Some think so: http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/sep/09/blocking-adverts-napster-for-the-publishing-industry link author Alex Hern
Who here does use an ad-blocker also to be protected against malicious ads?
Why the ad-launchers never took to self-regulate or tried to get SEO spamming cybercriminals on expired/parked and other domains blocked or sink-holed, then they would not have to blabber about their reduced income.
polonus
Ads are just one way malware writers can get into and compromise a users system.
I know companies like Google, Yahoo and MSN amass huge amounts of revenues but
we also have the right to chose what we see. The problem is not us the user, it’s how
much control search providers dictate. The more power we give them the more they
monopolize the interweb. Google wants to rule the world and that is proven by the way
they control add-ons/plug-ins we the user can use. If I don’t want to see an ad I maintain
the right to block them.
I my days of dial-up I did lots of things to prevent ads being downloaded to be displayed - That has continued to be my policy even on fast broadband. Certainly not a sin, but user preference.
There are very few sites that I allow in either noscript or requestpolicy and that catches/prevents most ads over and above either firefox’s popup blocker (mainly ads) or adblockplus.
With the amount of ads poisoning going on, prevention is better than cure. Only today there have been reports of malicious ads on amazon.ca and a number of other sites.
It may not be a sin but, sometimes it goes against the eula which you agreed to prior to installation of the program. 
Which programs eula says that you must not block their advertising ? ad’s burn up bandwidth which is something we all have to pay for so if I wish to stop advertising then I have the right to do so, another way to stop programs displaying ads is to use a licensed version but for me I only purchase programs that offer lifetime licenses.
Personally I block all ads with the exception of useful ads allowed via Adguard ;D
Google, Microsoft and Yahoo for starters all have disclosures regarding blocking advertising.
They may not be enforcing it but it’s still there.
Well I don’t know what Google or Yahoo do but no where in Microsoft’s terms of use does it say anywhere that blocking ads are prohibited and against the terms of use, Microsoft also supply a database for ad blocking if you happen to use the tracking protection feature provided with IE.
Hi Craigb,
Blocking ads is not an “illegal” act. There is no law against it as far as I am aware. Just damages from Breach of Contract for particular websites’ terms and conditions, but what “damages” then as the ads haven’t been shown anyway? Ad-blocking is just a way of rendering the HTML-page differently, so no Copyright infingement as well.
No one wouldn’t block ads when they weren’t annoying, but my main objection to ads is “malware ridden” ads, ads as part of “SEO spam blackhat redirection” and "sponsering"of cybercrime circles through clicking their fraudulent ads.
So for a lot of adblocking on the “open” Internet the ad-launchers themselves were to blame as the Internet was not started with commerce as a first prority.
polonus
I always block ads. And I always will.
AdBlock Plus and hosts on Windows and Ubuntu.
AdAway and MinMax XPosed module on Android.
Have to block them, together with javascript and anything 3rd party unless I can understand the need for a specific script to work.
If website owners are incompetent in protecting us from deliberate or accidental criminal ad submissions, what are we to do? Allow it? No way.
Hi cooby,
You have made some rather important point here. Ad-blocking’s necessity because an awful lot of websites are vulnerable because of outdated CMS and server software because of incompetent (amater/novice) webmasters/owners and sloppy hosting parties that go for the money first and where security isn’t a first priority or no priority at all…
Thousands of websites on one and the same IP. DNS issues. Name-server errors. Expired/parked domains spreading “bad” ads and other “goodies”. Best policy practices often not followed up like extensive header proliferation, http cookie vulnerabilities, click-jacking vulnerability and a lot of other erriors and weaknesses, etc. being “gefundenes Fressen” for hacker/attacker alike. Then there are quite some sites that are being attacked and intruded to display mal-ads and then an good functional ad-blocker is no luxury tool, it is a necessity i.m.h.o.
polonus
Polonus, what methods do you use to protect your devices against ads?
In Chrome I use ScriptSafe, Disconnect, KissPrivacy, ABP with some extra subscription.
Oh and I have the Personal Blocklist extension.
Damian
Well I’m not pol, I try not to get bogged down with too much, otherwise you are a slave to the tools not the other way round. I use the firefox RequestPolicy add-on as well as NoScript and AdBlockPlus, for me that is a happy medium.
Ads have to come from somewhere, generally they aren’t served up from the site you are visiting, but from another site/ad-server. RequestPolicy blocks 3rd party sites unless specifically given permission. Some however, find that RequestPolicy is a bit too intrusive as some pages won’t display properly if their content is imported from another source.
Hi DavidR,
Same approach for firefox for me, the other formula is thought for Chrome where script and ad blocking and browser tracking blocking is somewhat more complicated and far more difficult. NoScript could never be brought to Chrome as developed for the Mozilla browser, because Google does not allow developers to approach certain layers of the browser with their api and is therefore far more restrictive to extensions tweaking it, certainly on the Google platform.
Agree with you that the more extensions one uses the more the browser stands out as a unique particular personal identifiable browser to be tracked more easily. So the browser profile is always the user’s enemy here.
Agree with you there is no escape really and evading user tracking is nearly impossible.
Resistance is futile 
polonus
Me too for RequestPolicy.
I’ve dropper NoScript because I have too much exceptions, or can’t browse, etc.
I’m with Ghostery now.
Hi Lisandro,
Then it is either Ghostery or Disconnect, see what suits you best.
When with ABP you can have the Brazillian anti-malware domains subscription. ;D
polonus