of technology come out than for more draconian DMCA type laws to be passed that effectively mandate that we sit with our eyes taped open when browsing the web.
At least this way we have a fighting chance in an "arms race" of pop-up-blockers and anti-pop-up-blockers and anti-anti-pop-up-blockers. When the law gets involved it all comes down to who has the bigger guns, and that's hardly ever the little guy like me and you.
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
I do agree that advertising is crutual to the development of the internet. A few years back it looked like everything would be based on micropayment but we got over that.
Also I think that blocking off adverts when you brouse someones website is a little like stealing. I dont do it and I think its wrong to.
But Popups are designed to be annoying. I delibretly stop using brands which use popups.
People who use popup ads should realise that they are overpricing their product. I cant put up with them so yes I do steal the websites content. I am happy to view adverts for good content but when they overprice themselves I resort to stealing. I also cant affoard some software and I also will steal that too. I justify this as I wouldnt have bought it anyway.
The problem here isnt with the whole human behaviour but its with the people who think they can change they way people behave for a few measely bucks.
Mouse powered Chips, Open source Processors and Lego
Except for using the phrase theft, which could be considered libel, I see no problem with this.
So I won't see the site.. not my loss but ultimately theirs as I can't/won't recommend it to anyone else. And sites might not show up in Google either using this kind of technology.
The idea of the Internet is that ultimately someone will build a better site.. anyone can publish something. If there's no useful site on a topic, some freak will stand up and make one that is better and more user-friendly. I know I have done so and I bet many others with me.
Or some browser developer might find a way to show the content after all. Not that I actually see people pay for this stuff to put it on their sites.
Despite what it may feel like, pop-up ads account for less than 5% of the total advertisements on todays websites. Further, AOL (see this NYT article posted on ./ several weeks ago) has confirmed that pop-ups are a huge source of dissatisfaction from web users - thus making them in-effective.
Rather than use "anti-leech" technology, wouldn't advertisers be better served by simply employing technology that would be more palatable to their readers?
Needless to say the attitude of many companies these days is all wrong. Making you view popup ads. Trying to blame product shortcomings on the consumer etc. Well, I am cancelling my Digital cable, and I will not visit sites with obnoxious popup strategies.
If you want to do well in business, don't piss on your cutomers or potential customers.
"I don't think it's selfish, to eat defenseless shellfish." -NOFX
I guess that there are multiple sides to any story, though in the end I find the efforts of sites like anti-leech both amusing and somewhat dangerous. On the one hand, I do understand that serving a website can be expensive, and that as the recession continues many people are becomming more and more desperate to avoid going under. However, anti-leech is bad for at least two major reasons, one economic, and one societal.
;).
1. Alienating your customers rarely makes for a solid business plan: As the RIAA and countless other harsh regimes(both in business and government) have learned, the more you clamp down, the more people squirm to escape your grasp. Companies forget that one of the whole points of the WWW is choice- and that includes the choice to go to another website if this one is treating me badly. I don't think I need to point out that long term business is built on repeat customers, but then again maybe I do. Repeat customers are ideal, because they are likely to spend more, and have a far lower cost of acquisition. You generally get repeat customers by building loyalty, a positive feeling towards the company. Loyalty does not generally follow from pissing people off.
2. Even more so then with programming, many people start learning their HTML by looking out how another site has done it. I now do a lot of website development, but I got my start when I was younger in part through liberal copying/tinkering with already built stuff until I figured it out well enough to do myself. This makes me concerned about their 'anti-view-source' offerings. While I suspect much of their stuff can be circumvented, the very people who might benefit most from looking at code are new to the web and thus might not know how to get around stuff. If such things became widespread, it could have a somewhat chilling effect on the learning that goes on for the general, casual designer, who might never have the chance to get bit by the bug and learn more(/me looks over at large pile of Mt. Dew bottles, not totally sure this would be bad
Any how, I hope that the concept embodied by antileech gets thoroughly trounced. Heh, and I haven't even touched on the whole rediculousness of the 'theft' thing, but I'm sure that will get pretty well gone over by others.
By using the Anti-Image service, you can protect all your images and make it impossible for people to download them from your site. You will also stop other webmaster trying to leech them directly of your server.
Try out their example.
Okay, obfuscating the URL of the GIF with some screwy PHP probably isn't the best way to "secure" your images. To bypass their method, just view the source to find the scripted redirect that points to the actual image
You'll probably have to copy and paste those URL's because they seem to block off-site deep linking.
The future isn't what it used to be.
This was quite a shocker for me...
Just follow the day, and reach fo
Now there is something that will alert me when a website is no longer worth visiting. Thank you, Anti-Leech Dot Com! I am sure your IPO will net you hundreds of dollars.
- A.P.
"Remember when the U.S. had a drug problem, and then we declared a War On Drugs, and now you can't buy drugs anymore?"
Your browser *DOES NOT* support JavaScript.
THIS IS IN VIOLATION OF THIS SITE'S TERMS OF USE!
Do not press start, do not attempt to shutdown!
Your ILLEGAL behavior has been logged and sent to
the proper authorities!
I had this idea a while ago but never got around implementing it. Take a list of ads, and make a Perl script to load banners invisibly, of course faking the referer.
I see it as less "evil" than blocking ads, because if I just block them the site doesn't get anything from the advertiser, but the advertiser doesn't really lose anything. This way the advertiser should have it pretty hard to figure out which ads are seen and which are not, and the site should be paid at least a bit.
General questions: general@anti-leech.com
Advertising: advertising@anti-leech.com
Support: support@anti-leech.com
Lets email the shit out of them.
I am not morally or legally bound to view the advertisements of others.
If pop-up blocking in browsers is "theft", is it then also theft when your Tivo skips the commercials??
This is incredibly silly, and I wouldn't frequent a web site, or give business to a corporation that would ban be based on my browser or browser settings.
I'd rather be a conservative nutjob than a liberal with no nuts and no job.
Whatever happened to the micropayment model?
There doesn't seem to be any way to get it into some companies' heads that I DO NOT WANT TO BE ADVERTISED TO...and I can't even pay to get them off my back, which I would gladly do. Think about it:
1. Magazines.
2. TV - even when PAYING (~$50 these days) for cable, I still see commercials. Why is that?
3. Tivo - even though I pay for the service, they still "sponsor" this and that. WTF?
4. Web browsing - few sites offer a "members-only" AD-FREE portion of the site.
5. Phones - now companies are suing to get the "rights" to sell my info? What about MY rights? That's my info you have there, Mr. Head of Company.
6. Then there's the hospitals...who give your info out to folks when, say, your family has a baby.
7. DVDs!!!
8. Movies at the theater!!!
9. It just goes on and on...
I'm not confused about the need to advertise in the free market, but not one of these offer me discounts to advertise to me(phone companies, for example), or else they don't give me the option to pay a bit more to not get spammed.
If the window is loaded, but not shown, then everyone wins except the advertiser. As far as you're concerened, you saw no pop-up. As far as the web site is concerned, they get paid. As far as someone like doubleclick is concerned (or any other advertising-helper company), they pushed the impression and get paid by the actual advertiser. The advertiser loses, doubly, though. They have to pay for an impression that was never "impressed" upon the user.
As far as I'm concerned, this is fine. I don't like companies that would want pop-ups. This is like blocking spam as far as I'm concerned. I don't feel bad that the spammer paid for the bandwidth and I didn't read their spam. And in the same way, they're forcing ME to PAY for the bandwidth for getting their advertisement. It's not a big deal now, but what do I do when my I have a transfer limit on my broadband and actually start PAYING for downloading their ad.
I must say, that might be a *good* thing about this whole data transfer cap. People are going to get damn pissed when they start getting billed for receiving spam.
That link is to an article about some man that had sex with a goat.
You know this is silly. I bet that advertisers are pretty happy with this. People who block ads (I bet) are much more likely *not* to buy products related to those ads (if they saw them, of course). So advertisers are getting better views for their money. In reality, however, maybe the website providers should go after the advertisers, not the blockers.
That said, providers have a right to block access to people not requesting their pop-ups. I also have a right to avoid their page....
-Sean
And how about foolishly allowing people to alter the URL and change the message? How stupid is that?
Oakbox
Not just answers, the correct questions.
http://smartin-designs.com/
This guy is maintaining an
# hosts
127.0.0.1 ad.doubleclick.net ad.ca.doubleclick.net
doubleclick.net a.tribalfusion.com doubleclick.com ssads.osdn.com
ads.x10.com us.a1.yimg.com ar.atwola.com ads3.zdnet.com ads2.zdnet.com
ads1.zdnet.com ads.zdnet.com www.burstnet.com adfarm.mediaplex.com
altfarm.mediaplex.com s0b.bluestreak.com images2.slashdot.org
images.slashdot.org a.r.tv.com popup.msn.com sportsmed.starwave.com
advertising.com servedby.advertising.com ad.trafficmp.com fmads.osdn.com
media.fastclick.net popuptraffic.com www.popuptraffic.com log.go.com
games.espn.go.com sportsmed.starwave.com ehg-espn.hitbox.com
amch.questionmarket.com ads.forbes.com ads.enliven.com adj9.thruport.com
oas-central.realmedia.com ad.trafficmp.com click.atdmt.com
view.atdmt.com a1356.g.akamai.net
There is interesting background material on the Swedish company Intercosmos Media Group, Inc which owns the domain anti-leech.com:
Google cache of Yahoo news on "Intercosmos Media Group sues Verisign"
"Intercosmos Media Group, Inc., which has registered nearly 1.3 million domain names and is one of the fastest growing registrars of Internet domain names, today announced that it filed suit against Internet giant and competitor VeriSign, Inc. The suit alleges unfair trade practices and violations of the computer fraud and abuse act were engaged in over recent months by publicly held VeriSign.
"At first, Intercosmos management thought perhaps the tactics were the marketing ploy of a novice team or employee at VeriSign," Sigmund Solares, CEO and co-owner of Intercosmos, said. "Our company waited to see if actions would be taken to correct the matter by higher-ups at VeriSign. Instead, the deceitful marketing efforts only mounted to an egregious level."
Why oil price increase equals economic trouble (Score: Interesti
"Close your browser window, uninstall your pop up blocker and come back here to visit us."
How about I go to another site and forget about yours.
What we see depends on mainly what we look for. -- John Lubbock Now search for that bug slave!
I don't see what's wrong with this. I'd rather have them attempt a technological solution than buy some congressmen and have them make popup blocking illegal.
...I mean, seriously. If a website cares more for the (dubious amount of) money that it makes off of serving popup ads to me than it does with providing me useful content to make me come to their site in the first place, then I'm going to have to keep track of which sites are that hostile to users, and make sure that others know as well.
