[brucelidl]

Um, did you actually read the article? It's precisely about the ethics of ad blocking.

There is no "unspoken assumption." If content creators deserve renumeration for their work, there are plenty of systems they can use to generate it. Display advertising based on third party serving/tracking technology is proving to be a bad one. Ad blocking is merely the signal to let content creators know they should look for better options.

[groby_b]

Kindly note that I'm replying to GPs assertion that it's not their problem, and ad-blocking is simply "just a fact" - not the article itself.

This absolutist view - "ad blocking is always OK, because you can do it" - is what I take issue with, because it has ethical problems. It's wildly different from the article's stance that it is an ethical responsibility to use adblockers to cause a systemic shift away from the attention economy.

And yes, there is an unspoken assumption that work deserves to be remunerated. It underpins our society. There is also an unspoken assumption that in that interaction, there has to be respect for the consumers attention, resources, and desires. The ad industry is often violating that part of the equation.

If you use an ad-blocker as a tool to force the other side to rethink their approach, based on the stance that there's an ethical violation on their part, I fully respect that. I'm not certain it is a good solution, but at the very least, it is rooted in an ethical foundation, with an ethical goal.

"I'll always block it, just because I can" has no such foundation whatsoever, even if the actual effect is currently the same as the principled stand.

[brucelidl]

I appreciate the serious answer, and I suspect we don't disagree all that much.

I actively want a "systemic shift way from the attention economy" and believe that ad blocking is, somewhat bizarrely, the best practical tool to achieve that end. If there are some people who ad block for reasons I don't endorse, that is up to them.

I actually think ad blocking should be seen as, on balance, a powerfully good force for beneficial change. It's easy, it works, it makes the individual user experience better and has the ultimate effect of encouraging a better web generally. Doc Searls calls it the biggest boycott in history. He's not wrong.

[groby_b]

I can't say I'm entirely unsympathetic to the view. I'm concerned that after everything settles, the floor will be littered with the bodies of ad-dependent companies, many of them actually a net positive for society before their demise.

One of the bigger categories here is journalism. Newspapers made - in hindsight - a giant mistake when they bet on advertising instead of subscriptions. The house is already rapidly collapsing around them. I'd like them to get out before the place gets levelled, so to speak. Because functioning journalism is absolutely crucial to a democratic society.

There's also the fact that there's nothing inherently wrong with advertising per se. It's how it's done that truly matters. Respect for privacy and attention is crucial here.

It's a large set of problems, and it affects a tremendous number of people. Which is why I think it matters to question our motives for anything we do there - and hence my objection to "because I can". That's the same attitude that got us here.