| > Whether this is stealing or not is semantics, and I don't care to get into that discussion. But I do see a moral problem here. It's not just semantics. Words matter. It's important semantics. Using an ad-blocker is neither stealing, nor free-riding (web-content is excludable and other consumer are not paying for it.) This is much more akin to making use of a facility with a suggested donation and not making a donation. The morality here is fairly grey and heavily circumstantial. If you can easily afford the donation and the facility is the verge shutting down due to lack of funds, the the immorality seems fairly clear cut. If making a donation would preclude you from being able to use the facility or the facility is sufficiently funded, then few people would fault you from making use of it, especially if you make a point of picking up trash or making other efforts to improve the facility. Online advertising not a clear cut case. Do we need to make sure our content creators get paid? Certainly. Does online advertising do a good job of rewarding skilled content creators? Sometimes. Does encouraging content creators to use advertising for reimbursement lead to access to better content? Doubtful. I think you can easily offset any moral qualms you have about using an ad-blocker by funding direct donations, patreons, kickstarters or any of a number of other means of funding content creators and publishers directly. Overall, I think paid advertising is an inherently immoral way of funding the content I consume. Why should I force the customers of companies I'm never going to buy anything from to pay for my entertainment? |