It’s OK to block ads (2015)
48 comments
·August 17, 2025ilvez
Just for the context, in 2015 world's most used browser still had a sophisticated adblocking.
Ms-J
Yes, it is not only OK to block ads, but should be done.
yen223
> In the 1970’s, Herbert Simon pointed out that when information becomes abundant, attention becomes the scarce resource.
Attention is scarce, but what makes it valuable?
TheBozzCL
It’s literally what you experience in your life. I’d say I value my life a lot, in the end it’s all I actually own.
On the other hand, others value my attention because they can make fractions of a cent by making me look at stuff, because there’s a minimal chance they’ll convince me to spend money on stuff of probably little value.
Seems to me they don’t value my attention a lot, and I don’t get much of value out of it.
andsoitis
> Attention is scarce, but what makes it valuable?
Attention's value lies in its scarcity and its ability to drive action, connection, and influence.
Every moment you spend focusing on something comes at the cost of not focusing on something else.
globalnode
Its fuel for your life goals, lets you think about where, what and how you want to do things for yourself. As opposed to being led along by what other's tell you you want. I'm not a philosopher but this seems like a good reason for why its valuable.
12_throw_away
I accidentally turned off my adblocker on youtube today, and I immediately got 2 ads, both of which were AI deepfakes of some celebrities selling "supplements" of dubious legality.
So, um, is this what internet ads are now? Because even if it weren't "ok" to block these ads, I'm sure as shit going to keep blocking them.
keernan
For me, it is a straight forward proposition. There is literally nothing online so far that has ever interested me enough to pay money or with my eyeballs. I either see it without ads or move on without even a moment of thought.
roscas
It very very sad that some people will even say "I like to see ads, it might have something I want...". They are not just dumb, they are dangerous. This ads companies have been online for too much time. It is time to bring them down. Fast. And with them all those parasites of ads associations and marketing. We do need to bring the level of ads to 0. Then start new.
al_borland
To take this a step further, I have had people argue with me that tracking and profiling online is a good thing, because it provides more relevant ads for things they want to buy. There are people who actively want ads that can better target and manipulate them into giving up their money.
I would like to say I've only run into one person like this, but no. I've lost count of how many of these people I've run into. I like to think I'm pretty good at understand other people's point of view, even if I don't agree with it. This is one I have a lot of trouble with.
I'm fine with relevant ads, but I think they should be relevant based on the context around them, not on the viewer. If I go to a website about trout fishing, show me ads that would be useful to a trout fisherman. There is no need to track anyone to do that.
ndriscoll
They're imagining a benevolent system that will match them to the personal best deals for them despite all evidence that megacorporations are not in fact benevolent, and will in fact use that knowledge to find the worst possible (i.e. most profitable) deals that they'll still accept, or abuse their psychology to get them to buy things they know they shouldn't, etc.
They think the system is thinking "ohh! I bet X will like this pair of shoes! And this is a great deal on them!" when in fact a more accurate model is "Who is willing to pay the most to put a message in front of someone with the following detailed list of characteristics?" and then people bid for the right to manipulate you, so even if 2 companies are trying to sell you the exact same thing that you do want, the one that thinks they can extract more from you will pay more and win the spot.
nkrisc
It’s because they view the world with a consumerist mindset and buying things gives them pleasure.
charcircuit
People paying money for things is a win win situation. People are not just "manipulated into giving up their money", they get something they value more than money in return.
dkdcio
every hackernews thread on this topic has like 10 of those people and it genuinely baffles me. like in the year 2025 the idea that you need to see an ad to know to buy something you were otherwise unaware of is genuinely insane to me
bee_rider
Ads would be ok if they were non-personalized. Just buy ads for places that show similar content. Put ads for videogames on twitch streams, that sort of thing.
