Why Ad Blocking is devastating to the sites you love. (from 2010)

Originally posted by watcher73
From your ToS:

8)This is a privately owned discussion board community.

Not exactly what I was looking for but it will do -

This is a privately owned computer. I do not believe you have the right to say "do not use this on your computer". Just as no members, have the right to demand anything of this site or its owners.

I find the fact that you made it part of the ToS to be somewhat disgusting. You use your property in a way that you see fit and then try to deny us the same privilege.

...ahhh no...

...you may be missing a key point to that.


In my own house I have a rule: No wearing shoes in the house. Take them off at the door please.

My guests and my family all know the house-rules pertaining to footwear inside.
I politely ask people to remove their shoes when they come into my house...indeed I remove mine out of courtesy whenever I visit anyone else...at the end of the day I'm not the one cleaning the carpet/floors of their house so I'd rather not tramp any dirt or otherwise through their house by leaving my shoes on.

My house-guests brought their shoes.
They own their shoes.
By all means they can sing and dance in their shoes, they can drink champaigne from them, they can worship their shoes as a descendent of the great Pumbah the Foot-God all they want in their own time and own space...thats their property, thats their choice.

But when they step into MY house...on my property...on my floors and carpets...then those shoes come off.
IF they choose to then argue the point and tell me I have no right to dictate when and where they wear their shoes in MY house...then chances are they won't be stepping too far through the door before getting tossed out.


...what has been said here is that ATS requests that in THIS house you remove your shoes....not in that house, not in the neighbours house, not in your house...THIS house...


...by all means do whatever you want with your shoes elsewhere...



Peace.

[edit on 7-3-2010 by alien]

reply to post by operation mindcrime


Your fine mate, and THANKS for caring enough to ask.

Springer...

reply to post by alien


The internet doesnt work like that im afraid.

most here will agree. many mods too.



[edit on 7-3-2010 by MR BOB]

Originally posted by watcher73
Also if you really believe no ads = no ATS then what are the Store and Gear pages for?

The ATS store is a points-based feature which is part of near All message board software. It allows members to "purchase" additional options and features, as well as customize their profiles.

... not sure what ATS "points" are currently trading for on the open market, but would have to venture the guess of right around coupon redemption value. (1/20 of a cent)

GEAR - initially setup by staff member ZeddicusZulZorander - runs off CafePress. They process the orders, make the product, and handle shipping. ATS gets but a mere percentage of the actual cost ... with the prices having been set more for affordablity than any sort of realized profit.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Originally posted by watcher73

Originally posted by Blaine91555

No Ad's = No ATS

Really?

NEW YORK, July 26 /PRNewswire/ -- In conjunction with its tenth anniversary, The Above Network, the creators of AboveTopSecret.com, the leading source of serious discussion in the "alternative" category with over 3.25 million posts to date, announced today the completion of first-round equity capitalization. The undisclosed six-figure funding amount was provided by a private investment group attracted by the user-centric ideals of The Above Network and free expression advocacy of AboveTopSecret.com (ATS), the arm of the conglomerate where the expansion effort is targeted.

... for an infrastructure which chews through upwards of 5 figures a month in hardware, security and software monitoring services, not too mention monies allocated and/or spent to improve and promote the same.

Of the 3 owners and the bean counter Only 1 actually does ATS as a fulltime gig.(Bill, SkepticOverlord)

Given his knowledge, experience and overall abilities he could easily just work for himself and command upwards of $150+/- an hour for consulting and/or design services alone.

Honestly. This aint no cheerfest nor rah-rah session, just the reality of the situation.

What's the seeming beef with the site or guy getting some dime for their time?

I don't work for free. Do You?

reply to post by MR BOB


Yes, it does. It does here at ATS at least.

I don't know what "mods" you think would agree with you, but that's exactly how it works.

Springer...

reply to post by Springer


yes sir., no sir. three bags full sir.

reply to post by MR BOB


Ahhh, I see you got your funny bone out tonight... www.abovetopsecret.com...

Fair Dinkum...

'nuff said.

Springer...

reply to post by Springer


yup you should see my chart. its around hee somewhere. ask SD.

If I may redirect the conversation to the topic of the OP ...

I don't have an ad blocker installed on my mac ... that is not because I enjoy watching ads (I do not see them on ATS) but because it is my responsibility to decide which sites I visit and which ones I do not. If the site cannot integrate their advertising in a way that doesn't take away from my user experience I simply click away and don't return. If it is the only source of information on a topic I might bear it to partake in it, or not, but it's still my call.

One such site is salon.com ... I used to visit there everyday. Then they went waaaaaay over the top with intrusive advertising almost every click generating a pop up flash ad that needs to be closed. Then they were kind enough to give me the option to opt out of their ads if I purchased a subscription. I haven't been there for weeks.

The point is that there is a self feeding mechanism at play in which the less end users click on ads and/or opt out of them, the more aggressive the 'forcing' of ads into websites becomes. I'm not sure what the answer to that is, I'm actually surprised that skipping ads on dvrs hasn't been disabled (though I know it was proposed).

