French ISP Blocking Web Ads By Default 317
New submitter GavrocheLeGnou writes "The french ISP 'Free.fr' is now blocking ads from Adsense and other providers by default for all its subscribers. The option can be turned off globally, but there's no whitelist (Google translation of French original). From the article: 'Because the service doesn’t offer a whitelist (contrary to Adblock, a service I’ve used for years), this means that it is an all or nothing choice, activated by default to block everything. And since it is not only internet, but TV and phone lines running through the FreeBox, it’s possible that, if left unchecked, Free could beginning blocking TV ads, or phone calls from known spam hotlines. While this seems like a potentially beneficial service, there’s no doubt that it’s biting at the heels of several sectors who rely on advertisement to make money, let alone the advertisers themselves who pay to reach an audience, and are blocked at the door.'"
Hyperbole and baloney (Score:2, Informative)
You can turn adblocking off. Versus a non-neutral net where you can't do a damn thing over how your ISP shapes your traffic. Big difference. Or would say Dish networks recent attempts to automatically remove ads is not neutral?
Like to confuse the issue, huh? I swear some of you people are just astroturfers with a brain. Half a brain though.
Re:Good. (Score:4, Informative)
I see you have never been to the educational parts of the internet that are interdependently sourced. There are still plenty of sites out there that provided a wealth of knowledge that are funded (usually only partly) by the ads they have. A less independent example is youtube, there are a lot of shit content creators that rake in cash for making crap content BUT there are also a bunch of awesome people out there that make interesting educational and useful videos that are partly or fully funded by their ad revenue. Just because you go to shitty websites that serve shitty adds doesn't mean they should all be done away with. It means you need to stop surfing the braindead sections of the internet.
Look up Bill Beaty, Mike's Electric stuff, Jeri Elssworth, Ben Krasnow, Woodgears.ca, Smarter every day. They are all do what they do because they like it and to be educational but they earned every 1/10th of a penny for each page or video view. Blocking ads on an individual basis is fine, most people don't do it. Blocking ads as an ISP is fucking the hand that feeds you.
Re:Good. (Score:1, Informative)
After www.fark.com started detection adblock and offered non obtrusive ads to help run the site I thought ok well, we'll see how they look so i white listed ads on fark and low and behold multiple ugly flashing flash ads are considered non obtrusive so I immediately blocked them again and then added a rule to stop me seeing farks nag bar about having adblock enabled.
If It had been non moving pictures or text i would have left them active.