These tracking system: it’s just stalking, but done on such a massive scale that, unfortunately, law enforcement and politicians don’t see it that way.
maximus_01
How much do you value your time? A lot of people think like this and I'm not judging you or saying this applies to you. But I find it kind of odd when people I know who earn hundreds to thousands of dollars an hour won't pay even $0.10 for something that took them say 15 minutes to read. If their own time is worth $200 / hr, they thought it was valuable enough to use up $50 of their time. If they refuse to pay anything for the content, then in their mind the content was worth exactly $50, not a cent more to spare to the author of said content (eg $50.10, if you paid the author $0.10 and paid $50 of your time).
somerandom2407
Back in the old days, people would share useful information in the internet of their own accord. That still happens a lot today, too! In my opinion, most of the stuff that's ad-supported is not worth my time, as the "content creator" is trying to sell something or otherwise has an angle they're pushing. How can I trust what they have to say when I know they're only doing it to make some money? They will be less interested in helping me than helping themselves!
I think if you take ads away from the internet, you'll also take away a lot of the bullshit and inaccurate or misleading information. If no-one is making any money off of it, you'll be left with largely relevant information.
The internet today is like a free to air television network, but I remember a time when it was nothing like that.
vel0city
> I think if you take ads away from the internet, you'll also take away a lot of the bullshit and inaccurate or misleading information
Just a gut feeling, but I doubt it. You'll still get a lot of bullshit inaccurate/misleading information, just only pushed by those with the budgets to keep pushing it.
Right-wing podcasters that take money from the Russian government to spread disinformation[0] will still get their checks even if their supplement sponsorships get outlawed.
You can take away all of Alex Jones' money and he'll still find some way to put his nonsense out there.
[0] https://www.justice.gov/archives/opa/pr/two-rt-employees-ind...
ndriscoll
Not quite. Generally 'content' from people trying to monetize their writing online (or who describe it as such) is not worth the time spent reading it, so in fact you're already in the hole before being asked to compensate them somehow. That I read/watched the stuff at all is more a reflection of poor time management on my part than some high value of theirs. So it's more that I think it takes a fairly high level of audacity for some rando to think people would not just be interested to hear what they have to say, but actually pay to hear their thoughts.
Generally the most useful information on the web is freely given. Turns out actual experts frequently like nerding out about their thing and trying to get other people interested in it/to understand some facet of it.
wiredpancake
There is no universal, easy and feeless option to send money to people though.
Sure, I could pay for Hackernews or Github or whatever else (these may be bad examples due to the lack of ads) but lets even say the blogpost linked above.
If I could easily send 0.20$ to someone instantly, without much thought, I would.
I was hoping cryptocurrency would solve this, although the complexity and immense fees with most networks really rule that out.
Dfiesl
Its a neat and rational way of looking at things but does it always make sense to give your time a monetary value?
shortrounddev2
I used to subscribe to the washington post before the most recent election. Im willing to pay for the content I see or read, but I can't possibly pay for ALL the content that crosses my vision. Like streaming services, I used to have just one, and now there are like 100. If I paid for every show I watched I'd be paying over $100/mo in streaming services. Now I pay for NPR'S premium subscription. If every writer on the internet paywalled their content behind some content network's subscription model, I would happily just not read it
nosioptar
I'd love a Netflix for newspapers. I'd pay to be able to read a bunch of local papers' content if the site was good.
honeybadger1
every website that stops me from viewing it because i am blocking ads will never get a visit from me again. i don't watch television because of unavoidable advertisements. i will never accept advertisements as anything other than deception.
tjpnz
There's no good argument for not blocking ads with so many of them pushing literal malware for criminals.
shortrounddev2
I work for an adtech company and we recently discovered that we were serving ads to some users using ad blockers, but the impression tracker endpoint had bbeen blocked. We decided the best course of action is to just submit our bidders domain to whatever lists we can (easylist, ublock, whatever).
My project manager wanted to try just changing our endpoints periodically to evade the list. I said to him "You fool! You fell victim to one of the classic blunders. The most famous is 'Never get involved in a land war in Asia,' but only slightly less well known is this: 'Never go up against a software pirate or ad blocker when privacy is on the line!'
freeopinion
And then you keeled over while your project manager went on about their business?
moritzwarhier
Maybe they lost sleep over it, thinking
Wait, these people are clearly not just saying: Do Not Track me, they're also saying: Don't show me ads!
