Cnet and Slashdot: "The Morality of Web Ad Blocking&quo

[jpq]

I find arguments against blocking utterly compelling. If you're going to send content to me, I get to pick what I do with it, including not displaying it.

http://www.cnet.com/8301-13739_1-9770502-46.html

http://slashdot.org/articles/07/09/11/157256.shtml

[ultravioletu]

With such arguments, I am a thief even without ad-blocking software, because I don't CLICK on any ad. Since the days of Pay Per Impression are long over, I am depriving the poor webmasters and their children of revenue. That is an act of unspeakable TERROR!!!

[IceDogg]

I expect no less from sites that survive from ad revenue. Not exactly an unbiased opinion, now is it.

[Wladimir Palant]

I actually sent a mail to the author of this article (comment function didn't work). Here is what I wrote:

I fail to see the morality issue with ad blocking. What is the difference if you don't click ads anyway? This is how the business model of ad supported web sites works, they throw huge amounts of ads at everybody only to find the one person in thousand who will click on one. This might not be the best business model but it is the one these web sites chose for themselves and starting to blame somebody else is strange to say the least. Next time they will tell me that ignoring ads is immoral and that I am morally obliged to get this penis enlargement.

Adblock Plus is not going to spell doom for the free content on the Internet. The money is still there, ads or not. So the only problem are website owners who went into the business of making money by annoying their customers. Do we really want their business to survive? I don't think so.

Finally a small note: the trick to detect Firefox extensions that you mention can be used for just about any Firefox extension but Adblock Plus. See http://adblockplus.org/en/faq_internal#protectchrome - sorry...