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from the feeding-the-hand-that-bites-you dept.
Frédéric Filloux reports at Monday Note that two groups of French publishers, the GESTE and the French Internet Advertising Bureau, are considering a lawsuit against AdBlockPlus creator Eyeo GmbH on grounds that it represents a major economic threat to their business. According to LesEchos.fr, EYEO, which publishes Adblock Plus, has developed a business model where they offer not to block publishers' advertisements for remuneration as long as the ads are judged non-intrusive (Google Translate, Original here). "Several criteria must be met as well: advertisements must be identified as such, be static and therefore not contain animation, no sound, and should not interfere with the content. A position that some media have likened to extortion."
According to Filloux the legal action misses the point. By downloading AdBlock Plus (ABP) on a massive scale, users are voting with their mice against the growing invasiveness of digital advertising. Therefore, suing Eyeo, the company that maintains ABP, is like using Aspirin to fight cancer. A different approach is required but very few seem ready to face that fact. "We must admit that Eyeo GmbH is filling a vacuum created by the incompetence and sloppiness of the advertising community’s, namely creative agencies, media buyers and organizations that are supposed to coordinate the whole ecosystem," says Filloux. Even Google has begun to realize that the explosion of questionable advertising formats has become a problem and the proof is Google's recent Contributor program that proposes ad-free navigation in exchange for a fee ranging from $1 to $3 per month. "The growing rejection of advertising AdBlock Plus is built upon is indeed a threat to the ecosystem and it needs to be addressed decisively. For example, by bringing at the same table publishers and advertisers to meet and design ways to clean up the ad mess. But the entity and leaders who can do the job have yet to be found."
(Score: 3, Insightful) by anubi on Tuesday December 09 2014, @07:44AM
In return for programs like AdBlock becoming illegal to use, advertisers agree to accept unconditional and full responsibility of rogueware and system problems caused by their ads.
Like a restauranteur, they agree to accept liability for what they serve.
A successful lawsuit against AdBlock constitutes agreement to this liability.
However, in today's business-oriented world, their "by doing that, you agree to this" will carry legal force for a business, and my set of identical words will be considered meaningless.
The first three words go: "I pledge Allegiance"; and the last three words are "Justice for All". The last three words are just as meaningful as the first three. If not, there wasn't much sense in making the pledge in the first place.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 3, Informative) by Nuke on Tuesday December 09 2014, @10:46AM
They will not be making Adblock illegal to use (although the admen would love that), they are "just" pursuing Adblock for damages. Meanwhile, let's pursue the admen for damages arising from their unauthorised use of our bandwidth and time wasted waiting for slow ad servers before being able to see the web pages we ask for.
You need to understand the mindset of these admen. To them their ads are are the centre of the world and they really believe that we are missing something in our lives if we do not partake of the experience. They are like politicians who believe everyone should hear their speech, or subway wall poets who want everyone to read their ramblings. They think adblock is doing its users a disservice.
But it will be like TPB, clones will spring up everywhere.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Nerdfest on Tuesday December 09 2014, @01:10PM
They could actually do it. All they'd need to do is start serving ads that are either plain HTML or images. Stop cramming them with JavaScript. It's a damn advertisement. If they want them to be more, the consequences are their responsibility.
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Tuesday December 09 2014, @03:37PM
In return for programs like AdBlock becoming illegal to use, advertisers agree to accept unconditional and full responsibility of rogueware and system problems caused by their ads.
And I've got a bridge to sell you...
The problem with even suggesting this is that I guarantee you it would turn out that ABP gets declared illegal and the litigants still manage to weasel out of accepting any of said responsibility.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 10 2014, @04:59AM
This is a tort. A -civil- case.
They are looking for monetary damages.
The map you followed to get to "illegal" is not reliable.
-- gewg_