Ad Block Plus Filter Maintainer "rick752" Dies At 56

A user on Reddit pointed out that Richard "rick752" Petnel, maintainer of one of the most popular filter lists for Ad Block Plus, has passed away at age 56. In an article last year Petnel described a bit of what he was up against in the ad world. "'I'm playing against some pretty big players,' he said, explaining his reluctance to step forward. 'I don't want to be harassed. . . . I don't want to be bribed. I started it because I was frustrated with getting my computer infected from ads -- malware and spyware and all that stuff,' he said. 'I kind of went overboard with it. But you have to admit, it's pretty amazing, right?'" Update 15:05 GMT by SM: updated to reflect Rick's status as maintainer of the most popular Ad Block Plus filter as opposed to Ad Block Plus itself.

Comments

Condolences.. and kudos

[lawaetf1]

First and foremost, condolences to the family.

Second, Rich, thanks for a powerful plugin that I'm sure has kept my blood pressure down a few notches. Whenever I use a browser that doesn't have adBlock installed I am aghast at the irritating clutter that is on most web pages.

What should we do?

[XB-70]

Given the importance of what he has accomplished in the world cluttered with unwanted marketing, his memory deserves something special.

I'm interested in your thoughts. What about a completely ad-free town? Is there a small town somewhere that is willing to go completely ad-free (maybe there already is one)?

Maybe ad-free stretched of road (with anonymous sponsors)!!

Perhaps a huge billboard that is perpetually kept empty (or has only news/info on it).

Let's do something really good to commemorate this guy's vision.

Re:Rest in peace, Mr. Petnel.

[hairyfeet]

Not to mention as a PC repairman it has really helped me move folks away from the ubercrap that is IE. I would get a call to go out and fix a home user/SOHO/small business and I always carry my flash with me loaded with computer repair utility toolkit and portable Firefox with Adblock Plus installed. It never seems to fail that I have this conversation:

"Hey, how come I don't see that stupid 'hit the clown and win an iPod ad'?" that is because with Firefox 3 and Adblock Plus I don't have to look at stupid ads anymore. Makes my day nicer and my browser load quicker to boot. "I bet that is expensive and really hard to set up,huh?" Nope, it is absolutely free, no adware or spyware either, and with Adblock Plus I answer a single question and I'm done. It even updates itself so as new ads or Internet bugs come along I don't have to worry. "Uuuhh, since you are here anyway, do you think you could install that to MY machine?"

I can't count how many times I have had that conversation. I even managed to get my Luddite 67 year old dad to get off IE. Trying to sell folks security is like trying to sell them air. They know they need it but actually getting them to grasp it is NOT easy. Thanks to Adblock Plus getting them switched to a more secure browser is simple as 1-2-3. 1-Let them see me using FF3 with Adblock Plus. 2-Tell them it is free and easy when asked 3-Install FF3 and Adblock Plus when requested by the user(which they always do). So my heart goes out to their family. Guys like Rick have done more to spread FOSS than any bullet pointed list about security ever could. Thanks to Adblock Plus the web is what I WANT it to be, not what some damned irritating advertiser makes it into. He really was one of the unsung heroes of FOSS because by maintaining the Adblock Plus list he made FF3 an easy sell to every IE user I've come in contact with.

And for those that suggested a HOSTS file, aka the Cheap Opera hack? That is NOT easy, in fact for the average home user maintaining a HOSTS file is strange and difficult. With FF3 and Adblock Plus they don't have to do ANYTHING, as the software does it all for them. Can't get much simpler than that.

This does underscore one flaw in OSS

[rAiNsT0rm]

I'm a big fan of both this project and the Open Source movement in general, but this does show off one major flaw in the system. Just like the proverbial bus that is so widely feared and runs down IT folks everywhere, many projects are small and while there may be many contributors there is one main person whom without the project would fail. When that person meets that proverbial bus, in an instant a widely used and relied upon piece of software can become dead as well. That's a major problem.

If things were truly born of chaos like we seem to think, these things would have no impact... but there is still a major underlying structure and hierarchy to this "chaos" and it is quite fragile.

The biggest barrier is ego, quickly followed by celebrity. It is hard for the creator of some neat widget to give up total control and truly step back and just share the success with those who hopped onto "their" project after the fact, but that is what needs to happen. There should never be less than two individuals at every level of a serious project, and both need to be fully competent... but that is not the case, even in very large projects.

* Oh, and give up on bashing the people who are concerned about what this means as to updates/life of the project... none of us were his good friend and the question is not callous or insensitive.