I would point out to all the trolls who can't wait to call me a thief for doing so that I do not block banner ads (though I do not have Flash installed); only the ads that interfere with my surfing habits are the ones that have to go.
I don't care what the marketing weasels at these companies think, their ads are not so fucking important that they have the God-given right to shove it into my face and make me chase some stupid window around to get rid of it. I won't buy something from someone who runs up and screams "DRINK PEPSI!" into my face; I don't see pop-ups as being much different.
Jay (=
This guy doesn't really know what he's talking about and it's clearly more than he deserves to even mention his site on Slashdot. For one thing, he's got all this useless "code" for keeping people from seeing image links or right-clicking on the page to, say, view the page source. Of course, all I had to do in IE was go to View/Page Source instead of right click, and the page source comes right up, along with the address of all the images... Am I missing something? Do I just not understand something?
For a more amusing and accurate description of their opinion on ad-blocking browsers, check out this informative access denied page.
Blocked by Anti-Leech.com
Aaron
AaronCameron.net
I don't even care that the media giants say not watching ads is stealing, let alone some lame website.
Slashdot: Where people pretend to be twice as smart as they really are by behaving like children.
We at Anti-Leech believe that a big problem with the Internet today is that there are very few ways to protect your content and hard work online. Anyone can go to your site and copy the layout, files, images, source code and use it on their own page or link content right of your server, stealing not just your content but your bandwidth too. To prevent all this we have engineered several ways to protect your site. Because your hard work should earn YOU all the credit!
These people are crazy.
Registrant:
WakeNet AB
Tanneforsv 17
Stockholm, Enskede S-122 47
SE
Domain Name: ANTI-LEECH.COM
Administrative Contact:
Wennberg, Johan johan.wennberg@swipnet.se
Tanneforsv 17
Stockholm, Enskede S-122 47
SE
888 888 888 888
Technical Contact:
Wennberg, Johan johan.wennberg@swipnet.se
Tanneforsv 17
Stockholm, Enskede S-122 47
SE
888 888 888 888
Registration Service Provider:
Intercosmos Media Group Inc. dba directNIC.com, support@directnic.com
504 679 5173
http://www.directnic.com
Registrar of Record: TUCOWS, INC.
Record last updated on 19-Mar-2002.
Record expires on 22-May-2003.
Record Created on 22-May-1999.
Domain servers in listed order:
NS1.ZONEEDIT.COM 207.228.252.101
NS2.ZONEEDIT.COM 65.125.228.66
What I REALLY don't get is why the text it displays is set as an 'argument' -- you can make it say different things by changing the argument specified in the URL: All my base are belong to them?
________________________________________________
suwain_2
Aren't there browsers that can block Javascript on a site-by-site basis? That would be nice...
-Erf C.
Cthulu always calls collect...
Have a look at bug 181035 on Mozilla's Bugzilla. There is some good discussion on how to handle this. A pop-up window can't merely be hidden from view, because invisible windows are considered a security hazard. Maybe the sandbox idea will take off allowing pop-ups to have temporary play room.
However as of now its an open issue at Mozilla with no clear solution in sight. This is going to be an arms race no doubt.
"Unlike most of you, I am not a nut." - Homer J. Simpson
No, something more like this :-)
Simply adding the strings "banner" and "popup" to a squid-proxy DENY access control list rendered that page -- and most others -- completely innocuous.
-----
PGP Key ID 0xCB8FF658
Better Links
I E+ Sucks+because+pop+ups+SUCK
M oz illa+has+options+to+turn+off+pop+ups+YEA!
http://www.anti-leech.com/at_block.php?message=
http://www.anti-leech.com/at_block.php?message=
Christopher McCrory "The guy that keeps the servers running" chrismcc@gmail.com http://www.pricegrabber.com
Ok, so calling ad-blockers "thiefs" is stupid, and the odds of this thing taking off is something around zero. Some points, though:
1. There's nothing wrong with a site requiring you to view ads before viewing it. This isn't the best way to do it, mind you, but it's a reasonable theory.
2. Everyone is better off if websites know what advertising works. Pretending to view ads hurts everyone in the long run.
3. What we really need, at the end of the day, is better statistics on Internet ads. Radio and TV people can factor in bathroom breaks and channel surfing into their ad rates, but we're only beginning to get those stats for the Internet.
4. Somewhere deep inside of me, I suspect that people who refuse to look at (any) ads are the first ones to yell when their favorite sites go to a subscription model. Actions do have consequences, and your ISP fee doesn't subsidize the sites you visit.
now those my friend, are the true reason pop-up killers exsist. The worst part is when they start combining these "marketing techniques", which is almost always the case.
There should be advertisment guidelines (just suggesting, not enforcing) on the internet about how advertisemnt should be on the internet. Perhaps a label you could place on your website:
"This site is not a rotting cesspool of annoying pop-ups"
(note: most of the malices usually occur in IE)
"The majority is always sane, Louis." -- Nessus
http://slashdot.jp
These guys don't appear to be marketing to (or, perhaps, to be) the sharpest tools in the shed, though. They have a "Test your website's security!" link on their page. So I plugged in www.microsoft.com...what I got back was mostly a display of the HTML of the www.microsoft.com page, and some scare text saying "The following HTML code was copied from your site. Enough information to make an exact copy of your web site? With Anti-HTML you can protect all or some parts of your code." I feel like writing to them and explaining how HTML and HTTP work...but I suspect they know just fine; they're just marketing to idiots, of whom there is rarely a shortage.
Hi,
You offer a much-needed service. As a future enhancement, you might consider simply releasing a list of your clients, so i can avoid attemtpting to view their pages altogether. I'd be more than willing to wwork on things on the server side to redirect free-loading http requests from a popup-blocker to a similar site which does not block access via your service.
Please let me know if you would like to collaborate, I'm offering my services for free, and I'll be sure to forward this same offer to any of your clients I come across, to prevent them from having to handle unneccessary traffic. In fact, it would probably be worthwhile for me to start collecting a list of your clients myself and making them available, along with lists of alternate sites with similar content. Please let me know if you'd like to help, as it should make your job a lot easier. If we can redirect all traffic from your client sites, you shouldn't have to worry much at all about blocking free-loaders. Thanks,
Henry Quinn
Brooklyn NY
god is just pretend.
Privoxy is a great tool to block ads. I never have to see ads anymore its great and nearly flawless. Its even open source. :) SF project page: Privoxy
Free Instant Site Inclusion
Especially when you've paid money to see the movie.
Escher was the first MC and Giger invented the HR department.
It is my god given right to ignore annoying advertising. I will not go in an old navy because their TV ads annoy me. I will not buy from a telemarketer because their phone call annoys me. And I don't care how cool the pop up ad, or flash animation is, I will not buy from them. I don't care who I am supporting, I will not open/read/purchase from spam.
So, if I block the pop up ad I am saving them money on bandwidth.
That being said, I do not do anything to block banner ads. Sure, they do slow down my browsing experience a bit, but I can live with that.
--T
http://www.theMediaBunker.com
Do'h
Try again with html
Better Links
IE Sucks
Mozilla Rules
Christopher McCrory "The guy that keeps the servers running" chrismcc@gmail.com http://www.pricegrabber.com
Comment removed based on user account deletion
hey, i don't block popups...its just...um...browser incompatibility with a few javascripts.
forget it.
"Amazing, turn away shoplifters with our amazing system. We simply hold up a sign at anyone that we feel looks like a shoplifter. "You are a shoplifter, you may not enter this shop."
Well i visited their site with opera (no ad blocking) and i was blocked.
"If you believe you received this message by mistake you can find more information here."
Sorry i dont listen to people who tell me to go away... I have absolutely no idea what this company is attempting to do or how they're doing it. So can someone explain to me, because i cant be bothered to read through all their marketing hype.
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
--design your site so it's three tiered. Minimal basic "free" stuff to see if the surfer is further interested. Second level is "more" content for viewing ads and possibly they might want to buy something from the advertisers, if you know your target audience and have actual relevant ads. Third tier is no ads, pure opt in session cookie and login handle/password paid subscription. Each step up you get more features and content. That's about the best you can do, well, that and running the site as begware, some sites actually exist this way, but the site has to be actually pretty nifty to do this..
Glad to hear of successes with other programs as well.
Mike.
Mmmm......sacrelicious.
If someone refuses to show me their site because I'm blocking pop ups, that means they've lost my viewership. Once they realize that no one is visiting any more because of their stupid pop ups, maybe they'll rethink how they fund their site.
7 November 2006: The day Americans realized corruption and incompetence weren't addressing 11 September 2001
I went to that example website using mozilla 1.2b with all the good blocking options turned on, I don't see what's so special about the page.
Oh, and if some site is going to consider me a theif for not viewing their ads, then they just won't get visits from me anymore. Fine with me.
-- Note: If you don't agree with me, don't bother replying. I won't read it.
I waited, and waited, and waited. No button appeared. I think that Omniweb's slightly flawed Javascript implementation confounds it. Fine by me, most sites that have Javascript I need to use work just fine with it.
- Oliver
The right to bear arms is only slightly less stupid than the right to arm bears...
I rely on Internet Marketing for my business, and the idea that formatting content to suit your own whim is wrong - is absolutely rediculous.
This is like the quote about a month ago saying that ignoring commercials is also theft and violates a consumers obligation to watch advertising.
If they don't want you to watch it, they can just put up a friendly message. "Watch our ads or don't read our content".
Of course nobody would do that, or they'd seem pretty stupid and lose customers left right and center.... If they won't be upfront about their expectations for viewers of thier web site, then I'll go ahead and keep blocking the crap I don't want to see.
Ace
I used to have two house mates many years ago, and when watching something we were really interested in, two of us would hit "mute" when ad came on, and un-mute after it was over, and we'd usually gab about whatever during commercial, occasionally glancing to see if the show was back on. Commercials grate on the nerves.
The other asked us why we do that...we were both speechless for a heartbeat, and then we had to explain how irritating we find commercials - they are louder, they are demeaning to the intelligence, they are lying, etc...he still didn't get it.
When it was something we were only "marginally" interested in, we'd sometimes watch 3-4 shows...flipping back and forth, usually triggered by a commercial.
I've always watched TV in this manner. And then, I got Tivo.
I've spent most of my adult life not seeing (many) commercials on TV, and much of my childhood I didn't even HAVE A TV! Call me a criminal.
When people say, "Didja see that commercial where..." I'm that guy with the clueless look on his face...pure, blissful ignorance.