In any case, the responsibility should be shared imho ... that is to say that if a webmaster produces a clean, seamless, and enjoyable user experience advertising included then they should be rewarded for that effort and not be lumped in with other websites which do not achieve this via having the user disable ads. If someone is allowing me to benefit from something they provide free of charge to me, and they design an enjoyable product, it isn't right for me to deny them their livelihood. Conversely if the webmaster cannot master this balance, we should simply click away.

I hope that makes sense.

Second line.

[edit on 7 Mar 2010 by schrodingers dog]

reply to post by SkepticOverlord


The only reason i hate the internet is ADS. and popups. If i could do away with them forever i would. Besides most conputers now come pre installed with ad blocking software. As far as im concerned all computers should have ad blocking software.

reply to post by MR BOB

The internet doesnt work like that im afraid.

most here will agree. many mods too.

Actually, yes it does work the way alien described. It cannot work any other way.

Servers cost money. I know; I have a small one, and I pay for it. The time spent running ATS costs money. No one can afford to work for free, and both Springer and SO put in long days. Their time is valuable, just as mine is valuable and yours is valuable.

The money to pay for keeping this site up and running has to come from somewhere. On the Internet there are two ways one can profit from a site: subscription or advertising. Ad-blockers negate the advertising angle, since no one will pay to not have their ads seen. The only alternative is subscription. Do you want to pay a monthly access fee to access ATS? I don't, and I doubt many others do either.

If you wish to run ad-blockers on your machine, fine, by all means do so. I do. But most of them can be set to allow ads from certain domains, and that allows ATS to continue to run without subscription costs to the members. That seems a small price to pay for so much, especially when you already agreed to allow ads from ATS when you joined up.

I will also add that I and the other Moderators on this site act in that capacity on a purely volunteer basis. I donate a certain portion of my time to handling complaints, time that I consider valuable. Please tell me you do not believe a few seconds of load time on your machine is more valuable than the time I donate. Please.

TheRedneck

i disagreed with aliens post because it was worded in what seemed to me a controlling and arragont way.

And I have a big problem with being told what to do.

I dont like visiting here(this was meant to be a comma not a .) and being constantly told do as your are told.
i feel like im being told off. and im a free human being wtf is up with that?

somehow it seems like we are being constantly herded.

moo.




[edit on 7-3-2010 by MR BOB]

Originally posted by SuperSlovak
The only reason i hate the internet is ADS.

Do you also hate magazines, newspapers, television, and cable TV networks? Those all have ads, and in all cases, a much higher ratio of ad-to-content than here on ATS.

You purchase a magazine... but it has ads.

You purchase a newspaper... but it has ads.

You pay for cable TV... but cable networks have ads.

ATS is free to access, but we use advertising to ensure it stays free. It's rather simple.

Click here for more information.

Originally posted by MR BOB
I dont like visiting here.

So then I'm confused... why are you visiting (and commenting on) a site you don't like to visit?

Seems odd.

reply to post by SkepticOverlord


thats out of context.

also its dam bad puntuation by me.

reply to post by MR BOB

I dont like visiting here. and being constantly told do as your are told.

I despise that as well, but it is the price we all pay for needing others.

If I visited you, I would expect you to have rules that I would have to abide by in your home. If you visited me, I would have the same. You cannot defecate in my living room. You cannot urinate in my kitchen. You cannot take doors off the hinges. You cannot throw rocks through my windows (except the one that is already broken ).

Terrible rules, I know. But breaking them will get you throw off the place... bodily.

TheRedneck

Okay ATS, I did not want to wade through all the comments about ads, that would almost have been like reading ads about ads.

I use AdBlockerPlus w/firefox.

None of the ads here on ATS have slowed down my browser. In the past there were a couple, some will remember the Terminator Ad from hell, but ATS fixed that right of way.

Why I mentioned ABP, if there is an ad that does slow your browser down or is annoying, you can just right click on it and go to options for it and block just that one ad. Boom, problem solved for any annoying ads. Now, one thing it can also do, let us say my Gif is annoying, boom, you can block that also.

Do not just block all ads on a site, that is how the site operates. Of course when I had dial up over at my sister and bro in law's place while I was housesitting. I definitely blocked all ads, it did help to load pages much quicker. Dial up, oh how did we survive through that?

This is definitely a hot item on a lot of big sites I frequent. One particular poster on another site stated the following:

"The readers are not the customer. The customer is the advertiser, and the readers are the product which that website promises to deliver. But the readers, being the product and not the customer, have no obligation to the site or its bottom line."

brill

My favourite sites on the net are news sites. Name a capitol city of a country and if it's got english, I've likely either bookmarked it or at least visited once or twice. I really love to see what's being said in a place that dislikes another place, you know? They sometimes say things another country wouldn't dare let out.

Now all those news sites are pretty much on the up and up with their ads. They have to be because they represent the news from the capitol city and their populations are going to be reading what's on there.

Ok, where am I going with this?

ATS has less intrusive advertising than most of those prominent websites. I REALLY hate the kind that half cover the page of headlines with those floating pop-ups that have a hidden delete button. I despise them.

I don't use ad blockers when I surf... not Wired News or Sky News or anywhere else. Sure, I've caught a virus or two over the years and the worst even made me take my CPU in for a cleaning. Big deal.