How Adblock extorts companies to pay them 30% of ad revenue

adblockplus.org

13 points·vizzah··5 comments

The current title (How Adblock extorts companies to pay them 30% of ad revenue) is really misleading. It refers not to the title or content of TFA, but rather to an anonymous comment on TFA. If there is linkable evidence for this proposition, then that evidence should have been posted instead.

Best I could find was this: https://adblockplus.org/en/acceptable-ads-agreements

> Whitelisting is free for all small- and medium websites and blogs. However, managing this list requires significant effort on our side and this task cannot be completely taken over by volunteers as it happens with common filter lists. That's why we are being paid by some larger properties that serve non-intrusive advertisements that want to participate in the Acceptable Ads initiative.

It doesn't indicate what the percentage is, so it's unclear where the commenter got their number from. It'd be interesting to know the exact details though.

Plus, the post is talking about Adblock Plus, not Adblock, which are two separate things. And finally, the blog post has been wrote in 2013.

However, I'm not sure why, but I really don't like the tone of the Adblock Plus team, in this post. It kinda looks like extortion.

Putting aside question of "free" sites revenue, blockers and other similar questions. How could anyone call Ads "effective"? I have never seen an Ad that I would consider useful or even honest.

Massive carpet bombing advertising has instead a negative effect for me. If I'm buying stuff that is heavily marketed, for example toothpaste, where everything has Ads, and I see one brand that is not advertised and it is more or less similar to others - I'm buying it.

Assuming the title is unfounded, I think the letter has some reasonable requests.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com