"Serious question: Why do you block FB ads?"
Because I dont like looking at ads.
Because I dont like looking at ads.
The thing is, this already exists and it's called native advertising. The trick is to create advertisements that, while endorsing a product, have real value for me.
A simple example: a tutorial on doing XYZ with Docker on Google Compute Engine might (A) be relevant to my interests and immediately useful, and (B) incite me to use GCE.
Ad-blockers block the scummy, bottom-feeder, AIDS-of-the-internet ads.
Ads don't have to look like ads. And ads can give value, too. Did the local tavern pay me to run a story talking about their new 1/2 off drinks special every Wednesday? They sure did. But people clicked on it and read the article and then visited the bar and took advantage of the promotion. Not because they were tricked into doing so, but because it was interesting to them and they got value from it. And those people will come back to the site again tomorrow and read the next one, because my advertising provides real value to them.
In most jurisdictions, it's a priori legal unless it falls under some special category (e.g. a political campaign ad).
FTC will regulate undisclosed native content advertising content in US: https://www.ftc.gov/tips-advice/business-center/guidance/nat...
https://www.ftc.gov/tips-advice/business-center/guidance/ftc...
The Advertising Standards Authority regulate it in the UK:
https://www.cap.org.uk/Advice-Training-on-the-rules/Advice-O...
About vlogging, but clearly applies to blogging and traditional print media: https://www.asa.org.uk/News-resources/Media-Centre/2014/Maki...
http://blogtacular.com/sponsored-posts-ads-reviews-the-asa-a...
Honestly I'm not sure it is. Sure, it's deceptive, but he's not serving ads that annoy, distract and often serve as a vector for malware. It's not clear (to me) that it's worse than traditional web advertising, which tends to be deceptive, illegal, scummy and annoying, dangerous and distracting.
And again, the trick with native advertising is to provide valuable content for the users, otherwise it's just crap that nobody will read. I don't know if the poster in question is actually doing this, but if he is, I wouldn't be so quick to write it off as scummy; bear in mind that oftentimes such pieces are identified as "sponsored content".
I reject your assertion of "my taboola ads". I don't run any kind of third party ad scripts. All my sponsored content is written by me and labeled as such. And I immediately turn down any ad content I myself would not want to see (I run adblockers, too), since it wouldn't provide any value to my readers.
The browser is our user agent. Facebook can serve whatever it wants, but we're under no contractual or moral obligation to look at it.
Btw. the Black Mirror TV series is awesome.
http://www.theverge.com/2016/5/27/11795248/facebook-ad-netwo...
Also my country's civil law (along with any other reasonable civil laws) throws out the three links below out of our contract, as they're neither at a reasonable length nor clearness when the context is considered.