Adblock rant

I started this thread over at the Hummingbird forum, but I'll place it here as well for discussion.

I know most of us hate ads on our Youtube videos, Hulu, and television, but they exist for a reason. Those advertisements help pay for streaming and in the cases of non-anime for both Youtube and Blip tv it goes to their creators. I find it ironic that some videos that are illegally uploaded to Youtube have ads, but that is just me. However when you use adblocker on Hulu or whatever it causes problems, because they do notice when that happens. Even worse is if you use it on sites such as thatguywiththeglasses.com, blip.tv, or other services where the reviewers/content providers actually use that revenue as their livelihood. By using ad blocker you are doing a disservice to yourself and the people who are giving you cheap or even free entertainment. I know it is a problem in America, where we have spoiled entitled kids who basically use ad block and don't care for the consequences. Ads allow for people to strike it out on their own, yeah they aren't millionaires, but that make enough to live off of doing the stuff they love. Using ad blocker is a big slap in the face for them. If you don't like ads there are tons of free and cheap services to be used as an alternative. Such as if you don't like Hulu's adds go to Daisuke.net or Crunchyroll (and get a cheap premium service).

I won't lie. I have adblocker for certain sites. I whitelist everything I support, but there are some things I don't want ads for. I understand this sentiment that's why in certain browsers you can literally close ads on our website (you can close and rearrange anything in the side menu on the main site).

Most ad blockers actually don't take full profit from you either. For example, YouTube is an area where you can skip ads via adblocker, but specific ads can still be triggered just from the view. Either way, as someone who owns a business and as a user, I understand both sides. That's why I've given people the option.

[LivingShadow]

I use adblock primarily for one reason, security. I've found that 90% or so (completely made up statistics) of ad services have quite a few ads with malicious code inside. Which is why I disable ads.

There is a simple way to get around it for me. That is to host your own ads. As such, it won't get caught by my ad filter and I probably won't block it. Presuming that the ads aren't really annoying (aka flashing and throwing noise into my face).

I generally keep my adblock on all the time for the security reasons LivingShadow mentioned.

I have the luxury of several PC's to use. (working in IT has its perks! XD) So I change up the settings depending on what I'm using them for.

My main PC has all ads blacklisted. If I am paying bills, checking my bank accounts, etc. I don't want to nor need to see ads for anything. They are annoying and I don't care who doesn't get paid because I blocked them. The security risks far outweigh the need to see a Lowes ad for hammers.

However, on my video production PC, I do whitelist some sites. If I'm browsing around Youtube for ideas or just want to add videos to my playlist, I keep some of those sites whitelisted. But if the ads become annoying (noise garbage, weather ads, pills for this or that and other non-sense, I might blacklist the site)

I don't think ad blocking is an entitlement issue as much as it is a convenience and security issue for me.

But then again, I don't really use Youtube and the like for anything other than an idea resource
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That being said, the few people's channels I subscribe to are in my whitelist and will remain there.

The people who make the stuff you love deserve support so they can keep doing it. It's as simple as that. If they don't get support, you don't get stuff.

The issue came to me by Linkara who is a reviewer on thatguywiththeglasses.com. He reviews comic book and does a weekly comic review around 20ish minutes long. These are professionally made videos and obviously take time to make. Linkara doesn't have any other job as he puts so much time and effort into the videos that it would be almost impossible for him to do that and have a second job. Like many of the reviewers affiliated with Channel Awesome that is his job. They make money through the merchandise he sells and through the money he gets through blip.tv and or the various sites he posts his videos. I just kinda see it sad when he makes stuff, and he ends up not having enough to live off. I mean he isn't getting a fortune, but it is what he lives off of. It is his livelihood making videos about reviewing comic books and occasionally doing both specials and he also does the History of Power Rangers show. I know Linkara isn't the only one ,and this can apply to a plethora of people, but It kinda makes me sad is all. I wanted to bring this to the limelight, because I don't know if many know about it.

If you want me to be honest, depending on the volume of people watching, ads should be fine blocker or not to live off of unless you don't know how to manage money. You'll have better luck making money through merchandise or even convention appearances. It's really just dependent on your audience, and you have to keep changing to a degree to match your competition.

I'm not saying Linkara or anyone on TGWTG doesn't manage money well, but you have to have a business mindset. Sometimes it's not your fans using adblocker, sometimes it's you. What are you doing to make money? How are you spending it? Do you have additional revenues to make money? How long is viewer engagement? Is it up? Down? Has my statistics clearly shown for years that I'm on a downward spiral? There's a lot to discuss here without simply adblocker.

I'm not trying to knock your support either, but I do want to shed light on all aspects.

I see what you saying there may be more to this than meats the eye, just thought it was something that needed brought up. Linkara actually broke down and is start selling merchandise now, so once I get some cash I'll feel like donating some money. It is like all sites be it any site, or even all these webcomcis sites that make a small bit of money with their ads.

I have adblocker, but I whitelist everything I support as well. If it's a site I like I can and usually do turn off adblock for sites I support.