I find popups to be annoying, and over-use of flashing banners on the top, both sides, and at the bottom with 1x1 sq inch reserved for content. But casual use is tolerable, I suppose.
Here's one thing to be thankful for, though: I haven't seen any that use sound. [Diety] help us all if that happens...
1: Load the main add in the main page.
:-P
2: Pop up a new window with requested content.
Works for me
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
Just because they "thought" I would render the site a certain way using a certain browser doesn't mean ANYTHING to me.
How I choose to access material over the web is my business.
Of course, the same goes both ways.. the site operators are free to do whatever it is they want with their site. If they want to use stuff like this, or force the use of certain browsers, power to them.
I'ts poeple like you who toss around the word "stealing" and accept that just about anything not happening the way the originator intended is theft that let the world get into the state it's in now with the RIAA, MPAA, etctera.
You probably think it's theft to mod an Xbox too... or to buy something sold below cost then not use it for the intended purpose.
If someone doesn't want me to fetch just certain objects from their webserver, they can do something about it instead of WHINE
Now I might actually have to
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
I'm an avid user of Phoenix, which of course blocks pop-ups, and this is great news to me! Websites that use this will now immediately inform me, "We don't want you to give us (or our advertisers) your money." This is a big time-saving feature from having to wade through a webpage for a while to determine whether or not it's crap. Now I know from the outset. Thanks, webmasters!
It's worth noting that if you turn off Javascript and go to that page, absolutely nothing happens. Yet another reason not to have it running in your browser by default.
-Todd
"The details of my life are quite inconsequential..."
And this came up!
If you cannot tell: I do not like being called a thief for using a service on my computer how I want to.
Knowing how the web works can also be fun.
Now imagine that you could block that data, saving yourself money, and preventing the forced spending of your money(ie, theft).
What these people don't seem to get is that we have no contract with them. They've simply put the site out in the open for anyone to access. If they want to charge for the site, go for it, but accusing people of theft when they've commited no such theft is just childish.
It's the people that have pop-ups on their site who are the leeches. They're stealing our bandwidth, and I
Albuquerque PC
Since when was javascript a subset of HTML? An end user could always criticize a website for trying to shove some strange funky code down their throat that could be potentially harmful when they didn't ask for it.
"Not knowing when the dawn will come, I open every door." - Emily Dickinson
Hahaha their Anti-HTML is funny... it redirects to a javascript page which loads another javascript page which outputs a urlencoded version of the page... a simple wget, and gives their "protected" code very easily :) ... 25 seconds later i realize i've wasted another 25 seconds of my life... ugh.. :p
---- BEGIN Anti-HTML Example Code ----
<font size=3 face=verdana>
This HTML code is protected by Anti-Leech.com<br><br>
With help of the Anti-Html system you can protect both parts of your page or all source code. We can even protect java scripts.<br><br>
Take a look in the source code of this page for a better view of how good the protection actually is.
</font>
<br><br>
------------- teee heee -----------------
is that you chose a way to make money (pop up ads) that you have no way to force people to view... and now want to call everyone thieves for not buying into your totally broken business model.
We have a word for that: stupid business model.
You are right up there with the cuecat. Was it a crime to buy a cuecat then NOT use it for what the company wanted you to use it for? No... they took a stupid risk that their stupid business model called for, and they failed. Because they were stupid.
I think people (website owners and advertizers) need to sit back and realise that the dot com industry that once was, is no more.
:)).
.
RUNNING A WEBSITE WITH ADDS WILL NOT KEEP YOU AFLOAT!
Once people get that through thier 1998 skull, they can start using the web for what it was originally intended for... sharing information, research, and communication. (ok and a little online gaming as well
These idiots don't seem to want to accept that the market has changed. just look at salon.com
--Finger me
ouch... not hard, yeah.. that's better.
This makes pages un-readable for some visual disabled who use text browsers to get to what they need and read it out on a braille-board or via software that simply reads the text out-load to them.
There is software that can work with standard web software (IE & Popups) and there is some that doesn't...
"Special Interested Groups" ---ATTACK---
Like everything the answer is, it all depends. Some users are getting free or dirty cheap internet access and part of the deal is you will be bombarded by ad's. If you are in that category and block popups you are stealing. BUT again that is the popup ad's coming from the ISP, not ones from any site you happen to surf to.
Now I pay regular rates for my internet access and feel its my right to block popups. IMO opinion its no different than when I channel surf or hit the mute button on my TV when commercials come on. Being that I was a marketing slime at one point I know advertisers aren't expecting everyone to see their ad's. They pray for a large percentage to view the ad, but only hoping to get one or two percent to actually generate sale. Same as bulk mail and Spam, you only expect a couple percent return.
Like everything no one really was that annoyed by popups until advertisers started to abuse them. Once popups started spawning other popups, or browser windows. Then they went to long daisy chains of windows opening that can take minutes to close all, then popup blockers became a necessity. Now you are steal from my time I'm paying for, you are keeping me from my work in many cases. We should sue them.
But with America's first dictator in office George W. Bush nothing will be done. If anything helps big business make another penny he not only won't stop it, he'll bend over backward to help them.
Just tell Opera to kill pop-ups AND identify itself as IE, and the site is viewable WITHOUT pop-ups. And it's not like this is a new thing with Opera, they were able to get around MSN blocking non-IE browsers as well. Their "technology" was obsolete the minute they launched it.
if you ask me about this whole deal, it screams fair use; if i go to a burger joint and get a kids' meal requesting no toy, they should give it to me that way. if i forget to request no toy, and throw it out without looking, there should also be no problem.
are blind people all theives? they don't see ads!
what about stereo systems? they come with graphic equalizers, which let people filter music as they see fit. but hark! this means radio broadcasts and cds can be played without so much treble! the thieves!
this whole thing reeks of 'loss of potential sales' -- the same argument as used by the MPAA and RIAA. sure, it's a bit more far-fetched (and therefore more obvious), but this may help our case against the motion picture and recording industries.
Use my userscript to add story images to Slashdot. There's no going back.
anti-leech is most commonly used on WareZ sites, you know the old ones, where they actually hosted the files and all you had to do is be bombarded by ads to download them? obviously this hurts these people getting something for nothing's cash flow, so its no wonder why they are now offering another service to counteract that... hah
I was curious enough to try anti-leech.com, with an unexpected yet illuminating result.
Load the page in Mozilla with "Open Unrequested Windows" disabled, and get a short message saying I'm not allowed to view the page b/c I'm using a pop-up blocker.
I disable Mozilla's popup blocker and load the page again. This time I get the anti-leech.com home page, along with the expected pop-up ad. Lo and behold, the popup ad is advertising Cable TV Descramblers.
So let me get this straight. They want me to stop stealing from them by using a popup blocker so they can try to sell me a way to steal from cable companies using a descrambler.
uhmmm, riiiiight. If you're going to be a hypocrit, at least try to be clever about it.
Flying is easy, just throw yourself at the ground and miss. -Douglas Adams
Hah, now that I've got that out of my system, let me get serious: this is the dumbest idea/company I've ever heard of (Next to MS). Honestly, so many people use pop-up blockers these days (And people seem to have problems accessing the site without pop-up blockers) that they'll be losing so much revenue/potential customers (If it's a site that sells things) that it's worthless. In fact, they're blocking anyone who uses Earthlink, as their major feature is ad blocking (I don't use Earthlink, but I've seen the commercials). And, if all else fails, we'll just disable javascript to view their site. Mind you, most people will just turn away when they see the "Go away until you don't block pop-ups" dialog.
I also love their image/download link/HTML source savers. This is the internet; there's always ways to get things. If the image can't be downloaded, I'll take a screen cap. One of my friends who didn't know about screen caps took a digital picture of her computer screen and blew up the image to use it on her project. There are always ways.
I also love how they try to install the Adware/SpyWare Gator onto your computer.
I hate delayed content even more. Some hoser posted a good point followed by a lame link, so this reply really can't be under their thread.
/. ad system? Google? Are these working? I do not mind either one bit because I get to choose the nature of the experience. Seems to me the most valuable impressions are those where a user CHOSE, not was tricked or forced, to follow through that particular ad. In that small moment, you have the holy grail, you have a potential buyer actually interested in your product seeking more information.
They mentioned the salon system where you are basically forced to look at an ad for a time before getting the content.
The way I see it, broadband of any kind is a premium service. Why pay for it if the crap from the marketing folks reduces the quality of the experience to that of dialup? Think about it for a moment, if you use free Juno or something, what do you get? Ads --too many of them to make it worthwhile, so you upgrade service, but why? For a better experience of course! So, if the actions of the marketing people degrade this, does this not devalue the very service you pay extra for? Duh!
Personally, I like the ads that are intermixed in with the content. Most of the benefit of broadband is preserved, and the ads get eyeballs.
I can somewhat agree that browsing with popup support disabled somehow can be thought of as stealing, but what about malicious pages and such? How are users supposed to secure their machines without the freedom to reasonably define what their machine will and won't do for them?
Battling the customer for their attention is never going to work. It costs more money and generates more bad PR than good impressions, so why do it? You would think these types of all people would know this cold.
This sort of thing just limits the usefulness of the Internet just a little more for nothing but the profit of the losers selling this service.
Salon is going the wrong direction by holding content until the ad is viewed. These folks are just as bad. How are the people who place ads in a reasonable way doing? For that matter, how about the
To everyone considering foolish schemes like this:
How the hell are you going to get this by forcing the issue? Really, tell me how, I want to know!
Know also, I don't have to get the content.
This means more than you would think. We are all being attacked more and more in this new age of information. This will backfire and when it does, where will you be then? Consider your answer again after you remember also that everyone gets to talk about it --a lot and for a long time.
Right now, there is more content presented than I can reasonably view. When I seek to meter my Internet time, guess who won't get the attention?
Remember that when your stats go down as interested visitors don't come back after being treated like criminals. Our time is valuable too, why not create an experience that rewards participation rather than the opposite? It can be done though it takes work. Isn't that what we are supposed to be doing to make money. Isn't money made by adding value where you realistically can?
Maybe there is some hope left though. If we feedback (which is what they really want anyway) our negative experiences, marketing people will begin to seek those who are actually working at providing an experience that people will come back for.
Tell 'em what you think people, it is the only thing that actually matters in the end.
Blogging because I can...
Just let pop-ups pop up in an invisible (not rendered) window. Doh! Then they can check all they want... as for cookies, just rewrite them as session-only cookies (session cookies are ok IMO), but don't tell the site that.
