I tried an experiment just now - to see what the results would be if I didn’t have any adblocker installed.
The only site I tried this on was the S.D., and the results were rather a surprise. The proliferation of ads that came on to my screen after closing AdBlock were so obtrusive (every new page generated a new ad, most of which had to be closed before the screen would become usable) that they made the Internet basically an exercise in frustration.
I put up with this for a few minutes, then logged out of the S.D. and installed AdBlock. The results were immediate - the ads stopped.
If the advertisers would use just a little restraint, I would probably not have installed the blocker. But they came out with such an overwhelming number of advertisements that it made my Internet usage almost impossible.
I live in an Internet bubble; I run Adblocker, Blur and EFF’s Privacy Badger on all of my browsers. Online life is devoid of ads. In the rare (but becoming more common) instance where a site refuses access because I have their ads blocked, I make the decision to unblock to visit the site at least once. To see if they are worth it.
I’m still experimenting with a browser’s internal privacy mode.
I’m running a browser on my phone that completely blocks all ads. Some sites won’t load because of the adblocker, but I’ll disable it temporarily to view the site, then I’ll re- enable it to browse elsewhere. It’s an all-or-nothing blocker, there is no whitelist, but I like it like that.
I always run an adblocker and Noscript, and will simply not use a site if they won’t let adblock users have access. Ads are too obnoxious and dangerous for anything else.
A few si9tes, liie Pogo, suspend navigation during the ad breaks, and you still have to sit there for 40 seconds and look at nothing, while other people are enjoying ads. I’m surprised other sites don’t more often do the same.
Online live-streaming sports sites often cut out the ads, and during ad breaks, just show a card that says “commercial break in progress”. I’d rather see the ads, which are sometimes entertaining. MLB has even sold advertising space (Amazon) on the “be right back” card.