[proverbialbunny]

It doesn't work the way you think it does. Ads are paid for my the click. Some people never click on ads. The kinds of people who are likely to consider running an ad blocker are the same type who never click on ads regardless if they have ads or not.

The ideal situation is never advertising ad blockers, never bragging about them, never making a big deal about them, and keeping some mild barrier of entry. This way the average person who has less of a concern about ads will not run an ad blocker, and meanwhile the one who never makes money for the company to begin with doesn't have to deal with it.

[the8bit]

Ads are not just charged by click. Some campaigns pay by impression served and some pay by conversion. It depends on what the advertiser is trying to accomplish. Pepsi might pay per impression because their goal is brand awareness. Local Pizza joint might pay per click b/c they want to drive business off the web. AFKArena wants to pay by conversion because their ultimate goal is to get app installs.

Ads of all of these types generally compete for the same slot in an auction.

So yes, a user who has adblock is worth less than a user who doesn't have adblock but also doesn't click ads.

[0_gravitas]

Technically, if the user with adblocker doesn't even count as an impression, and the campaign pays per conversion, then the overall click-through-rate of the ad goes up, which means higher RPMs!

[jamiequint]

I ran the ads product org at one of the 10 biggest websites in the US. I'm pretty sure that ads work the way that I think they do.