Memes y Mamas

Ad blockers aren't about paying or not. I was offered the HTML and other media from the web server like everyone else. What happens on my machine on my browser is up to me.

Imagine getting a free magazine in the mail. You open the cover and the first page is an ad. Are you obligated to read it? What if you cut it out? Is that against a moral code? What if you happened to have a fancy mailbox that cut the ads out for you? Would this be illegal or something?

What parts of the magazine I read is up to me, and I am in control of my own body. A web browser adds more moving parts, but everything remains the same. I am simply getting HTML, JS, media like images and video streams, etc., which is exactly the same as the text and graphics on the magazine.

And my magical mailbox that removes the ads before I see them happens to work great. Some people change the website with a light or dark theme. Some people see different fonts. Some people have accessibility settings enabled. Some people hide the ads. At the end of the day, I got content for free, and I can consume it however I want, because I am in control of my own body and my own browser.

There is an existing technology on televisions that use a camera to observe if you're actually watching an ad. If you take your eyes away, it will pause until you pay attention again, then it will resume. I just want to be clear that if you disagree with ad blocking, then you are for forced advertising and the dismissal of control of your own body and browser.

I'm not even trying to get content for free. I don't want to see ads, so I get rid of them. Again, it's part of the content that is offered by the web server like everyone else, much like the free magazine that gets delivered to others. The website can attempt to intervene if they don't like this, and they're free to attempt to fight my magical ad-removing mailbox if they want, but ultimately, I will do what I want with my browser because I am in control of it.

If their revenue model is based on attempts to remove control of my body and web browser, and that isn't working, then they need to find a new model. They're fighting ad blockers, but much like your ability to skim ads in a magazine, the ad blockers will catch up and remove ads again. Being able to consume content the way you want to consume it and run software that you want to run is a right. It's not free as in beer, it's free as in freedom, and the distinction is important.