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Comment by yafbum | Hacker News Reader

The entire business model of sports entertainment ventures like NBA is built around advertising. Saying I'm a fan of the NBA except for the ads is a bit like saying I'm a big fan of credit cards except for that part where you have to pay the bill.

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I personally wouldn’t agree that the only possible reaction to anything ad-supported is to like the ads, or else you are making some kind of logical or category error. The existence of ad blockers on the internet for example seems to indicate that not only do some people quite dislike the ads, they even spend time and energy to actually do something about it.

I don't claim that anyone has to like ads. Only that when someone self-describes as an "NBA fan", that sounds like they're saying they're a fan of the NBA overall. When in the next sentence they complain about ads, it sounds like there's an assumption that the ads are encroaching on the NBA, whereas they're an extremely deliberate action by the NBA.

If someone said, I like watching basketball games but I don't like watching ads, that sounds different to me.

I would understand someone saying they are an NBA fan to mean they are a fan of watching their favorite teams compete in the NBA, not that they are fans of the NBA corporate structure, business model, and/or management team, or that they like every attribute and action of the NBA without hesitation.

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