[genedickson]

Stop calling them ad blockers. They block surveillance features that advertisers put in their ads. I do not believe that ads would be blocked by surveillance blockers if they were just ads. Absent the surveillance, how would they recognize them? If ads were identical to the ads in analogue newspapers then surveillance blockers would let them through. When I read an analogue newspaper or magazine nobody is knowing if I read the ads or not. They only know whether they get results from advertising in that outlet. And they know that by tracking. They could run ads that don't spy on people. I always use surveillance blockers. I never shut them down for anybody. It is especially offensive when sites that are hardcopy outfits which have gone digital to keep up with the times complain about surveillance blockers. They certainly know how to run ads that are just ads. There is no technical difference between the ads and the rest of the page. The layout is the thing. They have experience with this and professional advertising people know about tracking results.

[CM30]

Sure, they block surveillance features, and that's definitely a reason why a lot of people use them. But people would still use adblockers with traditional, static ads, because they detract from the look of the page on a visual level and use up extra bandwidth on top of that.

[manigandham]

Ad blockers dont block ads. They arent even "ad" blockers but just filters - browser extensions that block anything on a page from loading if its coming from a blacklisted domain. Whether it's ads, trackers, social widgets or just an image - it gets blocked by canceling the network request.

Surveillance is not the leading cause for adblock, it's because people don't like ads and a 1-click install to remove them is incredibly easy.

Advertising online will always have some sort of tracking because that is the benefit of advertising online - to know the real metrics of who has seen and clicked and engaged with an ad. If you're worried about real privacy issues, you should focus on Facebook/Google and government agencies.

[genedickson]

I don't use facebook or google. I use startpage a a google proxy on rare occasions, but mostly search with ixquick. My representatives know what I think about government surveillance and privacy issues, for what its worth. I agree and disagree about online ads always having interactive features. It makes sense, but the controversy around this does make for the possibility that some will go for straight ads. For me surveillance is the main reason I use blockers. History shows that corporations are more of a threat than government. Hitler could never have made it absent the Krupp family. They put him in power. I don't know about Stalin. He did have help along the way, but since he ruled till he died there is a lot less information available, and it is spotty at best. Of course in America the corporations run the government, and it isn't just from campaign contributions, though at this time that is the biggest thing. Europe to. Most of the world's governments are run by corporations behind the scenes. The big possibility to force ads to be non interactive is to seriously call newspapers and magazines that predate the internet on this. I do this pretty regularly. An ad that does not have any interactivity cannot be filtered without removing the article one is reading. That is easy to do. And the incredible amount of publicity waiting for the first newspaper or magazine to require advertisers to eliminate interactive ads should be really tempting. If their publicity department doesn't see this they need to hire me! Given the resources that publicity outfits have I could get the ball rolling and keep it going for long enough that it would be remembered for a while after the boom. The only thing to filter would be the graphics. Alt text would deal with this. If on has use of the advertised item(s), one will check out the pictures. However, I noticed when I "upgraded" my firefox that they don't have the option to block images in the new version, or at least they make it difficult by completely removing the tool bar that held that function. I've looked and looked, but not found. In any event, I utterly lack sympathy for interactive advertisers and the websites that allow them. I'll happily do without them as they go out of business, and I hope they do!

[MarcusP]

AFAIK, and what it looks like from Adblocks FAQ [1] they work by blocking particular addresses from serving content. I assume surveillance blockers do what you are describing and it sounds like a move away from ad blockers to surveillance blockers might make the web more usable and sustainable.

[1] https://adblockplus.org/faq_internal

[bigbugbag]

Adblock plus is on the way out, the new kid in town is µblock origin.

The difference ? Adblock plus can be extended to block trackers by adding block lists to the default, while ublock origin has those lists activated by default. Then adblock plus let through some ads they whitelist for money and supposedly good behavior, ublock origin has no such policy for the reason that ublock is the work of an individual who wants a better online experience while adblock plus is now the product of a commercial company.

[SquareWheel]

That may be true of the general HN crowd, but I doubt it's true for most people. I block ads because they make the web ugly and slow. It's simply nicer to browse sites without them.

In my case at least, "surveillance" doesn't factor into it. If I were to see ads, I'd actually prefer they be targeted to my interests.

[hackerfactor]

Be careful what you ask for...

Right now (and without ad blockers): Go to homedepot.com, search for toilets, and view one toilet product page. This marks your interest. facebook.com will show you ads for toilets for the next month.

[SquareWheel]

Well, I don't have a Facebook account so I can't test the experiment. But generally if I search for something I don't mind seeing related ads for that thing. Especially if it's something that suits my interests. Google for instance lets you edit your interests list.

[genedickson]

I don't give a FF, I want to minimize the information strangers have about me. I'd rather see ads that were not targeted. If they know about me that is bad, regardless of all else. Who doesn't matter. Why doesn't matter. I've never had a checking account or credit card. My bank knows nothing of how I spend my money. For mail order I use money orders and aliases. When I contact online sellers I use an alias which I delete shortly after receiving whatever and telling them that it came. I consider surveillance unpatriotic. I may not be able to prevent the NSA from knowing all, but I make purchases anonymously unless I am at a brick and mortar store.

[SquareWheel]

Well, that honestly sounds like deep-seated paranoia, but you're free to opt out of tracking with almost all ad networks. Here's Google's:

https://www.google.com/settings/u/0/ads/authenticated

https://www.google.com/settings/u/0/ads/anonymous

Others can be found with a simple Google search.