Comment by MCarusi | Hacker News Reader

Comment by MCarusi | Hacker News Reader

As a content creator myself it's disappointing when I see Adblock rates as high as they are, but I absolutely get it. If I'm upset at anyone in the Adblock debate it's the advertisers; the people who introduced intrusive pop-ups, auto playing videos, and those obnoxious banners with the smileys that scream "OH MY GOD, NO WAY!"

Then there are the issues of ads causing videos to freeze, browsers to crash, and containing malware. Or what if the ads are offensive to you or you have young kids in the house? For me it's impossible to blame users who just want to view their content in the most optimal way, which is why I see Adblock as a barometer for how satisfied users are with the way websites are delivering both paid and organic content.

That barometer effect is why I've always considered adblock how end users can "negotiate" with the advertizement networks.

As ads become more intrusive and annoying, more users learn about and install adblockers. As ads become more tolerable, users getting new computers, switching browsers, etc... don't install again. They might not consciously turn blocking off once ads improve, but it's not like the ad industry is going to get significantly better overnight. So it doesn't really matter that users won't turn them off overnight.

Any stamping of feet from the Ad companies about AdBlock strikes me as sour grapes that they're in a weaker negotiation position than: "If you don't want to look at what we tell you to look at, don't visit any websites"

100% agree. Ads are being taken too far. But in moderation, i don't think they are a bad thing if they help the developer.

I think that if I wanted to help out a developer, I'd rather cut out as much middleman and pay directly or through kickstarter.

If there were a middleman, I would especially rather it have the character of an entity like kickstarter, as opposed to an entity that tries to get a piece of your attention so they can sell it to a group of bidders.

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