Eyeo is now reaching out to developers of other ad-blocking tools to cut deals that allow certain ads to pass ads through their filters, too, in exchange for payment.
Mr. Murphy said he has taken Eyeo up on its offer, and plans to implement an option within his app whereby “acceptable†ads will be displayed to users. The feature will be switched on by default, Mr. Murphy said, and he will receive a flat monthly fee from Eyeo in return. Mr. Murphy declined to disclose the fee, but said he expects to make less money from Eyeo’s payments than from sales of the app itself.
So, they sell their ad-blocker in the App Store, and then double-dip by also effectively allowing ad brokers to sell ads to him. Kind of scummy.
i’m increasingly of the view that in future (and now) we need to not rely on others for tech.
If we do – this is what happens.
Instead the ability to understand how code is made, or even code yourself, so that you can regain tech autonomy will be critical. So that you can use open source OSes and software to ensure they behave as you wish.
The choice is stark – be a slave to others imposing this kind of s*** on you – or be in a position to do something about it.
And given how much our lives will, and do, depend on tech – this is not an edge case geek issue anymore.
Yeah, that’s a nice sentiment, but it’s not going to happen. I’m not about to rewrite all the proprietary apps I use (like the patch editor/librarian for my hardware synth), where no open source alternatives exist. And that is assuming I knew how to code in the first place
Edited 2015-09-24 21:51 UTC
Indeed. And why is Tech special? Surely it is just as important to be self-sufficient when it comes to food? After all, isn’t eating is more important than browsing the Internet?
If we really were to follow that train of thought, in order for us not to be slaves we’ll all have to go back to subsistence farming, make and mend all of our clothes and build our own houses.
Too late. We are far beyond the time when one person could comprehend everything in an operating system and the applications they use. I’ll bet Linus Torvalds will be the first to say he doesn’t even know the full Linux kernel, let alone the full GNU stack that goes into building a fully working bare bones GNU/Linux system, and that is just for getting it booting, let alone doing anything useful.
Software systems are way too complicated now, so if you think your choice is between understanding it all and being a slave, then I’m sorry to say we’re all slaves.
Understanding everything that goes on inside your modern car is a full time job, so be my guest, get started on your mission to not be a slave as long as you don’t expect me to pay your living expenses while you do it.
“Kind of scummy.”
Kind of?
Now they can sell an in-app mod to block those extra ads…
AdBlock Plus allows some per-approved “non-intrusive” advertising, but the user can easily opt out by un-checking a box.
I don’t know if Crystal gives users the choice.
From what I’ve read, you can choose to opt out in the app’s settings. Still, AdBlock Plus offers their plug-in for free. This guy charges for his app and doesn’t even opt us out by default?
So, basically they’re deliberately selling a defective product – an ad blocker that by design doesn’t block ads if the ad provider is paying them more than the user is?
This could almost be an interesting model. Most current subscriptions to remove ads seem to cost the user a lot more than they are worth in ad views. The whole micropayment thing that never really gets traction would be one way to have an auction paywall, see if the user wants to pay for access or split what an advertiser would pay to the site owner to view ads.
This is what google are doing with their adblocking subsription.
Basically, your subscription bids against the third-party ads, and whoever bids more, wins. The more you pay, the more you block.
If you go to iTunes on a computer and sign in to your account you can look at your purchases and ask for a refund.
Launch iTunes
Click on your name at the top and in the dropdown select Account Info.
Type in your password when prompted in order to proceed.
Click on See All under your Purchase History.
Click on the arrow next to the purchase batch that contains the purchase you’d like a refund for.
Click on Report a Problem next to the single purchase you’d like a refund for, unless there is only one, then you may use the large Report a Problem button.
You will be routed to Apple’s website. Just follow the steps after signing in and request the Refund option and explain why.
This is literally what the ISPs that are also cable companies do in USA with the Internet service.
Low is an understatement.
This is definitely wrong, especially when customers have paid for the app. If this was done with a free app, it would still not be great, but understandable.
What should instead happen, is that these ad blockers should add advertising networks that are good (fast performance, do not distract, do no tract etc.) to a list, and allow users to view those ads while blocking all the others as an option.
But this should be done as a feature of the app, not something for which advertisers pay you.
This would be good because it would encourage more ad networks to start respecting their users.
Also, the default should be to show well performing apps, and only block the bad ones. With an option to block all ads in the ad blocker settings.
This way, sites & ad networks that respect their users will earn money, and the other sites will be forced to change the way they work as well.
