Ad Blockers Reprise

A while ago I was talking about ad blocking software being enabled in iPad and becoming more and more common and I was slamming the concept. In the wake of Apple's press event however, many people have been coming out in favor of ad blocking. And, in some cases, some decent points were brought up, well one point actually. It doesn't change my stance, but it does mean I may need to clarify my stance.

The one relevant piece of information was effectively this; in time revenue models WILL change, so sites and services that rely on ad revenue will eventually need to adapt to a world with either much reduced ad-revenue or even none at all. Nothing has permanence, not even ad funded web sites and services.

What many overlook however is that isn't just the web sites that suffer by not getting revenue for the ads. And, sadly, by virtue of the fact that you wanted to visit that specific site in the sea of web sites available indicates that you value the content, despite denying them any form of compensation for providing it. The indirect side effects of widespread ad blocking however are far worse than simply impacting websites you actually use. Those ads are paid for by a lot of "free" services you use regularly that produce metadata to help improve ad efficiency. If demand for ads declines because most people are blocking them, then demand for metadata dwindles as well. If no one is paying for that data, the people who were once offering you free services now need to charge a fee to maintain the service.

In such a world where ad-blockers are highly prevalent, not only will the sites you use suffer and perhaps even disappear, but you may find that many services you took for granted as being free are now disappearing as well, or all of a sudden are no longer free.

Saying that ad-blockers are good, is the same as saying that Google gives things away for free. On the surface, most people would agree that both statements are true. But the reality is a lot more complex. Just as people don't see the privacy they give up in exchange for Google's services, they also don't see the dozens of other products and services that they rely on every day that receive just a little less funding each time they block an ad.

Almost nothing is truly free in this world. And most things we think of as free would not be were if not for advertising.

Blocking ads just means you'll end up paying more and for a lot more things, or they will simply find a new way to advertise that isn't blocked.

But hey! Buy an Apple product and you'll never get a virus, right?