Hacker News Reader

Comment by morgante | Hacker News Reader

How does something generating revenue automatically make it immoral or unacceptable?

Pharmaceutical companies generate their revenue from selling drugs. That doesn't make selling drugs illegal.

Nobody is getting tricked by ABP. For one thing, their homepage literally says "unobtrusive ads aren't being blocked in order to support websites" right above the install button. [0] Moreover, even if a user were to install it and still saw ads they would realize that it's not in fact blocking all ads.

Since you apparently hate capitalism, I'm curious how you're paid.

[0] https://adblockplus.org/

View on HN

Nobody is getting tricked by ABP.

I'd be surprised to learn most users ever even touch the homepage, rather than the plugin installation mechanism for their respective web browsers. Result #1 on Google for me goes straight to the Chrome store.

The immorality comes in when the program actively subverts its own purpose for existing... imagine an antivirus with "acceptable viruses" allowed out of the box. They don't steal your info, or ruin your computer, but its authors gave the company a backhander to leave them unblocked by default. This is directly analogous to ads.

It's also a conflict of interest, and gives the developer a perverse incentive to allow more ads, since they charge ad publishers actual money to be on the whitelist. ABP's customers are the ad companies, not its users. (Something something if you're not the customer...)

And "hating capitalism" is such a ridiculous strawman that it deserves no further comment.

_ The immorality comes in when the program actively subverts its own purpose for existing_

Depends on what you think its purpose is -- I don't block ads because I have a moral problem with advertising revenue paying for content I view -- I block ads because I'm tired of overly disruptive ads that interfere with my web browsing experience. I really don't mind if there are some unobtrusive ads and I might even click on them if they are particularly relevant (i.e. Google ads tend to be relevant enough that I click on them).

_ It's also a conflict of interest, and gives the developer a perverse incentive to allow more ads,_

But AdBlock devs have a strong incentive to not piss off users so much that they'll stop running the software or will click the button that says "block all ads". If developers remove that button, then users will move to different software.

I don't care how much money ABP makes from publisher payouts, I just care that my browser no longer freezes while I wait for a 2MB pop-over to load as it chews up my limited bandwidth.

Not OP, but I do things that people pay money for. I find advertising degrading and avoid it where possible. The real issue is most online content is terrible and not worth paying for.

Worse even when I do pay, the ads don't go away. (Hulu, premium cable TV, etc.) Because, it's the people with money that subsidize the Advertising model, let them opt out and it collapses.

Evidently, and as I'm very sure you completely understood but chose to disregard in order to go on a tirade, the above poster wasn't objecting to revenue making in itself, but to the fact that the way that this ad-blocker makes its money is by (ironically), displaying ads. Most non tech people instantly associate ad-blocking software with AdBlock Plus, and don't even realize that the software they are installing made a deal with certain companies to let their ads through. Your tirade against "those damn anti-american commies" (hyperbole but that was the gist of it) makes no sense at all.

Since you're apparently hate reading and replying to comments as they were written, instead of as you want to read into them, I paraphrase the above poster:

"We all know that outside tech circles most people don't even know what "acceptable ads" are, assume ABP does what it says on the label, and don't bother changing defaults. That's why ABP's business is so shady."

I don't hate capitalism and there's nothing wrong with generating revenue. In fact, the rise of ad blocking is a perfect example of market efficiency. What's important here isn't the software that blocks ads, but the expression of preference by hundreds of millions of people around the world who say "we do not want to see ads on the web and we know they can be stopped."

Believing "acceptable ads" can thrive alongside such knowledge is naively asking to be reminded of the tragedy of the commons and the fact that such widespread coordination usually happened in either dictatorial or communist societies.

Revenue will be generated, only that it will eventually have to come from consumers directly to publishers and content creators.

>the rise ad blocking is a perfect example of market efficiency

No it isn't - it's market inefficiency. Ad blocking allows content consumption without contributing to costs, which publishers have budgeted for. Flattr and Google Contributor are more efficient versions of blocking ads because it still contributes to content.

You seem to hate capitalism because your argument against ABP was basically "they get revenue."

ABP is in fact a capitalist solution. It gives advertisers an incentive to tone down their ads so they can be seen by more people.

Absolutist ad blockers are actually the ones exploiting the tragedy of the commons. Without advertising, the content which you're viewing without ads would not exist.

> Revenue will be generated, only that it will eventually have to come from consumers directly to publishers and content creators.

Why? That's your personal preference and political position. Reality isn't forced to adapt to your preferences and in practice advertising has existed for thousands of years—it's unlikely to go away anytime soon.

Moreover, I suspect that if you asked most people outside the HN echo chamber they'd actually rather have advertising than paying through subscriptions.

You seem to hate capitalism because your argument against ABP was basically "they get revenue."

This is a very disingenuous representation of the other comments in the thread. It's a low-brow dismissal by straw man and an appeal to the sacrosanct "capitalism". You seem to be trying to manipulate others into supporting your view by labeling the other view as anti-capitalism. This is the same as accusing anyone who opposes government surveillance of "hating freedom".

ABP is problematic because of how they generate revenue. From the advertisers' side, it looks like racketeering. From the consumer side, it looks like the tobacco industry paying your doctor to get you to smoke. Accepting money to whitelist ads is the very thing an ad blocker should never do.

Is ABP being paid by the advertisers whose ads they're allowing? I honestly don't know. But it's unlikely they're blocking ads they're being paid to show.

> Since you apparently hate capitalism, I'm curious how you're paid.

Is advertising a synonym of capitalism?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com