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My name is Iyerbeth, and I block adverts on my Internet browsers.
To some people this statement is meaningless, after all pretty much everyone does it. To others, it's an admission of a life of E-theft. An admission of stealing content from sites and not giving anything back. An admission of doing something morally wrong.
The first time I came upon this view I was surprised, after all who doesn't hate adverts? On my TV if I want to watch something I'll record it and watch something else I've already recorded, and fast forward through the adverts. But doing the equivalent on the Internet, is slightly different. The space for adverts on the TV has already been paid for, on the Internet the payment comes if I click or if I see the adverts, but not often if I block them out entirely.
Businesses and organisation both small and large complain of the lost revenue when people use their site, access their content and deny their income. So then, why do people block adverts if all it does is harm those whose content we enjoy?
The primary reason that people block adverts, is that they're annoying. They're in the way, some use sound(!!!) some are bright or flashy or distracting or innapropriate or simple irrelevant. There are too many adverts on the Internet, and unlike with a TV a user often can't just switch over the channel if they don't like the content. It might take quite a significant time investment to find useful content again, and just because a user has clicked on to a page, should they have to immediately support that page financially without any idea of what it's providing or if it's worth supporting? Often the fact of views = money results in split up content for more income, or just spamming tag associations to divert more users on to the page. There are a lot of ways adverts can be bad.
But - adverts do have a role to play in supporting our favourite sites, and ensuring we can get the best content, but it has to be a two way thing. In my opinion, it is perfectly right to block adverts, but I also think users should be prepared to compromise.
Websites should use adverts responsibly, TeamLiquid is a perfect example of this. As you can no doubt see, this site has one advert at the top of the page, which is never intrusive and never in the way of content. Further, the content on this site is useful, informative and original. For that reason I think everyone who uses the site should disable adblock programs for sites like this.
Websites which I'm vistting in passing though which don't provide original or useful information, or which have annoying or intrusive adverts or try to milk me for more adverts through splitting up content, I don't believe are offering a service worthy of paying for and as such, I don't think it's morally wrong to say I'm not paying for it. There is no contract, social or otherwise, that obligates me to pay to support every website on the net I might click on, it is up to content providers to make their product worth supporting.
So my conclusion is, it's not morally wrong to block adverts, but that one's own principals should allow for exceptions when good content is available. What do you think TL.net people?
Also, if anyone is interested, I do actually have Adblock Plus allowing adverts on TeamLiquid, except for on stream pages because I want to see if a stream is worth supporting before I individually allow adverts on those video's. If you're interested in allowing TeamLiquid.net adverts, or all except streams which are judged invdividually like I have, here's how you do it. There are faster ways if you know what you're doing, but this method should work for everyone using Adblock Plus on Firefox.
+ Show Spoiler [How to disable Firefox Adblock Plus fo…] +
On the menu bar at the top click "Tools".
On the Tools drop down menu click "Add-ons"
On the Add-ons Manager tab that loads, click "Extensions"
Click the "Options" button on the AdBlock Plus line
At the bottom left of the window, click "Add filter..."
In the text box that will appear type in (or copy/paste) one of the following:
For allowing adverts on all of TL.net:
@@|http://www.teamliquid.net
For allowing adverts on all of TL.net except streams who you can allow later:
@@/http:\/\/www.teamliquid.net(?!\/video\/streams).*/$document
 
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5/5, nice blog, I've always found ads an interesting debate, as they basically pay for our Internet usage, but can be blocked. I don't block myself, but then I hear of things like the less-than-ethical idea of Facebook I think it was, selling 1 pixel ads so the 'advertisers' could track your browsing habits etc.
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5/5, I personally stopped blocking ads when I started watching a lot of youtube videos when I switched from SC2 to console games because I watch a lot of videos and the people who make them deserve that revenue.
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I don't mind giving money to websites that I think deserve ad revenue. The only reason I use Adblock is for live streams, where the ads are as obnoxious as it could possibly be.
I'll disable adblock on a lot of other sites though.
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People that provide a certain internet service that uses adds just have to find that middleground.
I personally don't use an adblocker, I never have actually used one, because I don't care that much.
I can even live with sites that have a certain pop-up when you go to the site that you have to click away, it doesn't bother me.
On the other side, over the last couple of weeks I have really been doubting to get ad-blocker purely for justin.tv, because they now have ads for my country + their completely stupid "get an add when you load a stream".
I watch a lot of streams, and I usually end up switching between some of them, maybe just checking out a stream that comes online, see what that person is doing etc.
If you combine this with people using the /commercial function, honestly it is getting so annoying, I can watch 30mins of streams and see 5-7 adds, and it doesn't help that it is the same two adds everytime.
Sometimes probably a lot more of I'm just checking out some new streams.
Reminds me when there was an IEM (I think) and they had like multiple stream, but there were stream issues, and you had to reload them a lot, and every single time again I had to look at the same irritating add, this for a whole weekend, eventually I just gave up and didn't watch anymore.
So yes, I agree, it's a bit of a two-way street in that we have to understand that these adds are what keeps sites running, provides revenue to do certain things, and so on.
But at the same time company's/etc have to understand that having the same goddamn thing flashing up or just trying to milk it as hard as possible isn't helping your cause and is probably gonna piss people off/make them get an adblock.