I didn't mind a few banners. But with blinking red and yellow banners, pop-ups, pop-unders, nested, timed, infinite amount of pop-ups starting to show up, I killed them all. It was a source of blatant abuse, and I'm sorry for all the average sites that are just trying to make a living. I'd like to support you, but it'll have to be another way. There's no way in freezing hell that I'll turn banners and pop-ups back on.
Kjella
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
I've found the web to be a much better place since using mozilla. Another great thing is my 1800 line hosts file which redirects the majority of ad servers to 127.0.0.1. Now, that seems like the simple and easy way to do it, but is there any way to get statistics on how many ads I'm missing and how much bandwidth I'm saving or am I better off not knowing?
..this is but a fantasy..
I don't think these people understand who the real thieves are. Sites that serve unwanted popups, banners, etc. without my consent are stealing the bandwidth that I paid for. If they want to use my bandwidth, they can damn well pay me for it at the prices I set. If they don't want to pay my prices, then they shouldn't be able to use my bandwidth. By the same token, if they don't want me to use their bandwidth, they're perfectly within their rights to deny me access to their sites.
These bandwidth looters are trying to set the tone of the game by portraying those of us who are trying to preserve our bandwidth usage as something dirty. I am paying for my bandwidth, and I will be the one to determine when it gets used.
Damn straight, now we know who is in charge now don't we?
I went ahead and sent this to their sales support and general questions departments. They might just find it as funny as I did.
Bravo!
Blogging because I can...
Theft? That is insulting and offensive.
:)
I guess you can consider these other things theft also:
* Using the Lynx web browser
Lynx is 100% fine. It works perfectly and is not blocked for a reason.
* Any TV using Tivo or ReplayTV
The day everyone has TIVO, you'll see that the advertizements start to get buried INSIDE the show, or that that show you loved in no longer supported. All you can access for free will be propaganda supported stuff or pay-per-views. I'm nt looking worward to that day
Going to the bathroom during commercial breaks.
Nobody requires you to look at the screen when they display an add last time I checked. Not even to stay on the channel. Most websites are not asking people to click the banners nor asking you to pay carefull attention to all the banners.
* Coming to the movies a bit late for the commercials.
They couldn't care less, the fact is some people enjoy those commercials, and for the movie you have already payed a ticket wich is the way you supports the creation of movies.
unfinished: (adj.)
Their website will be assimilated (not that I would want to).
Tried it with Avant Browser (http://www.avantbrowser.com). The website detected the popup blocker, so I turned off Java/scripting on the fly, reloaded and dropped off their "maaaaajical" radar.
Just because you can mod me down, doesn't mean you're right. Shoes for industry!
Run the Anti-Leech security tester on "your site" - www.anti-leech.com
then see all the source and links that are visible, and howly poorly written "your site" is.
Moderation Totals: Flamebait=2, Troll=1, Redundant=1, Insightful=6, Overrated=1, Underrated=1, Total=12. (not mine)
What do they think of Earthlinks TV adds, which focus on blocking unwanted popup adds.
Get a free ipod.
I think the problem is people using the fully featured website while trying to suvert the very means that makes the website stay online.
I don't see a problem. If they don't want to put a full featured web site on-line for free, they don't have to. Nobody is forcing them.
If there existed a way to automatically reformat a printed newspaper into a non-ads newspaper, they'd have to charge everyone more and due to reduced audience they'd also have to cut jobs and lower the quality of the articles.
Tough cookies. Technology makes some good business models go bad and eliminates certain categories of jobs. It happened for farming, it happened for manufacturing, why should newspapers or content providers be exempt?
So, the bottom line is it's ok for you to try to block adds, as long as you can recognize that when your favourite site closes you are part of the reason.
The fewer sites that are created with commercial motives in mind, the better, as far as I'm concerned. Companies and advertising already dominate newspapers, television, and radio. I think it would be great if such business models simply didn't work on the Web. So, please, go ahead: block all you can.
I always loved Google because of their advertising methods, as well as their prioritizing pages that has the most pages that link to it. But lately I'm seeing more and more commercial sites pop up at the first page of links, obviously because they're buying the listing from Google, and I have to dig way down deep for the pages that have the content I am really looking for. Yes, it's great that they are keeping their layout simple, but I think this type of advertising, perversion of links, is a worse form than banners or pop ups. On the other hand, it could possibly be the only way for sites to make everyone see their ads. If they can successfully inbed ads in their content, sort of like Maxim magazine, without ruining the content, then more power to them.
1) Your analog cable connection will be phased out.
2) You will be required to have digital cable (if you want cable that is), with a set top box that they provide.
3) They will track your viewing habits.
4) They learn that you change channels during commercials
5) They disable the channel changer before commercials are shown.
I kid you not.
Aliasing to many things to 127.0.0.1 isn't a very smart idea, it can break your resolver code.
Better thing is to place them in your firewall with a REJECT (not block) rule.
I wonder what they think about me blocking images and cookies from their site as well?
... disabling javascript. It's funny how impotent the anti-leech system is when something that simple nullifies it.
What the phoenix and mozilla projects should add is a javascript manager, similar to the cookie and image managers. That way you can let specific sites run javascripts and block all others or block specific sites' scripts and run ones from sites that haven't been added to "the list".
They should also add an animation/flash manager. I really hate flash ads.
So I ran their example, and checked it out. Sure enough, they block right-click, shift-f10, and the right-click key on the keyboard. Next stop, my browser's cache. Whoops! All the files and images are in there. Do'o!!
Yeah, right.
... and roam on their site.
To be more proactical
use the toolbar from XULPlanet.com
(a checkbox to enable/disable JavaScript).
Evidently if the site contain "pertinent"
data that need javascript....
my 2 cent
A web site has every right to decide wether or not they allow a particular browser configuration to access their site. Of course, the more people block pop-up ads, the fewer people that will be able to visit anti-blocking enabled sites, the less cash they'll get for ads, and eventually they'll die a natural death from lack of money.
A free market cure for stupid business models. one that I will totally support by continuing to use pop-up blockers - and encourage friends to do likewise.
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
Strictly from a PR point of view, I can't imagine that kicking users off your Web site for any reason is all that good for business.
But all this talk about ad blocking reminds me of PrivNet's IFF. In 1996, PrivNet launched the Web's first ad-blocking software, "Internet Fast Forward", saying "if it's out there, we can filter it". When PrivNet was threatened with various legal nastiness, they responded with "The Scissors Defense".
The Scissors Defense argues that if you pick up a copy of a newspaper (even a free one), you're full entitled to cut out the ads out with a scissor and throw them away, and the newspaper has no standing to sue the scissors manufacturer. Hence, they argued, just because someone uses PrivNet's software to do something undesirable doesn't make PrivNet liable for the outcome.
If "enough" people snip the ads, the newspaper may ultimately have to raise their newsstand price, but that's capitalism for you.
-Mark, who has some experience in this area
Is this what it's supposed to say?
$x='S24;r)>63/* h@<5+oZ)32"5cz';$me='phroggy'x$];
$x=~y+ -xz+\0-Tx+;print$_^chop$me for split'',$x;
Wonder if they validate the string at all.
You know, I am not sure, but from the security certificate request, I think anti-leech.com just tried to put "gator" on my computer. Lesson: Get ad-aware.
Nice that people that accuse end users as being theives, yet they don't feel there is anything wrong with _stealing_ information about *ME* using my own property and my own bandwidth.
Right now, I block maybe as many as twenty ad servers because they have spyware, or serve Flash ads that chunk up my dad's K6-III to a crawl, and I _know_ that he's not going to upgrade simply because ads don't work well. So who do I bill for a faster computer to play them?
Hey, I see you could add HTML code to that link while their server actually run the code and show the page. Let's link to some mp3's and sue them, then watch the outcome. :-)
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
The "Hide your HTML" stuff has me baffled. I can't get their demos to work in IE or Moz. It shows me a page and tells me the HTML is "encrypted"...but there's nothing on the page except that message. Everything I see in the browser, I can see in the source.
;)
;)
;) ), and adding a link to one of those spambot trap pages (which generates endless random email addresses for the poor bot). Whoop-tee-do. I could do the same thing on any web site in about five minutes.
;)
;-D
I'm dying of curiosity...I'd love to know how they're tricking potential customers into thinking their HTML is "secret", short of writing their own web browser to decode their "encrypted" content...
Their other "protection" schemes are silly. Let's see what we got here:
The "hidden" URL of their test download file:
http://www.anti-leech.com/ddd/test.zip
The "hidden" URL of their protected image:
http://www.anti-leech.com/pics/logo.gif
Got both of these in about twenty seconds. Turns out their right-click menu doesn't work in Moz; it displays the JS message, but then the right-click menu opens anyway. Heh... Even if it doesn't, all you have to do is copy the URL of the image from the source and paste it into the browser. It will not only display just the image, but it will also redirect you to the real URL that is supposedly hidden. As for the file download, Mozilla helpfully tells you the URL you are downloading the file from, and the filename. Stick the two together, and there's the real URL. Duh...
Their "anti-spam" service involves using a Javascript to print your address instead of plain HTML (wow, that's innovative...
Can't see the "Source Code" protection, but I'd bet it's about as effective as the image and file "protection" schemes.
About the only thing on here that really functions is the popup detector, and that obviously doesn't work right most of the time itself, judging by the posts here...
Anti-Leech.com says: "We estimate that our system can protect you in 98% of all cases and in the other 2% make it a lot harder for anyone to copy your content." Apparently, they figure 98% of the people on the web are too clueless to know what an image tag is, to know what "View Source" does, or to be able to concatenate strings in their head... Maybe they're trying to push their system on site owners whose target audience is limited to AOL users?
DennyK
Seriously though, I understand that sites need to advertise, but there is a limit. I love Opera for the 'Disable Popup' feature (and many others) and use it. And if a site is really annoying, I just don't come back. I have yet to find a site that I couldn't live without.
Sigs are bad for your health.
Even funnier is putting in the URL for the site itself, and getting the same canned response. Apparently, *they* aren't even using their wonderful technology.
mstyne: real name, no gimmicks
Well, as long as there are alternative sites they'll obviously get a visit from *me* instead of those just showing a message that I'm blocked.
And if those alternative sites use ads in a more pleasant way (hint: *not* popups) and you enjoy the site, they'll get the money if you click their ads once in a while.
Ironically, this will only hit hard against the pop-up sites the protection is supposed to assist, since you'll definitely not be able to help those anymore if you don't like pop-ups.
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
Closing a pop-up window takes time. And as we know, time is money; hence when you pop up a window you cost me money. Expect a bill soon.
