Google wants to make it harder to block ads. Thought experiment:
If, instead of ad blocking per se, we used browser extensions that blocked all tracking, prevented execution of arbitrary code, and made fingerprinting devices impossible, but also left all ad content visible, would Google (and the rest of their industry) still be opposed?
The answer tells you everything you need to know about why it is moral and ethical to use ad blockers.
@maxleibman I remain convinced that if they really wanted Google et al could create a personalized ad serving framework that delivers ads far more relevant than the current systems achieve and yet retains complete privacy with zero tracking. I know this because it's already been done by Brave. Yes their implementation had flaws but fundamentally it proves it can be done and by paying you to watch ads it also opened the door to micropayments to enable ad free content.
We used to have this, when most ads used to be displayed as an <OBJECT> element, which was diligently eliminated by the WHATWG when they were drafting HTML 5. Before #HTML5 you could easily block any <OBJECT>.
It was easy to see then, as it is easy to see now, that HTML5 wasn't 100% driven by the lofty goals invoked at the time, even if upright individuals did great work as part of it, that was certainly not the primary goal of the companies that sponsored the work of the #WHATWG.
@maxleibman one long-standing tool in my arsenal against ad networks was noscript. (I now use uMatrix.)
Why do I insist this extension work properly? Because my whole MO was to block arbitrary code execution. I found it very odd that hardly anyone else recognized the threat that executing random javascript brought, but blocking it has been much more effective than uBlock Origin (which I also use for its elemet blocking!)
If the ad networks aren't going to be vetted, I'll not run their code.
@Robotron Yeah, that’s kind of where I am, too. The last time I posted about this, I used a comparison to magazine ads—in that, if I was allowed to flip past a magazine ad, I should be allowed to do something to “flip past” online ads.
But the truth is, I liked ads in magazines. In the video game magazines I read in the mid-to-late-80s, and the guitar magazines I read in the 90s, and even things like ‘Wired’ or ‘Fast Company,’ the ads were as much the content as the content.
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