Some context about the project: We built this a few days ago at the PennApps hackathon during a period of 48 hours. We originally wanted to try to block out magazine advertisements and billboards, but didn't think we could quite get that working with the time constraints, so we chose to block out logos instead. We called the project Brand Killer.
Ah neat, that certainly is a lot more fitting of a description.
I've updated the reply.
Yes, if you want to buy a specific brand you'd need to modify the filter. I'd like it to say pick out the "cheapest lemonade that has lemon in it and no aspartame and scores at least 50% in taste tests" or "the lemonade I drank last time" and just show me that one at my behest!
Simple advertising like branding on the product itself isn't the problem, anyway. It's usually not intrusive nor irrelevant to what you're doing. If you're looking at the bottle, chances are that you want to do something with it. It's not like you're driving down the road and the bottle forces itself into view like a billboard. It would be better if this form of adblocking could somehow detect if the branding was actually attached to the product and let that through, since it does double duty as branding and identification.
The difference becomes apparent when considering soda pop bottle versus a high-end dress shirt. The soda-pop bottle is a trivial purchase, and is generally available among many other brands offering the same thing. However, the shirt may be purchased with more effort and care, and is generally available among other clothing from the same brand.
The brand on the bottle offers identification of the individual item during purchase and later during selection for drinking. No matter if it is found in a bin among bottles from other brands, or within a section containing only bottles from one brand. Bottles are also discarded after use, so they are not identified individually, but merely as one of many copies. I have several bottles of soda pop, some Coke some Pepsi. The brand is still very relevant.
A shirt on the other hand is probably accompanied by an entire section of clothing for the same brand, and does not need individual identification. Even more so during selection for use, shirts are generally owned by a single person and cared for individually. I only have one pink broadcloth shirt, and it happens to be from Banana Republic. The brand is not as relevant.
No?
If you didn't know the shape of the bottle or other characteristics you wouldn't know what the hell you're buying.
Sounds like a fun shopping trip.