Roughly 5% of Firefox users run a plugin called
AdBlock Plus, which effectively blocks all display and text ads on web sites. There can be little doubt that the
ethics of using a tool like this can get pretty tricky, though a lot of users do opt to block online ads, and given that this is mostly and all-or-nothing approach, once a user decides to block ads on one site that features exceptionally annoying ads, they will also block ads on every other site as well. Now, AdBlock Plus' developers have
proposed a new meta tag that would allow site owners to pop up a notification for AdBlock Plus users, asking them if they want to block ads on a site that, according to the webmaster's own judgment, does not contain any "annoying advertising."
Even AdBlock Plus' developers seem somewhat torn by the problems that their product can cause for webmasters, but, according to their reasoning, giving users an easier way to opt-in to less annoying ads would encourage publishers to opt for less intrusive ads, which would ultimately give users less reasons to use AdBlock Plus in the long run.
According to the proposal, a pop-up window would appear at the top of the page when a user navigates to a site that implements this tag.
Ads Are Getting More Intrusive Again
It is no secret, of course, that most readers do not necessarily like ads - and while we have thankfully moved away from pop-up and pop-under ads on every single site (remember those?), the latest crop of new ads is getting increasingly invasive again. Just yesterday, the New York Times front page was taken over by a giant ad from chipmaker Intel, which covered the text of the front page completely. And the new ad standards (including ads that remain in the page even when a user scrolls up or down) from the Online Publisher Association also call for bigger and more intrusive ads.
Of course, advertisers and publishers have to walk a fine line, where the ads still pay for the content without annoying readers so much that services like AdBlock Plus become a default tool for everybody.
Taking the AdBlock Plus proposal even further, maybe advertisers and site owners could also set different 'noise levels' as well, so that users could decide to automatically block ads that expand, make noise, or feature dancing aliens, but keep static display ads and text ads.
Do Publishers Have an Option?
While content providers have experimented with micropayments in the past, these experiments have generally failed, so at least for the time being, advertising is the most effective way for publishers (including ReadWriteWeb) to monetize their efforts. Content producers and advertisers are obviously aware of products like AdBlock Plus, and as the comments on the AdBlock Plus blog post clearly show, there is a large contingent of users who are adamantly against all forms of advertising on the web.
What do You Think? Give us your opinion in the comments