Which is a demand that any ad-tech company must take very seriously! We can't ignore the privacy implications of our ad networks. We better avoid any such privacy concerns and comply with the user's expressed priorities.shortrounddev2
That's exactly how the meeting went. The CTO agreed that the best thing we can do is help comply with user's wishes about ads and privacy as best we can, so we are in the process of adding our domains to the block lists of common ad blockers
martin-t
Out of curiosity, how do you feel working on something that is zero-sum (does not produce positive value for society, only changes where the money goes)? Would you change jobs if a positive-sum job became available?
And to risk being seen as preaching, have you read https://drewdevault.com/2025/04/20/2025-04-20-Tech-sector-re... ?
cm2012
It produces a lot of value when products are actually used as opposed to unused
martin-t
No, it produces money, not value, and not for society but for the company which spends on advertising instead of spending on improving the product.
genewitch
import more land fill
charcircuit
Connecting people with goods or services they may find valuable provides a positive value to society.
martin-t
Products should compete on their cost vs value for the customer, not on which is better known.
Yes, advertisements make customers aware of a particular category of product but by pushing one specific brand instead of the whole category. I would OK with advertisements which push the whole category, that is positive-sum.
But currently we have an arms race where you have to invest in ads to compete with other products of the same category and that is zero-sum. Inter-category competition should be based on quality/longevity/cost.
shortrounddev2
I work in retail media. There is a large difference in the kind of value we capture - rather than creating incentives for annoying or addictive behavior, we only show advertisements on ecommerce pages. If you are seeing our ads, you already have the intent to buy a kind of product, but the kinds of ads we show are trying to convince you to buy a specific brand of product.
Perhaps you searched "laptops". You see a handful of results, and at the top a banner says "Dell XPS - 20% off!"
Have we manipulated you in any way? Have we lied to you? The fact that a laptop is 20% off is valuable information to a user who might consider price in their purchase. What we sell is not advertising, but real estate on your screen
Am I in love with what I do? No. But we dont engage in the kind of advertising market described in the OP's article. What we do is the equivalent of a grocery store putting products on the end cap of an aisle and getting paid extra for the valuable real estate
bee_rider
That seems less evil, at least in the sense that it doesn’t require staking people and collecting dossiers about their personal information.
I’m surprised your business model doesn’t completely dominate over the social media algorithmic nonsense. I’d expect people who searched for something to be actually interested in it.
alphazard
I remember reading this closer to 2015. I'm convinced that these sorts of mental gymnastics and philosophizing are an info-hazard for otherwise smart and thoughtful people. Not a particularly dangerous one, but time that you won't get back.
Unless you are a psychopath, your human instincts will alert you to when you need to show respect or gratitude, or reciprocity is expected from you. You don't need to try to think your way in or out of those things, especially when the other party is a large corporation bothering you over the internet. The whole premise of the article is just nuts.
TLDR: You should blocks ads because they are annoying. Don't overthink it.
themafia
I'm not blocking ads.
I'm blocking unaccountable third party advertising networks that let random javascript code run in my session.
If site operators want to put their ads inline then there really isn't anything I can do about it and I doubt I would even try.
nosioptar
I would make no effort to block ads if they were either static images or text, required no js, and were clearly marked as ads.
JdeBP
When one is (in 2015) a doctoral candidate in ethics at Balliol, there is not really any such thing as overthinking this. (-:
martin-t
> You don't need to try to think your way in or out of those things
I think the danger is the opposite. Normal (non-psychopathic) people are prone to being manipulated into feeling for inanimate objects, such as corporations, especially if those are driven by exploitative incentives where humanizing _itselves_ is beneficial.
Abdii430
[flagged]
Mate, you've had since 1995 to come up with a functioning micropayments system, and you're unhappy that I am not requesting every image referenced by your web page? I think that we are long past the point where we can safely say that this is a "you" problem.