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Ads have long been part of the trade-off for users of the free Web, but the rise of ad blockers is making it increasingly difficult for publishers to sustain that ad-supported model.
That's according to a report published Monday by Adobe Systems and PageFair, a startup focused on assessing the cost of ad blocking and proposing alternatives.
While PageFair clearly has a vested interest in illustrating the negative effects of ad blocking, the findings of its study with Adobe are difficult to ignore. Most notably, ad blocking will cost publishers nearly $22 billion this year, it reported.
Ad blocking has grown by 41% globally in the last 12 months, the report found, amounting now to about 198 million active ad-block users around the world.
There were some interesting geographical differences highlighted in the report, too. For instance, in the U.S., ad blocking grew by 48% over the preceding 12 months to reach 45 million active users by June. In the U.K., ad blocking grew by 82% to reach 12 million active users over that same time frame.
Meanwhile, those numbers will surely be on the rise on the mobile side, Adobe noted in a blog post, given that Apple's iOS 9 will likely include ad-blocking features in Safari by default while Adblock Plus is already available in limited beta for Android.
Ad blocking represents "a major, growing problem for both digital publishers and marketers," said Greg Sterling, vice president for strategy and insights with the Local Search Association.
In many ways, the ad-blocking phenomenon is a response to security and privacy fears that have arisen in the culture at large and a rejection of the state of advertising on the PC internet, Sterling said.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 12 2015, @05:29PM
I have been advocating for years that the solution is personal responsibility and selective attention away from ads, or from the negative feelings they seem to engender in some people (along with proper security measures to prevent actively malicious code).
For obvious reasons this has always been met by increased hostility and waves of propaganda in favor of ad-block.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by jummama on Wednesday August 12 2015, @05:42PM
That would be great... If the ad networks weren't constantly letting exploits through.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Ethanol-fueled on Wednesday August 12 2015, @06:44PM
And causing page-load times to soar and choking browsers.
(Score: 2) by naubol on Wednesday August 12 2015, @08:11PM
Hear, here. I ran without an ad-blocker for some time, but got tired of the aural rape and the cpu cycles theft.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Nerdfest on Wednesday August 12 2015, @07:06PM
... having Adobe propose alternatives doesn't make that seem very likely.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by physicsmajor on Wednesday August 12 2015, @05:54PM
I would be fine with passive ads. I'm not fine with tracking, delayed page loads, and bandwidth sucking.
If there was a curated/registered service which only did that, I wouldn't block. Until then, there is no way I'm letting that shit through.
(Score: 2) by tibman on Wednesday August 12 2015, @06:38PM
No tracking means showing untargeted advertisements. You'll get so many adult diaper and v1agra ads. Wouldn't you prefer to see Grant Imahara trying to sell you electronic parts?
Filter error: No Spam Please! I had to mangle some words to bypass the filter, sorry.
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(Score: 2) by Nerdfest on Wednesday August 12 2015, @07:08PM
I would, but I think it really should be opt-in. Alternatively sites could show ads based on the sort of interests that *their* site attracts.
(Score: 2) by tibman on Wednesday August 12 2015, @07:41PM
I really like the "their site" thing. Sites probably know what their demographic is anyways. Most of the tracking seems to be for weird things like "Hey, you looked at processors on that other site, now you can see processors on our furniture site too".
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(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Thursday August 13 2015, @01:40AM
Now, that is one hell of a good idea. When I'm on a motorcycle forum, I really don't mind seeing Honda, Kawasaki, and Suzuki ads. When I'm on an auto forum, again, I don't mind seeing Chevrolet, BMW, Ford, or Nissan ads. When on a hunting forum, ads for Winchester and Remington are more or less expected. Computer forums can very reasonably carry ads for computers, software, hardware, research, and more.
I'm a 59 year old man. When, if ever, have I had any interest in prenatal vitamins, pregnancy tests, feminine hygiene? And, toys. I lost interest in most toys more than 40 years ago, and only renewed that interest when my own children were born. They are grown now, so I have zero fokking interest in toys. I REALLY don't want to see another Mickey D commercial aimed at the juvenile mind. The lists could go on and on.
The content being viewed is a very good indicator in most cases of my interests.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 12 2015, @07:26PM
I don't care what ads they show, since i'm not buying anyway. I don't want to be tracked. The useless ads could be shown, and i'd allow it, if there was no tracking, the ads would be small in file size and page size, would not come from external sources etc. but this current shit, no way.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by tangomargarine on Wednesday August 12 2015, @07:58PM
No tracking means showing untargeted advertisements. You'll get so many adult diaper and v1agra ads. Wouldn't you prefer to see Grant Imahara trying to sell you electronic parts?