Find out how they get their ads (ad company, in house, etc) and pay to display banner or pop-up ads on their site which bring the user to a site that explains what they're doing, and how easy it is to get around it
Seriously, just like those web sites that make it difficult to right click (assuming that anyone who right-clicks on their site is stealing images or content) they have every right to add code to their site that prevents one from reading the material without jumping through some hoops.
I simply avoid those sites. Chances are this technology will be picked up by the kind of sites I don't visit anyway.
If major sites which I frequently visit become the victim of stupid thinking, then I will simply hack around it, or stop using them.
-Adam
...the popups block you!
I pledge allegiance to the flag...
of the Corporate States of America...
The day everyone has TIVO, you'll see that the advertizements start to get buried INSIDE the show, or that that show you loved in no longer supported. All you can access for free will be propaganda supported stuff or pay-per-views. I'm nt looking worward to that day :)
This is why I want the penultimate filtering technology: the glasses from 'They Live,' rigged to filter out any advertising you happen to see, even in real life.
My God -- they'd be glorious.
-- This and all my posts are in the public domain. I am a lawyer. I am not your lawyer, and this is not legal advice.
In related news, I'm a thief because I channel-surf or visit the toilet during loud TV commercials.
Moderating "-1, Disagree" is simple censorship. Have the guts to post your opinion.
Actually, if you remember this thread from not too long ago you'll see that you can order digital cable pay per view simply if you rent the digital decoder, you don't need to pay for the "digital basic" channels unless you want them.
So no, you're not paying for the ability to get PPV when you're paying for the other channels.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
"ANTILEECH:
No more ad-blockers
No more pop up-kills
No more cookie-stops"
And then....
"We do not tolerate theft of our bandwidth!"
Err... hold on, it's my bandwidth too you're filling up with all these flashy blinking ads!
If you don't want people to download from your website unless they have looked at something, make it so that they have to look at something before they can download. If my browser, with all its bells and whistles, can allow me to watch it, then ad stopping software can do it too! Fix it where it is broken!
bash$
then do I or do I not have an inalienable right to;
Block whoever I want to block,
Block whatever browser agent I want to block,
Or do whatever else I want to do with respect to how content my on website is served?
Whether people *visit* my site is entirely up to them.
In the free world the media isn't government run; the government is media run.
Well it seems that atleast 2% of their visitors going to their site don't even have javascript enabled.
Are they theifs as well?
[alk]
Does Mozilla, or any other browser support opening windows on an alternative desktop tab in like KDE? open anything beyond the main window on an alternative desktop.
Ha ha ha
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Or, better yet.. you can use the filtering proxy server I wrote (get it here, or just look at my .sig) which can not only block banners; but can also rewrite webpage content using regular expressions, block certain mime-types, redirect requests using regexp's (i.e. advertisement click-thru's), forward through proxies that use NTLM or Basic authentication, accept gzip encoded content and recompress files on the fly, and can even use any external program (perl script, etc) to parse website content.
These guys are just begging to make the front page of fuckedcompany.com. Any bets on how long it will take them to get there?
Seriously, do they really expect people to pay them for a few lines of crappy javascript?
And what's up with calling pop-up blockers "theft-tools". Theft is an actual crime. If I go around all day accusing innocent people of crime, you can be faily sure that I'm eventually going to get sued for slander.
Calling a web browser a theft tool, might just be enough to land them a big fat libel suit. I really hope it is. I hope they get sued into oblivion for making wild accusations about non-existant crimes. If you don't like me blocking pop-ups that's fine, but calling me a criminal for doing it might just be legally actionable.
Life is too short to proofread.
On one side, the client can block popups. Its perfectly legal/morally right.
On the other side, when I request a HTML document from a website, they are no way obligated to send it to me. Calling blockers thieves is bullshit, but they are in no way obligated to serve me data if I block popups. And if IE ever implements popup blocking, the sites that block users who block popups could find themselves with no audience.
The Doormat
If you're not outraged, then you're not paying attention.
I have to pay for bandwidth to see your fucking ad; i guess that means i have the right ot be paid for looking at your fuckig ad which i didn't request to look at to begin with.. you know there was a time when intrusive (spyware) advertising didn't exist and ads themselves were subverted and the content drove the web and drove the #'s that brought the .com goldrushers which have bankrupted the web of both useful content and the driving reason for it's popularity to begin with
i for one read less than 5 websites on a reglar basis now as a result, there is nothign but peoples vain web logs and guestbooks anymore to be interested in.. anyway the point being that unlike cable, where you pay fo ra stream of available channels, many people are still paying hourly for internet access and your lame ads cost all of us money (yes even fractions of pennies to us cable modem users ad up, just ask banks where they get their money from) and you DO NOT HAVE THE RIGHT TO MAKE ME VIEW your shitty worthless bandwidth wasting ad..
how's that for some greek fire you unreasonable troll.
When you advertise (on any medium) you have to count on fostering at least a little good will towards you by your prospective customers. Labeling people who have voluntarily come to your site thieves or leaches is unlikely to inpart the sense of trust and warm fuzziness needed for them to buy something from you or even come back again.
Most people are used to advertising and thus don't mind banner ads, etc... but the pop-up ad is one form that many (most?) do not like. In fact enough poeple don't like pop-ups that a thriving industry that blocks them has formed.
One would think that that would send a message to advertisers to find another, less annoying way to sell products. Instead some sites are choosing to pit themselves against their customers using technology like this. Since this software, as it is now, is easily defeatable (turning off javascript in Opera let me by their demo page and I was still able to copy "protected" images by choosing copy image from the right click menu) then the only message they are sending to visitors is "We don't like you, go away".
I think the highly competitive market out there will deal with sites that use this and favor those sites which try to accomodate their visitors wishes, Google has been brought up many times and is an excellent example.
If Godzilla did not exist, man would have had to create him.
Popups can be used for other reasons. Maybe I'm blocking pop-ups for a totally different reason than advertising. The fact that Anti-leech.com thinks that blocking pop-ups == blocking advertising, is wrong because many more applications exist for the standard pop-up window (like games, application notices, cool effects, temporary data store, etc. -- whatever the programmer can imagine).
On the flip side, there are other ways to make advertising annoying without popups. For example, some sites now use a DHTML layer that floats across the content to get your attention. Now that's annoying, but it's not a pop-up, which proves pop-ups aren't needed, so why protect pop-up advertising? I don't see a reason, but maybe somebody else (an advertiser) can shed some light on this. I would like to hear perspectives from advertisers on that point. DHTML layers are a good idea from the advertiser's perspective because layers can't easily be suppressed, unless JavaScript is turned off completely, which most people are not likely to do. Sorry about giving out such "evil" pointers but it's nothing new that people don't already know about.
Excluding anti-pop-up browsers will make most potential clients angry. Instead, the advertisers (and Anti-leech.com) should better spend their time creating alternate methods for delivery of advertising (like the DHTML layer) intsead of blocking the defunct pop-up. It's easy to see that protecting pop-up advertising is short-sighted because popups are not the only delivery method available for advertising. These companies must not be technically savvy. Whoever buys into this foolish logic will end up annoying their potential clientel, and therefore alienating them. Are you gonna' buy from someone who calls you a thief and then forces you to see pop-ups that you've already decided you don't want? Notice the accusing intonations of the text that the anti-popup detector displays -- very rude indeed -- any descent advertiser or sales outlet wouldn't use it, unless they are convinced they have to deal out punishment to their potential clients as a parent might to a child. Very demeaning to say the least. We're all grown-ups here.
Why do so many browsers allow you to block pop-ups? Because the people have spoken, and the people do not want pop-up advertising! For any advertiser to now force-feed pop-ups and call clients thieves -- especially at this point in history -- it goes against every ethical and smart business practice.
I don't mind advertising being displayed to me, because I am so accustomed to it. However I do despise it being pushed to me in pop-up windows or any other annoying fashion that blocks the primary purpose of my visit to the website. If they have to yell that loud about their product, then I would say the product most likely sucks. For example, you probably won't see the Segway HT in a pop-up window anytime soon because the product speaks for itself. Quality, value, and purpose.
The irony is that most of the websites that use their software are mp3s, warez websites.
[alk]
I first found this website from a link on the website where you download Kazaa Lite, Kazaa with all the ad-ware and banners taken out. I think it's hilarious that a site that provides software with the ads hacked out thinks people who block pop-ups are stealing.
...
What bugs me is not so much the pop-up issue, but the fact that the "access denied" page is one of those irritating Javascript jobs that you can't Back-button out of.
A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
So if blocking popups is stealing, does this mean that when their site is unavailable they are obligated to compensate us for the downtime their site was unavailable?
So many times ive been upset because a site i needed to get to was down.. At long last justification for getting money for my loss!
After all, im not paying my ISP for bandwidth just to have these sites be down stealing information from me.
I never click on ads, so they aren't losing anything from me. Even if they made money based on how many people saw ads, as far as their server is concerned I still "saw" the ad, my browser just replaced it with a blank spot on my end.
I hope you're not pretending to be evil while secretly being good. That would be dishonest.
This anti-leech.com is clearly a thing that should not be. Hackers and crackers, have at them. Make them pay.
How ya like dat?
Good publicity move you pulled there- way to get on CNet.
What we call folk wisdom is often no more than a kind of expedient stupidity.-Edward Abbey
Does this violate the guidelines for sites for the disabled?
:-)
Can we legislate that all the p0rn sites must use this script?
- Tjp
I am in wallow with my inner money grubbing capitalistic pig. ... Oink!
Getting donations from mine is like pulling teeth. But, in the long run? If they don't donate, and I can't pay for it, then obviously people don't really care about it enough for it to desperately need to stay online.
Yes, you can arbitrarily block people if you really want to.
However, unless your website is so utterly mercenary that you probably don't have any of your own content anyway, it's a stupid thing to do - why alienate people for no good reason?
If the purpose of your site is to sell your products, you'll sell them better if your site is accessible. If the purpose of your site is to provide information, you'll provide that info to more people if you let them in. If the purpose of your site is solely to attract ad revenue, I don't want to be visiting it anyway, so I suppose you blocking me is actually sort of useful.
(For blocking read unnecessary Flash, excessive scripting, gratuitously incompatible HTML, or anything else that detracts from your site's purpose)
-- smcv, owner of an ad-free website
pop-ups use my bandwidth, my computer, my software, and my electricity for free. That is theft. It will remain theft until I sign an agreement that gives them the right to access my resources.
The problem in this world is we never recognize the real thieves.
A Good Troll is better than a Bad Human.
Second, their code to disable right-clicks is lifted from DynamicDrive, comments and all. It's not like they have any new technology.
Third, calling someone a thief may be libel. It's hard to prove libel in the US, but falsely accusing someone of a criminal offense usually does do it.
