Comment by akersten
20 hours ago
> If the reason the site exists is to use ads, they’re not going to let you use an user agent that doesn’t display the ads.
They've been giving it the old college try for the better part of two decades and the only website I've had to train myself not to visit is Twitch, whose ads have invaded my sightline one time too many, and I conceded that particular adblocking battle. I don't get the sense that it's high on the priority list for most sites out there (knock on wood).
People who block ads are a minority. Sites that serve heavy content like video would care if someone wastes their resources but blocks ads, but why would a site that serves a few KBs of text spend the resources on blocking such users or making the ads beat the ad blocker in a tiresome cat and mouse game?
Those users could even share or recommend the site to someone else who doesn't use ad blockers, so it actually makes sense to not try to battle ad blockers if you want to make your site more popular.
This makes sense for sites that rely on network effects, like forums or classified ad sites and so on. Unless they have a near monopoly or some really valuable content, they would benefit financially if they let people block their ads.
I can't back that up with data or anything, but it makes sense to me.
Many "news sites" are pretty hostile to me as someone with an adblocker. So I add them to my deny list of sites to never visit or hear from.
I once made the mistake of adding the site to the deny list of uBlock... The ads were so annoying I couldn't read the article anyway. So, never again.
Anyway, you're right in that I'll never share articles from those sites to people who don't use ad blockers.
Same, I just don't use Twitch when possible. Most streamers rehost their VODs on Youtube which has a better player anyway.