No. No I wouldn't. Ads targeted at me are creepy. I don't want Google trying to psychically determine how to mangle my search results to "better fit" me, either--everybody should get the same result.
Plus, ads for stuff I don't want are easier to ignore. Er, would be if I didn't run adblockers. Whatever.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 5, Insightful) by vux984 on Wednesday August 12 2015, @08:16PM
Wouldn't you prefer to see [targeted ads]
No. I would not. I would not like to be subconsciously manipulated into wanting and buying a product I currently don't need, want, or even know exists. I am not bored, casting about for something to spend money and time on; and whatever Grant Imahara might convince me to purchase will not result in a life more enriched for myself; and will only divert time and money away from other things I am already interested in doing.
When I do get bored, and have some money to blow I'll look around... and I'm sure I'll find plenty. I certainly don't need to attach leeches onto myself.
And I certainly don't want to hand the amoral sociopaths that are corporations additional information about me to make it even easier for them to present ads to me that are tailored to the sort of person I am, to more effectively manipulate my subconscious than they already do, just to increase the ads effectiveness. To create a desire for a product I don't currently need or want.
If your response is "nobody is making you" and "personal responsibility" and "self control". Shove off. I'm a human being. And all human beings can be manipulated. They wouldn't spend billions on ads if they didn't work. Think you are the lone individual who is immune to advertising, who makes all his purchasing decisions based on rational self-interested motivation? Ingorance and hubris. Or maybe you really are some sort of rain-main but I'm not.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by RedBear on Wednesday August 12 2015, @08:50PM
No. I recently started seeing ads on completely unrelated websites for THE EXACT ITEM on Amazon that I had been shopping for just 30 minutes earlier. That shit is fucking creepy as hell. It is unacceptable for the entire business population of the planet to be cooperatively helping each other follow me around the web and recording everything I'm looking at or buying.
No. Nonononono. No. Stop it. Creeeeeepy.
Until business owners start going to prison for tracking people without their consent, it's Ad Block City, baby.
¯\_ʕ◔.◔ʔ_/¯ LOL. I dunno. I'm just a bear.
... Peace out. Got bear stuff to do. 彡ʕ⌐■.■ʔ
(Score: 3, Interesting) by fido_dogstoyevsky on Wednesday August 12 2015, @11:49PM
Until business owners start going to prison for tracking people without their consent, it's Ad Block City, baby.
I do believe you have found the solution to the problem.
It's NOT a conspiracy... it's a plot.
(Score: 1) by termigator on Wednesday August 12 2015, @09:06PM
The TV and radio industry has operated all this time for advertisers without the need to track exactly what people were watching and listening. The type of ad is driven by the type of show. If a sporting event, beer and v1agra. If a kids program, toy commercials. There is no need to track folks on a per-person basis to effectively advertise.
I think the push to track people on an individual basis, which sounds like the holy grail for advertisers, may lead to consumer blowback. And if tracking is not enough to stop the abuse, then security considerations will. I do not have to worry about my computer being comprised when watching ads on TV.
(Score: 2) by Nollij on Thursday August 13 2015, @11:30PM
While there is certainly a lot of that going on, you'll notice there are a TON of ads that are aired like a shotgun blast. Every channel, every time slot. Major companies, like Ford, Coke, etc. Strangely, some of these even seem to be targeted, but at a different demographic. Easiest examples of this are the truck ads, featuring country music, airing on a heavy metal station. It's the same ad airing everywhere else, but it is noticeably out of place here.
I will say, though, that the different ads shown do say something about the viewers. Apparently, everyone watching cable news (all of them) in the morning is in desperate need of catheters; people watching ESPN need liver pills. And anyone watching anything during the day needs an injury attorney.
(Score: 2) by physicsmajor on Wednesday August 12 2015, @09:16PM
Not actually true! If I'm on a page on Amazon which is hawking tools, that's great info - you sure can target based on that. Home improvement, other tool brands once you get to individual listings. All of that is targeted.
You can target ads based on the specific query I just input, which was necessary to generate the page, for search engines.
This is somewhat less information than all my history forever, but to say it's untargeted is grossly incorrect.