You can just edit the first ad URL ending in "1a.*" with say a "4.*" and skip to the end of the ad. I'm on dailup at home and used it to avoid downloading all that flash.
After I skipped all the flash I got a page asking to click here to continue and got a cookie that let me back in all day -- it's not too bad b/c I noticed the ad was for a... ah... maybe they are doomed...
Proxomitron handles their sad little test just fine. Here's the message I get:
We have determined that you use ad blocking software. This site is provided for free and depend on an income from these ads. By blocking them, you make it impossible for us to continue keeping this website online for free. Therefore, you will not be able to access this website again until you uninstall or de-activate your ad blocking software.
Close your browser window, uninstall your ad-blocker and come back here to visit us.
The message displayed is passed as a parameter to a script so one could easily display one's own message
iirc, the glasses from "they live" didn't filter out advertising, they reduced it to its base message. so instead of seeing a billboard for jooky, you'd see simply the word "CONSUME." it's been like 15 years since i saw the movie, though, so let me stress the iirc part.
So what do I do if our obscentity filter blocks the blocking message?
Xix.
"Everything is adjustable, provided you have the right tools"
FYI, this site is a great resource for information on detecting popup killers.
/. does here -- micropayments.
/. who simply can not afford this, and/or are not interested in this.
Now, onto getting myself flamed out of existence.
I run a Web site hosting over 60,000 message boards. The service is free for anyone who wants to use it. Yes, it comes with ads - banners and popunders. Those who wish to not have the ads have the option to pay for our ad-free service, much like
Now, many of you have stated that you are under no contract to have popups come up, so they shouldn't come up. But what about everything else on the page? Did you enter into a contract to view the content of the Web page you are viewing? No? But you are still viewing the content of the page, so why are you not viewing the ads that came with it?
When you download a Web page that someone puts online, they send you the layout (images, etc), the content, and yes, even the ads. You should respect the fact that the person who has put this content online has put effort into creating it, and you are repaying them with a moment of your time by closing an ad window.
It seems to be the general sentiment here that you should just do micropayments for everything online. What about the people who do not want to do this? There are many people who are less fortunate than many people here at
So what do you do for these people? Advertisements. The ads that you view help pay for servers, bandwidth, employees, etc. Personally to run my Web site I spend around $3,500 a month on expenses (servers, etc). Most of my money does comes from ads, because most people are not interested in paying for a free service like mine. I do make quite a bit of money off of these so called "micropayments" from people who want ad-free.
If I ever wanted to switch to a paid-only service model, I know I could do that successfully without a problem, and probably make around the same amount of money. But do I want to do this? No. I would isolate the majority of the people that go to my site and piss off a lot of people. I'd rather keep the community atmosphere that my site has with the ads, than go to paid only and kick 90% of the people out who are not interested in paying.
When you view an ad, you are compensating the owner of the Web site for their efforts. Downloading a page and preventing the ads from displaying is stealing. Webmasters who let you download a page that has an ad are letting you have access to that content because you are doing something for them in return. They give you content, you view the ad. The Internet is not a one sided deal. You don't get your cake and eat it too.
Deal with the ads, they aren't going to kill you.
Bring on the flames.
Patrick Clinger
ProBoards.com
I recommend the MNGS philosophy to anyone and everyone. If your web site won't let me in, I will do something else rather than jump through hoops to get in. It's not like I lack for amusement or research material anyway. Sites that don't suck as much generally manage to do just fine with unobtrusive and well-targeted ads, minimal or repeated images (thence low bandwidth requirements), and maybe voluntary subscription. The anti-anti-popup whiners just don't want to bother doing a good job, so they try to fence you in instead.
Why is this site not slashdotted yet? With everybody abusing, er, experimenting with thier weak software, you'd think the server would have gone down by now..
Personally, since I haven't yet gotten around to installing Mozilla, I just avoid sites that use popup advertisements. My favorite web comics I support by buying thier books; the authors I like don't seem to care for popups either.
Twenties Retirement
How can they get away with this?
/. articles, spam is only going to get worse. As seen here, there is a new breed of spam/popup on the horizon.
Can you say class-action libel suit??
"A website cost time and money to run. Every time you visit a website you will cost the webmaster behind that website money as they have to pay for the bandwidth you use when downloading images, information etc."
Ok, and by popping up images, information, flash movies, etc., you're saving bandwidth *HOW*???
"If you start trying to block that income you will still cost the webmaster the same amount of money as before, but the webmaster won't earn any money from advertsing to cover the expence."
If you are going to call us theives, please at least spell expense correctly. Aside from nitpicking their spelling, do they honestly expect we all get *FREE* access to the internet? And that we all have extra time to read and close all the popups that? Our bandwidth costs us too, and our time is money too.
As I browse their site, I have closed at least 7 ads, AND a popup for that stupid Gator spyware.
Heh, they offer spam protection. But, if you follow their logic, blocking spam email is theft. Those spammers take all the time and effort (download list, slap into mass emailing program, hit enter, go read a Tom Clancy novel while the email zips off to inboxes unknown..) to email us with viagra offers, penis enlargers, and 19% credit cards. All that bandwidth they use, and the email lists they have to buy, and we're stealing by not reading their emails.
Heh, here's a blurb on cookies, "What cookies have to do with all this might be hard to understand at first, but blocking cookies can also cause major problems for webmasters. Many sponsors use cookies to track from which site a sale came from. E.g. if you visit a specific site, click an ad and chose to buy something the webmaster of the website you first came from obviously should earn some money from that. When blocking cookies that revenue could be lost..."
Sure, but they don't just want to track what website you came from, what you did at their site, and where you went to next afterwards... since they seem to be buddy-buddy with Gator, they want to know what you're doing on the web, at all times...
And, as seen in previous
"Ralsky, meanwhile, is looking at new technology. Recently he's been talking to two computer programmers in Romania who have developed what could be called stealth spam.
It is intricate computer software, said Ralsky, that can detect computers that are online and then be programmed to flash them a pop-up ad, much like the kind that display whenever a particular Web site is opened.
"This is even better," he said. "You don't have to be on a Web site at all. You can just have your computer on, connected to the Internet, reading e-mail or just idling and, bam, this program detects your presence and up pops the message on your screen, past firewalls, past anti-spam programs, past anything."
So, taking Anti-leech's arguement to the logical extreme, blocking these invasions of privacy would be theft.
Ain't technology grand?
Julie Moult is an idiot.
Motorists not staring at billboards for a full ten seconds are now considered thieves, and will be prosecuted accordingly. Time to invest in Geico...
If your theory is different from practice, then your theory is wrong.
The amusing thing is that also advertised on the SAME PAGE as the "anti-theft" programme is an anti-spam program which supposedly blocks spam, and removes ads from email...
Don't you just love hypocrisy in action??
that is tantamount to saying that my flipping by the pages of ads in the front of a magazine is theft. this is a great way to make me never come to your website again.
As George Orwell made so abundantly clear those who control the language control the world. This is why you are called a thief and a bomb that wipes out villages is called the daisy cutter.
It's all double plus good.
War is necrophilia.
Google should have a feature to exclude sites with popups... now, that would be neat.. much more useful than their catalog search :)
However, I routinely click-through on my favorite sites' banner ads just to give them a little extra bank.
Hey! I found another thief! He's defrauding the poor advertisers by feigning an interest in their products that doesn't really exist. Using up their precious server bandwidth to view an order form that he has no intention of ever filling out.
Guys like you will be the downfall of the interweb.
Pop Ups are terible.
I don't mind banners at all, even the new really big ones (they are the same physical size as an old banner was for me a few years ago).
What I really hate is pop-ups though, not even limited to advirtising ones.
Why do websites automatically open in a new window sometimes? I have two buttons on my mouse (well 5 if you could mouse wheel, wheel up and wheel down). I can right click open in new window (as can 90% of computer users, the other 10% hold some keyboard button and click).
So why do sights do this too me?
As an example I will give mail2web.com. Why is every message I view it's own window? I really don't get it.
Anyway, pop-ups and pop-unders suck, I prefer 10 seconds of full screen forced diversion flash adds to pop-ups.
Wow, sent an e-mail as suggested when clicking on "use classic" banner, and got a fast response that addressed my msg
I like OmniWeb's solution to the popup problem. You can simply set it to never open a window via Javascript unless it's in direct response to a click. Just as it should be. I used to avoid sites that had popups. OmniWeb gives me back my freedom to surf without obtrusive "marketing" being constantly thrown at me.
-- thinkyhead software and media
Remember, Jamie Kellner (new CEO of Turner broadcasting) said it's ok to go to the bathroom. He cuts you that much slack, but he does say skipping through the commercials is theft.
These media execs have such mind-boggling egos, they have no sense of reality. But what they do have is enough money to get senators to do what they want, which means the law doesn't have to make sense to normal people. Scary.
Not a problem. But I think it depends on the show. I record and put to VCD episodes of Oprah (I hear raucus laughter from afar). Her show easily can be between 22 and 26 minutes with the remainder being commercial (that means I can fit two to three episodes of Oprah per VCD). Likewise many of the "good" shows (meaning popular) can end up significantly shorter as networks try to sell more and more ad space at increasingly high prices. I would love to see a break down from the networks though of what the "rules" are for programming.
"Do not be swept up in the momentum of mediocrity." - anon
my own pop up blocker, from earthlink (for free, from them) for earthlink users:
linky linky
all i had to do was hit the 'off' button, and refresh
worked out well, they have truely foiled my browsing popup blocking program...
what will i do now?
Runnin' On Empty
They might as well use intersistials, which are irritating, but not nearly so much as popups, IMO.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
They want to install gator from their site. Gator should be considered as the number 1 net criminal. The lie about uninstalling the associated application then gator will automatically uninstall needs to be proven in court. I want a class action law suit against them. I want them to file chapter 13.
Get a free ipod.
Somewhere deep inside of me, I suspect that people who refuse to look at (any) ads are the first ones to yell when their favorite sites go to a subscription model
Wrong. I refuse to look at any pop-up adds, but when LWN went to subscription I subscribed and I still pay them. why ?
1) they give me a good return for my money.
2) they treat me with respect. They give me a choice. If they'd use popup ads and other nasty tricks that take the choice away from me they'll lose me as a customer in seconds.
provide value, charge fairly, treat me with respect, and you'll get my money for a long time. Don't, and you won't. Like you said, Actions do have consequences.
Working for necessity's mother.
Exactly. A friend of mine who's a UI designer once passed on the following UI credo: "When you emphasize everything, you emphasize nothing."
.
- First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then ???, then profit.