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On September 03 2011 23:58 Lightwip wrote:
I don't mind giving money to websites that I think deserve ad revenue. The only reason I use Adblock is for live streams, where the ads are as obnoxious as it could possibly be.
I'll disable adblock on a lot of other sites though.
True that. I have adblock disabled on couple streams as well as tl, but thats about it.
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I should have adblock on for anything not related to esports (damn Youtube ads for useless videos!!!)
But I'm far too lazy so nothing is blocked and I'm fine with it, even though I don't watch many livestreams anymore (except tourneys) and I remember that was annoying to wait 30 secs each time and when the loading failed you would get another 30 sec and be like "hmm ok I won't watch the stream then".
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Is it at all possible to block ads on the streams with chrome? Ad block plus doesn't seem to be working for me.
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Ads make me feel angry. So i block them, then i feel better.
Thats my moral.
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Honestly i don't overthink Adblocking,i always have it on.Ads are such an annoyance i have no regrets on blocking them ;p
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Great blog. I block all ads because I hate them with a passion. At the same time, I wish that didn't negatively effect my favorite sites and the people behind them. Someday I plan to rectify my deeds by donating some of my future-disposable income to those who I think deserve it.
On a related note, does anybody know a way to unblock the advertisement at the top of TL while still blocking the advertisements of the streams on TL?
Edit: I fail for not reading the full OP before posting. Thanks OP!
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I don't know why you would block adds on a site like team liquid. Or on streams. Sure, it costs 30 seconds of your day, but it doesn't actually "cost" you anything, and you are helping someone, for free, to make money. Mute the add if you don't like it.
Frankly i am sad to see so many people saying that adblocking is fine on TL, how do you expect people to do well if they can't sustain a living playing this game? Think about for example mrbitter, he made a show in which he paid pros for tutelage, and then used adrevenue to pay for the coaching, it is a win win for everyone. So you lose thirty seconds of your day, for someone to give you something for FREE. And i bet it cost them more than 30seconds to set whatever it is you are watching up. Stop being so greedy and actually help out other humans. What is wrong with that?
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Norway28785 Posts
I don't visit websites with annoying ads. any banner at the top is fine, but popups or ads that make sounds annoy me. as such, I don't have any adblockers turned on.
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Surili there were pro's before internet streaming was born.
If they wouldn't stream anymore, so what, i will watch replays of pros or do other stuff.
I dont like ads, so i don't watch them. Easy
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Personally i have never blocked ads but some websites that over use them i just leave. It reminds me of telemarketers just trying to get all p in your face :/
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I block everything on most sites, TL + it's streams is one of the few sites I don't block. However, when a tournament starts adds in the middle of interviews or matches, I'll block it immediately. That shit is just so annoying.
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On September 04 2011 00:41 Surili wrote:
I don't know why you would block adds on a site like team liquid. Or on streams. Sure, it costs 30 seconds of your day, but it doesn't actually "cost" you anything, and you are helping someone, for free, to make money. Mute the add if you don't like it.
Frankly i am sad to see so many people saying that adblocking is fine on TL, how do you expect people to do well if they can't sustain a living playing this game? Think about for example mrbitter, he made a show in which he paid pros for tutelage, and then used adrevenue to pay for the coaching, it is a win win for everyone. So you lose thirty seconds of your day, for someone to give you something for FREE. And i bet it cost them more than 30seconds to set whatever it is you are watching up. Stop being so greedy and actually help out other humans. What is wrong with that?
I'm not sure who you're addressing this to; basically everyone above has stated that they block ads on sites excluding Teamliquid.
Personally I block ads on everything except TL; usually the streams I watch have no ads, so it's not a problem.
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On September 04 2011 00:56 XXGeneration wrote:Show nested quote +On September 04 2011 00:41 Surili wrote:
I don't know why you would block adds on a site like team liquid. Or on streams. Sure, it costs 30 seconds of your day, but it doesn't actually "cost" you anything, and you are helping someone, for free, to make money. Mute the add if you don't like it.
Frankly i am sad to see so many people saying that adblocking is fine on TL, how do you expect people to do well if they can't sustain a living playing this game? Think about for example mrbitter, he made a show in which he paid pros for tutelage, and then used adrevenue to pay for the coaching, it is a win win for everyone. So you lose thirty seconds of your day, for someone to give you something for FREE. And i bet it cost them more than 30seconds to set whatever it is you are watching up. Stop being so greedy and actually help out other humans. What is wrong with that? I'm not sure who you're addressing this to; basically everyone above has stated that they block ads on sites excluding Teamliquid. Personally I block ads on everything except TL; usually the streams I watch have no ads, so it's not a problem.
That is not the case, a few people said that they do not disable them for streams for instance.
Even so, why should TL be so much more important that other websites? What is wrong, morally (as the OP put it), with making other people money FOR FREE? If i see a website covered with ads that i don't want to see and i don't particularly value it, i will close it, they still made a tiny amount of money from me seeing it, and i don't have a problem with that. I am sure a lot of people DO use it, or it wouldn't be top of the google search for instance. So i am helping a community somewhere.
My main problem is why people object to helping other people in general.
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I've never blocked ads, ever. I just dont see the point, they dont really annoy me. I dont think it's morally wrong or whatever, but i'm just too lazy to do it.
Never understood why ads piss so many people off, i never really notice them : /
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EPT