(Score: 1) by Francis on Wednesday August 12 2015, @09:48PM
What it means is going back to the days where the ads were targeted to the content. In days of yore the targeting was done by the prospective customer when they selected the material. If you bought a magazine about home decorating, there would be ads related to home decorating. If you bought a magazine about fishing there probably weren't any ads for doilies or duvets.
And it worked well for quite a while. The internet allows for marketers to engage in more and more obnoxious behavior in the course of getting people to look. There's no consideration going into their theft of my attention.Or that none of the ads they target at me result in a click. That was before I started using adblockers. It wasn't a conscious effort on my part to not click on the ads, it's that the ads weren't selling things that I was interested in. So, they'd waste my bandwidth and attention showing me an ad for something that in most cases I couldn't even use.
A simple text ad that's targeted to the content of the page is something that I have clicked on a few times. But, even that isn't something I normally do. That's probably a half dozen times. It's no wonder they have to resort to covering content and other shady practices to get clicks.
(Score: 2) by tibman on Thursday August 13 2015, @02:30AM
The verdict is in! Everyone hates advertisements and especially targeted ones : )
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(Score: 2) by HiThere on Wednesday August 12 2015, @08:21PM
And your reaction to HTML5 is??
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 14 2015, @12:45PM
network.websocket.enabled false
media.ogg.enabled false
media.wave.enabled false
media.webm.enabled false
media.windows-media-foundation.enabled false
dom.battery.enabled false
(Score: 5, Insightful) by aristarchus on Wednesday August 12 2015, @06:24PM
I have been advocating for years that the solution is personal responsibility
Amazing! I have been advocating the same thing for years! Businesses should exercise some personal responsibility by not using an information network that I pay for to try to hawk their garbage! I cannot believe the amount of entitlement advertisers seem to have! If you want my attention, you either pay for it, or at least ask nicely. And do not, repeat, do not moan and cry about some Imaginary lost Profits (IP). Yep, more personal (corporate) responsibility is just what we need, since corporations are people, nasty, rude, greedy people.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 14 2015, @03:14AM
You must be confused, "personal responsibility" only applies to poor people and other victims. Its never been anything more than a dog whistle for victim-blaming.
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Friday August 14 2015, @03:37AM
Yeah, those who think they are entitled, like advertisers! Why don't they go and get a real job? Corporations that claim that they cannot make money because of regulation? What a bunch of Losers! How about some "Personal Responsibility", my dear corporate citizen? Yes, you are right, which is the exact point of the sarcasm. Republican dog-whistle talking points. Why has Scott Walker never had a job outside of the public sector? How about some personal responsibility there? Sucking Koch is no job for a self-respecting person! No sirree! Donald Trump? Born in Bahama (look it up) with a silver spoon up his nose! Classy? I think not! So, let us now bow our heads, in a moment of silence for all those conservatives incapable of rational thought. Jesus can forgive your sins, but He can't do much about stupid.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by M. Baranczak on Wednesday August 12 2015, @07:26PM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 12 2015, @09:22PM
My argument to this is that ignoring adds just forces the advertisers to make adds that are more blinky and more annoying,
if you're that good at ignoring adds you might as well be using an ad blocker, since you're basically doing the same thing.
(Score: 2) by fido_dogstoyevsky on Wednesday August 12 2015, @11:45PM
...the solution is personal responsibility and selective attention away from ads...
That was fine when ads were simply images that only wasted bandwidth and were easy to ignore. When advertisers escalated (that's when I remembered that _I_ was paying for the bandwidth) I started applying remedies. That was an own-goal on their part.
It's NOT a conspiracy... it's a plot.
(Score: 2) by Anal Pumpernickel on Thursday August 13 2015, @01:07AM
I have been advocating for years that the solution is personal responsibility and selective attention away from ads, or from the negative feelings they seem to engender in some people (along with proper security measures to prevent actively malicious code).
Truly? Because it seems to be that ad blockers are the solution for many people, or they wouldn't use them. In addition to being annoying and increasing page load times, ad networks often spread malware. "personal responsibility" would fix nothing, as "personal responsibility" can't actually block ads. It's perfectly legitimate to control what you see on your own computer.
For obvious reasons this has always been met by increased hostility and waves of propaganda in favor of ad-block.
Probably because your "solution" is not a solution at all. And propaganda? Really? If someone wants to use an ad-blocker, I'm not sure how that is propaganda. The advertising companies, however, spew forth tons of propaganda; far more than any normal user could hope to spread.