Doesn't this sound a bit like the argument the networks and the MPAA made that ReplayTV is copyright infringement because it allows you to bypass commercials?
Things are getting scary out there folks.
This space available.
And what about people who wouldn't want to obey such instructions? Would they be thieves? I'm having a bad feeling about this... One day, that idea of yours might become a reality, so be careful what you wish for as it might just happen. What would it really mean?
Generally, such file would be considered a "terms of service", and the server could choose to block everyone who didn't read the file. Only people who had browser to read the "machine readable website viewing license" or whatever would be able to request any files off the server. And after this, if your browser would ignore that, and would choose to not display ads, it would be violation of the terms of service. Writing ad-blocker could be seen as completely illegal thing to do. Far fetched? Think DMCA.
Is this what you want? How about we got a bit further? How about this...
Servers could implement a new protocol for serving information about what services are available, and with what conditions. This service would be assumed to exist on every server, and if it didn't exist, you wouldn't be allowed to do anything. Once browsers would begin to enforce this, all servers that wanted to be visible would implement a rule serving protocol for sure. If the rulefile said there is only a http service available and it requires viewing ads, trying to probe for ftps or anything else would be illegal. Such protocol would make it easier for search engines to process data (they'd know what is public and what private), it'd make it easy to sue spammers that are using smtpd's that aren't marked public, it'd make it easy to sue for the guys port scanning and the kids who sent you icmp_echo in the morning without checking for the server rules first...
Eventually, ISPs would be forced to comply with this also, preventing rogue users from doing stuff. Transparent proxys would enforce the remote server rules, so that you couldn't request pages without fully receiving the ads first.
Such a great idea, isn't it? Rules are bleh without enforcement, and when MONEY is involved, as it is with ads, there's need for enforcement. Have a nice day.
-- Matti Nikki
Web interactions can be described at two levels. The first, and the only one nontechnical folks know about, is the human level. Here interactions are described as they are perceived by a human using standard tools. That is, when I click a link I'm asking for a page as rendered by default configuration Netscape or IE -- a bundle of content which you're offering as a bundle and which I see only as a bundle. If this is the way you understand web interactions, then accusations of theft make sense. But it's an abstraction that doesn't reflect what's really going on.
The truth is at another level, which is network level. Under HTTP, I request a chunk of data and, your server may or may not send it to me. That's it. The protocol says nothing about what I do with the data once I have it -- my computer is my agent, not yours. In particular, it says nothing about whether or not I will follow any suggestions to request other chunks of data. The protocol says nothing about what whether or not I'm using the standard tools. (It does suggest that I tell you, but I see that as a detail of the request -- "I want the version you've prepared for IE5".) Those are the real terms of use. If you're server sends out data on those conditions, you've implicitly agreed to them
(This doesn't give me license to violate copyright law or commit identity theft. Those are illegal independently of any protocol.)
If you want to make sure I download your ads, use a protocol (or server configuration) which is a better fit for your abstraction. You can:
- Configure your server to deny content requests until the ads has been downloaded. E.g. don't serve me part 2 unless I've downloaded the ads in part 1 (tale.com does this), or put the content I want in a frame that I have to load last. [But there's no way to tell whether or not I've displayed the ads.]
- Use a protocol in which the whole page -- text, images, and all -- are transfered in a single bundle, like a zipfile or tarball. The protocol makes it clear that the ads and the content are a package. [There's no way to tell whether or not I've displayed them here, either].
- Require me to use code you trust. It could be a signed version of a standard app or your own applet. [But the only way you can require it is by serving the content only to machines that have proven that they know some secret. With fully programmable computers -- i.e. not crippled by "trusted computing" hardware -- the secret will be be DeCSSed.]
In other words, you can readily force me to download the ads, but forcing me to display them is just another DRM use case. Or maybe it's a DMCA issue.The protocol is the law. Or at least it should be -- reality may differ.
Check this out
Seriously though - you saw it on their site - does this make it legal?
Consider their basic assumption:
People who find pop-ups so annoying that they've gone to the trouble of installing software just to get rid of them will, when forced to look at pop-ups, still think favourably of the advertisers and buy from them.
Maybe they should try cold-calling people at 3:00 am. And wrapping flyers around bricks and then launching them through people's windows is certainly going to get them read.
Sheesh!
I know what penultimate means. And this is second-best. It doesn't filter out advertising delivered through other senses AT ALL. Sound ads will be a serious problem until They Live headphones are also introduced. Industries that use odors (perfumes, food, possibly bookstores) will survive even that.
Taste is kind of difficult to force on people. And I'm not entirely sure how well touch or orientation* could be employed in advertising.
So the ULTIMATE filtering technology is probably some sort of mecha that you sit inside, to insulate you. The glasses don't come close.
Surprising as it might seem, I very carefully and deliberately used 'penultimate' before. Some people do know what it means, dumbass.
*I.e. the Vestibulary sense -- your ability to sense which way is up or down, and the position of your limbs, etc. The major sense organs are in your inner ear.
-- This and all my posts are in the public domain. I am a lawyer. I am not your lawyer, and this is not legal advice.
Too bad that got marked as a troll. That should have been modded as informative if anything.
Actually, this is a widely held myth. Some stations may vary the actual volume but most don't - they use compression (limiting the range of frequencies used to give the sounds more impact) to achieve the effect.
If the actual volume was changing then it would be easy to regulate but dynamic range is a much more subjective issue. The sounds are percieved as louder but wouldn't register as having a higher volume on a VU meter.
If theft means avoiding pop-ups, then call me a happy thief.
I would never respond to a pop-up ad. I usually keep blocking turned on. There is a reason for this. My window space is mine. I give 'you', the web site, no authority to pop up windows that force me to make a mouse click to ignore an ad.
Feel free to put ads in your page, as long as they don't move and distract me while I'm reading. That means Flash is out, of course. I will never respond to such an ad.
Donate background CPU time to fight cancer.
Web-enabled STB's rarely support POPUP's because of the HCI problems with a handheld remote (typically no mouse/cursor constrol) and screen sizes, the same can be said for many other web-enabled devices. Mobile phones, etc.
These people seem intent on cutting off most of the next generation of Internet devices so I cannot see this catching on with any other group than blind linking porn advertisers.
It does suggest a HTTP issue that I've been considering for a while. There seem to me to be an increasing requirement for a USER-AGENT-PROFILE header to HTTP requests to identify a clients capabilities, to many web designers assume a PC and MIE/Mozilla access only.
I think these frustrations are being vented at the wrong people. Before I started using mozilla, all I did with pop-ups were trying to beat them back like crazed student protesters at a WTO meeting, I never ever looked at them. What the hell is the difference whether they pop-up or not, actually I'm saving them bandwidth.
They are the ones putting up the site on the internet for all to see, not me. If they think their site is so important to people, make it a pay site, if not, don't complain.
Just like the content industry, they see their business model just does not work, so they demonize their customers instead of looking at the root cause. If the way they are doing it doesn't rake in the dough, find another way or just shut down, don't slander your customers and expect any sympathy in return. They should be glad to get the hits they are, contrary to popular opinion, eyeballs on the internet is a valuble commodity for more than popping up ads.
Doesn't work on my Mac running Omniweb anyways. CTL-Click & save image or view sources. So much for that .....
Alison
"It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education." - Albert Einstein
I read through the comments on this topic and there was a lot of noise about "I am under no contract to view ads from your site."
BE VERY CAREFUL here. Pay close attention to terms of service from now on, because this may very well be the next step:
3) You agree to view advertisements online from Verizon's affiliates and partners. Any measures taken to:
a) Prevent loading pop-up or banner advertisements
b) Prevent the creation of "cookies" on your computer
c) Otherwise prevent the delivery of advertising content approved by Verizon
shall be construed as breech of this agreement, and may be prosecuted as theft of services.
This is not an actual excerpt, but something that might find its way into terms of service if we don't all pay VERY CLOSE ATTENTION...
Heh. I guess that goes with the "there no such thing as bad PR" theory.
But trust me, it was a royal pain in the reverse proxy. We'd developed this software for both Windows and MacOS, and we'd seeded it to a dozen test sites -- including a bunch of K12 schools were THRILLED with it.
As a small (tiny) software company, we depended on various Web sites to carry our new product announcements and get the word out about our offerings. When we released AdScreen, most of those very same Web sites not only refused to carry the announcement, but many also sent us three-dimensional nastygrams saying that they weren't going to cover ANY of our products ever again.
We had some very heated discussions with many of the Web site owners and editors that morning, and came to the conclusion that they were "holding our head under water", and that unless we recanted, they'd collectively cut off our (free) PR channel to the marketplace. Since we depended on that for our marketing and sales, we backed down.
Our software did not remove ads. Instead, it removed the graphical parts of the ads, replacing them with text-only versions (mostly from the ALT text) that were still visible and clickable, just not as bandwidth-hogging or visually intrusive.
It's interesting to note that several of the most vocal Web sites that were complaining about how AdScreen was going to ruin their business have now switched from running graphical banner ads to inline text-box ads -- exactly what AdScreen would have done to their site anyway four years ago.
Canning the software LOUDLY was a good PR move, given the rest of the situation. But it in no way made up for the extended multiplatform development effort that went into developing AdScreen.
-Mark
Advertisers take note: I never by anything offered to me by a solicitor. This includes phone, direct mail, fax, and e-mail marketing. This do not buy policy has kept me from falling for a couple scams. I found it good policy to NEVER buy from any direct advertising. When I want something, I shop for it to get the best deal, quality, warranty, shipping rate, etc. This includes research on the reputation of the seller. Push content ads almost always have a lower quality higher margin product in order to pay for the high priced ad campaign. Pushy ads always wave a red flag. Example, everyone hated the popup/under ad campaign for a wireless tv camera. A quick search located 3 other manufactures of similar products. One of them at a higher price was a much better product. If you want to sell me anything, don't direct market me. Be sure your ad properly shows up under a google search. Be sure your reputation is clean. Searches also pull up reviews listing the rip-off artists. Sites that have sponsership are OK. If I go to a skateboarding site and it is sponsored by a wheel manufacture, that is fine. I expect it. Just don't expect to close a deal for 8 wheels just because I stopped by the website. When I look for wheels, I will remember if you bombed my browser with pop-ups, or sponsored a fan site. By the way, I didn't buy the wireless camera that had the obnoxious ads.
The truth shall set you free!
The anti-leech error script lets you include arbitrary HTML (read: cross-site scripting), which the above link takes advantage of.
remote controls will no longer have a "mute" button. People who use existing mute buttons will be rounded up into camps and executed. Families will be billed for the cost of execution.
