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Free news sites step up pleas for consumers to disable adblocking software:
If your web browser has recently updated, or you've loaded some new browser extensions, you may be seeing a message when you visit certain free content sites.If your web browser has recently updated, or you've loaded some new browser extensions, you may be seeing a message when you visit certain free content sites.
"Please support journalism by allowing ads," one of the pop-up messages reads.
In the message, there is a large link that will disable the adblocker extension in your browser. There is a smaller link that will allow you to proceed to the site while continuing to block ads.
Dominic Chorafakis, with the cybersecurity consulting firm Akouto, says adblocking extensions aren't exactly new, but it's possible browsers have strengthened them in recent updates.
"Sites that rely on ad revenue, of course, don't like this at all, and there is quite a bit of effort being put in from their side to detect when a visitor has adblocking in place and either ask them politely to disable adblocking or outright prevent them from viewing their content unless they disable it," Chorafakis told ConsumerAffairs.
(Score: 3, Funny) by Username on Wednesday December 23 2020, @12:52AM (2 children)
The paywall. Newspapers were never free. CNN was never free. I am not going to put up with annoying ads just to read an opinion, and if I'm going to pay for an opinion it's going to be one that interests me.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by isocelated on Wednesday December 23 2020, @11:57AM
I've just about given up on reading news at all, save this website. I realized 99% of "news" is sensationalist BS and clickbait and never affects me personally anyway. Journalism is dead.
(Score: 2) by kazzie on Wednesday December 23 2020, @05:35PM
The trouble is that public service broadcasters won't/can't put a paywall up. Commercial news websites then find themselves with free (at the point of use) competition. That leaves them with the choice of aiming high - producing content that's so much better that people will hear about it and pay for it - or aiming low and plastering their pages with ads.