[bostik]

Have to concur. Some time ago I wrote down a list of ground rules that would make display ads acceptable, at least for me: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10521930

When ads are served locally, avoid tracking, remain kept out of the way and are kept strictly within the topic of the content - then we are talking about a reasonable starting point.

Unfortunately the current ad ecosystem seems to be diametrically opposed to this. As far as I can see, the ad vendors brought this situation upon themselves.

EDIT: typofixes.