This ought to also cut down on their whining, since if they complain about being blocked, we can just point out that they can get their ads unblocked if they started behaving.
Like a time-out of misbehaving kids
It seems a little tiresome to recreate Hong Kong action films…shaolin soccer among ad networks perhaps…in ad blocker/subverter/converter apps.
On the other hand I was just completely shocked when an ad for Malwarebytes actually brought me to a site whose URL looked very much like Malwarebytes’.
Why is this post dialogue modal?
I see so many people outraged by this, like they are virgins to such ecosystems. Call me a cynic, but that’s pretty much what I would expect from an add blocker bought from an app store and that’s why I use FOSS software for such tasks.
I don’t think this is scummy, I think it may just what is needed.
Here is the conundrum.
On the one hand I hate the intrusive, disruptive, resource guzzling web ad ecosystem that has developed over recent years and which has seriously degraded my web viewing experience, especially on mobile devices. So, like tens of millions of other people the very first thing I did when my device finished upgrading to iOS9 was to install an ad blocker. In fact I installed several and then over the course of a couple of hours browsing settled on one I liked. My web browsing experience got much, much better.
On the other hand I know that publishers are heavily dependent on ad revenues to produce the content I want to consume. The web is killing a lot of the old publishing industry, some deserve to die, so don’t, some are essential to my cultural life. And the ones I want desperately to survive need to earn revenues from ads (paywalls are never going to be a widely successful model).
So on the one hand I decide to block ads on the other hand I know they are crucial to the survival of the content and publishing I want to survive.
Really what I want in an ideal world is to be able to block just bad ads, ads that abuse me as a reader by being intrusive and disruptive. I could live with some ads, less intrusive ads, produced by advertisers that behaved themselves.
If Ad blocking app vendors start to let vetted, curated, advertising through their net that may be the beginnings of exactly my ideal scenario where ads are a source of revenues for publishers but the ad system is prevent from spiralling out of control in such a way that it ends up abusing consumers of web pages.
Of course any one ad blocking app vendor may end up being corrupted by advertisers payments into letting too many, or disruptive and intrusive, ads through their net.
But here is the beauty of a cheap app ecosystem, as long as there lots of different ad blocking apps, and they are priced so low as to be trivial purchase (which they are) I can at any time replace an ad blocker that has been corrupted by payments into letting through bad ads by another blocker who has not. I can actually run several ad blockers at the same time. Its a kind of Darwinian process, ad blocking app vendors that don’t abuse their power to let through some advertising for payment will flourish over those that do abuse their position.
So maybe, just maybe, this is the beginning of a better web ad ecosystem, and it will be better because having a choice of multiple alternative ad blockers can empower consumers and let them to say no to excessive and bad advertising practices.
Your making is sound like this is a new idea…
The company Dean Murphy (maker of Crystal) partnered with, Eyeo, has been doing this for 4 years (with Adblocker Plus and Adblocker Pro). The result? Most people stopped using them and started using adblock or ublock (on Chrome at least), because they both just block ads, all ads, – which is what people actually want. The ads blocked.
If you care about certain sites getting ad revenue you can just whitelist them. Do you really need a curator to do it for you?
I use an ad blocker. I whitelist some sites out of empathy, no other reason. I don’t use it because some ads are annoying, I use it because all ads are annoying. They are annoying because I have never, not a single time in almost 15 years, ever clicked on an ad link on purpose (and I could count on one hand how many times I did it by accident). They are annoying because they are irrelevant to me, and likewise I am irrelevant to them. I’m pretty sure I’m not alone in this.
Anyway, the point is sure, this will result in other people making adblockers – I guarantee that. The ones that will end up “winning” though are the ones that block ads most efficiently – all ads. All this guy did was sabotage his own product (or at the very least drastically reduce future sales). Which is ironic to me because unlike Adblock Plus/Pro, he actually had a revenue stream – why he would resort to this shit is beyond me.
Hope for his sake he makes a boatload of money off the stragglers left after the mass uninstall-fest that is about to go down with his “alternate income stream”, because he won’t be making it on sales anymore…
From the publisher of Crystal
Source (which is worth reading in full):
http://murphyapps.co/blog/2015/9/25/on-acceptable-ads
Well if that is true, and he keeps his word, then I don’t have a problem with it myself. He better try and get out in front of this quick though, because I had already uninstalled his app on my phone
But yeah, if it is optional, I don’t see any problem with it.