>80 column hard wrapped e-mail is not a sign of intelligent
>life
The point of the comment is that "Daisy Cluster" sounds like a boquet of flowers, not a weapon. Another example is "friendly fire." Friends don't shoot at you! If you are killed by your own army, that doesn't make you any less dead.
How ya like dat?
Using Mozilla, I generally block a site if and when it sends me an annoying graphic, which is usually, but not always, advertisement. I've found, however, that once I block an advertisement, I click on it more often.
I use the keyboard for screen movement, so I must click on the window to get it focus. I do this by picking a blank part of the screen and clicking there. Increasingly, this blank part is a blocked graphical advertisement. Thus, these clicks become advertising hits when before they rarely were.
This may not match the behavior of other people, but now that I'm blocking ads, the number of advertisements I "click on" has gone up enomorously (less than one a month to about one a week).
Interestingly, if you block javascript (tested in galeon) you dont see the access denied message atall, you just see their example page.
http://spamdecoy.net - free throwaway anonymous email - avoid spam!
I agree with you on that level. But I don't mind my favourite show beign financed as producers want.
unfinished: (adj.)
What I'd like to see is a tool that lets these guys see just how many of their ads are blocked via automatic tools and how many are closed mid-transmission. There has to be a way to do this; since the ad doesn't continue to be served once you've closed the window [though it may trigger a few dozen other ads even if you've ALT-F4'ed it].
Like many of you have said; don't alienate your potential customers but don't shove your ad down their left nostril either.
I imagine a surprising result (at least for advertisers who feel they do no wrong) from a study like this; proving that users refuse material like this and deliberately avoid it. And if they deliberately avoid it then you must be doing something wrong - not that advertisers will feel it is wrong but a different approach should at least then be in order.
Then again, those "different" approaches often then involve true thievery and scams such as long distance dialer theft and credit card fraud - which is real thievery and [I feel] should [still] be punished Old Testament style with missing fingers and hot irons and the like. {When did herding criminals like these ones together in pens and letting them feed off tax-provided welfare ever provide greater than 30% reform rates?}
I think with the interesting people, their lives can't possibly be wrapped up into a nice little package.
Seriously, showing up unwanted materials on the computer .. Forced onto you.. Isn't this one of the definitions of a virus? I mean, you don't agree to it, and it's NOT expected. It's not given to you from the host site. It's a 3rd party pushing down unwanted software and content without your permission.. To me that sounds like a great way to land in jail and on the FBI's watch list. No?
Well, I must agree with you. I never click at pop-up ads too, for the same reasons. That's very different to blocking all and every way of doing and adverticements.
Banners are actually a good thing, if not abused. When banners stop working they sometimes start selling "content". They start recoming the product that paid them more. And they do it very stealthly, so you don't notice the slight bias.
unfinished: (adj.)
Yeah, but then you'd want to show a friend, you'd tell him to put them on, he'd say no, you'd say yes, and then you'd have to wrestle, secure in the knowledge that if you lose, he'll put them on anyway.
ObRef: the long, drawn out "Cripple Fight" in South Park was based on the They Live fight scene.
"Sometimes a woman is a kind of religion, she can save your soul & set you free from all your sins" - Bad Examples
They claimed that you can not copy their image. So it got me interested. Took me a whole 15 seonds to copy and save it.
& name=test and vola!! The page returns me http://www.anti-leech.com/pics/logo.gif which is a normal copyable .gif image.
I clicked on the Anti Image . By right clicking you notice they have a javascript disabling the button. So what I did next? Looked at the source code. Did a search for Viewing picture to find the img src. And sure enough it is a PHP script grabbing the image. It is img src="ai_load.php?id=demo_gat&name=test". So, I took that php script and it parametes and pasted it back to the url. So now I have http://www.anti-leech.com/ai_load.php?id=demo_gat
Pretty basic if you ask me. And they are charging for this? This is a stanrd way of page retrieval and javvascript button disabiling.
NO! NO! Please don't mod me, I'm too young to die a troll. *click* Oh the pain, the pain...
I was just giving it some thought, and Anti-Leech's popup blocking method may be illegal, and fall under the anti-circumvention code of the DMCA.
Argument:
1. They are requesting CPU cycles from you, in a discrete program window... the popup.
2. According to existing computer law, going back to the UNIX mainframe days, all CPU cycles can be accounted and billed for.
3. Thus, system operators have the right to limit user requests for CPU time.
4. Popup blocking, because popup ads are not integrated into the content of the served site, is a legitimate control on the amount of CPU time a user can request.
5. Anti-Leech's "Theft Control" device attempts to bypass this control.
6. The DMCA defines a circumvention device as code that is intended to defeat a protection mechanism.
7. Therefore, the Anti-Leech script is illegal.
-- We live in a world where lemonade is artificial and soap has real lemon.
I think you meant "and" rather than "but". I don't know about you, but having ads shoved down(?) my left nostril makes me either feel kind of alien or ancient Egyptian.
I don't block banner ads. TANSTAAFL. I do block doubleclick over privacy and spam issues. For the rest, I use the same thing as I use for TV ads: BrainBlocker. "Come on down to Dodge-Chev-Ford .. hisss ..", commercial gone. Popups are another story. They get killed.
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
Only Thieves Block Pop-Ups
I do not think so. Company who gives Pop-ups ads are Thieves. They use up our bandwidth and cpu, when most users clearly do not wish it. Is it fair, for a person, who pays months for a set bandwidth (let's say 1 gig a month) and some of that bandwidth is wasted for these ads? I do not thinks so!
NO! NO! Please don't mod me, I'm too young to die a troll. *click* Oh the pain, the pain...
One of the things that makes the Internet great is the wealth of content freely available online. Some might say that the signal-to-noise ratio is rather low, but having funds to run a web site does not automatically mean you're improving that ratio.
This freely-available content has to be paid for by somebody. Usually it's those wanting to make that content available, and unless they have some means to offset the costs of doing so, some will be unable to do it. This is why most free sites resort to advertising over paid memberships.
Yes, "free" sites need to take into account the jerks that want to rape their site without looking at the promotional content as well. This needs to be addressed when they're coming up with a pseudo-business model (keeping in mind that many sites that carry ads are not remotely commercial). But all you're really doing is increasing the bandwidth-to-advertising revenue ratio, and are having a direct impact on that site's ability to stay online.
Yes, it's an issue with their business model. But the only reason their business model is failing is because there are people blocking their ads. It doesn't matter that their ads may be well-placed, are not intrusive and not offensive, your ad blocker blocks them all.
This attitude, quite frankly, sucks.
Thank God we have enough people out there who do not block advertising, or else we wouldn't have Slashdot. Would you rather sites like Slashdot disappear (due to a "poor" business model) just because you're anti-advertising?
Does this mean people really do read Playboy and Penthouse for the insightful articles?
Freedom to fear. Freedom from thought. Freedom to kill.
I guess the War on Terror really is about freedom!
I reserve the right to read what _I_ want. Full Stop. :) and
On a note, I'm still using Lynx for 98% of my web
browsing, dillo for 1.9% (=userfriendly.org
Netscape 4.75 for BSD/OS (in the emulation) for the
remaining 0.1% of casual sites that won't do without.
Pages that can't be displayed with lynx+xloadimage
usually aren't worth it anyways, IMHO at least.
My Karma isn't excellent, damn it! (And
I found a block list that I pasted into my hosts file (running Win2000 SP 2). Even with general browsing, I still get an occasional popup, which I then immediately track the source of and add them to my hosts file. The annoying part is that whenever I make a change, I'm forced to reboot my computer because the change slows down my entire system. After rebooting, I can surf just fine (until I see another popup). Even the reboot is a pain because after I log onto the domain, a ton of stuff runs on login, and I believe my hosts file is then processed. I certainly hope that I'm next in line for a new computer.
you are absolutely right on the mark.
You were mistaken. Which is odd, since memory shouldn't be a problem for you
Of course, if you walk up and use a public 802.11b network, there is no such contract. But you expect eavesdropping there, don't you? After all, there's a longstanding principle (with some recent breaches, notably as cellphone traffic) that it's legal to use any signal that hits your antenna.
Even without such prohibitions, I have some protection. If a third party uses my credit card number without my authorization they're committing fraud, regardless of how they got it. I don't see how I could be said to have authorized the sniffer to use it. An intermediate host is like a cashier who runs my card in a store -- it is possible for them to learn the number, but they are not authorized to use it. Similarly, for most of the obvious examples -- legal evidence, intellectual property, inside information on stocks -- the sniffer is prohibited from using the info by other laws. And if the sniffer cracked the intermediate host, then they're already across the line.
Not all cases are protected, though. There are cases in which the info can be used only if it was obtained legally -- suppose the sniffer is a journalist and the content is a salacious email from Bill to Monica. (If you want a web example, assume Monica is using hotmail and that it's the web traffic that is sniffed.)
Hello,
p aign for answers.
Due to the enormous respons to the Anti-Theft campaign we can't unfortunately answer all the e-mails we have received lately. Instead we have added a FAQ to the campaign page. Please go to http://www.anti-leech.com/index.php?option=at_cam
Regards,
Johan Wennberg
Anti-Leech.com
----- Original Message -----
From: stinky wizzleteats
To: general@anti-leech.com
Cc: johan.wennberg@swipnet.se
Sent: Monday, November 25, 2002 2:31 AM
Subject: theft tools
> I visited your site after seeing a story on slashdot describing how you
> characterize pop-up blocking as "theft". I found this quite surprising,
> and to be quite honest, I fully expected to find that this was an
> extreme exaggeration of who you were and what you are really about.
>
> The reality is that your site, and your company, are so clearly evil
> that I wonder if you can actually be real.
>
> You actually do characterize pop-up blocking as theft, and you actually
> do sell a service (despite the silliness of the technology involved) to
> force web site visitors to see pop-up ads. How unimaginably vile of
> you. What right do you have to determine how my computer is going to
> behave? How dare you presume to force me to view ads I have neither the
> time, processor power, nor memory for? What kind of arrogant
> neo-railroad tycoon do you think you are?
>
> I am very pleased that your technical acumen is as poor as it is.
> Client side "web site security" is pitiably easy to overcome, and I'm
> sure that every non-Microsoft web browser in existence will soon have
> javascript munging features to render your service inert, and return to
> me the same control over web browsing that I have with my television
> with its channel, volume, and power buttons.
>
> I sincerely hope you enjoy absolutely no success with your nefarious
> venture. I will certainly do everything possible to ensure that
> everyone knows your organization for the pack of weasels that it is.
>
Comment removed based on user account deletion