• Aatube
    -4•2 months ago

    No, that’s not what ad blocking is. You just described viewing a traditional “1 banner at the bottom/top” ad. There’s a snowball’s chance in hell that you actually check out/click on the ad after seeing it; you throw it away after seeing it. On the off chance you’re intrigued by the ad, you take it home.

    That’s not what ad blocking is. There’s no suitable metaphor for ad blocking IRL, but it’d most nearly be raiding the nearest available ad pamphlet warehouse or interrupting the guy who gets the pamphlets to the foodgiver. Sure, the difference is that nobody gets the ads anymore, but that’s not a bad thing for you, is it? The foodgiver gets no ad revenue for now until delivery is re-established.

    Edit: Please say why you think that I’m wrong, just as I did. Thank you for your cooperation. Let’s not be redditors.

    • @pivot_rootEnglish
      16•2 months ago

      There’s no suitable metaphor for ad blocking IRL

      Sure there is.

      Every week, your community puts on an old movie in the town park that everyone can watch for free. You, an avid movie enjoyer, watch this movie every week.

      But, the movie equipment isn’t free. To make this event happen, the community accepts a donation from The Church of Microwaving Babies and Kicking Puppies. In exchange, the Church of Microwaving Babies and Kicking Puppies pauses the movie every 50 minutes and puts on a small two-minute presentation about why you should consider joining and what puppy-kicking can do to improve your life.

      You don’t care. You do not agree with their views, and you definitely are never going to join. Instead of paying attention to their mandatory presentation, you stare at your phone and read Lemmy. Then, when the movie is back on, you once again pay attention.

      That’s ad-blocking. Some group gains revenue from their publicly available service by having an advertiser peddle their crap through said service. You take an active role in ignoring said crap, while most people just sit there twiddling their thumbs and pretending to care. The only tangible difference between you ignoring the ad while it plays and you blocking it is 60 seconds of your time and the bandwidth required to serve the ad.

      Advertisers don’t like it—but fuck the advertisers. The difference that you as an individual makes in how much money is made through advertising is less than a hundredth of a cent. If the impact of the collective using adblockers is enough to be an issue in sustainability, then advertising was not the correct business model to begin with.

      • Aatube
        -1•2 months ago

        Again, that is not ad blocking. That’s just reading the phone while the ad is playing. That preserves the ad revenue, blocking does not.

        The difference that you as an individual makes in how much money is made through advertising is less than a hundredth of a cent.

        That’s just one view. It adds up within the month.