Should Ad Blocker be used for Internet Reviewers/Entertainers?

Recently I saw a video with a Internet reviewer who had an honest one-on-one with his fans about adblocker. It caused quite a stir amongst members of the website, so I'm curious, btw:

Adblocker for those who don't know blocks most if not all ads including ads before a video starts. It usually is used to stop inappropriate ads and/or virus based ads. The problem when it comes to Internet Reviewers and/or Entertainers. People who use the Internet for strictly their jobs of making money by making videos and posting them for people to watch. This is their only source of income in most cases and it has gotten to the point where Blip made a screen saying that they won't start the video for 90 seconds unless you watch a sixty second ad.

So I'm curious: Do you think that Ad Blocker should be used for Internet Reviewers and/or Entertainers? Why or why not? Do you think that people should take the videos without permission and post them on Youtube?

And yes, I know about the Whitelist, and that there's some countries that don't allow ads like Canada, though it'd be interesting to hear the countries POV, I'm aiming towards countries where you have to watch the ads unless you have something like Ad Blocker.

I have always supported anything I watch. Albeit their websites and/or a third party. I will sit down and watch the ads. I don't have much money and I want to support as much as possible for something entertaining that makes my day a bit better. I know this is their only income and if they had other income coming in they'd be no longer able to make the videos because of how much work eats away at time. So I will sit through any ad, that and in the U.S. at least the commercials are getting out of control anyway on television compared to online, but I digress.

 

Personally, ads have never bugged me and I can never see why people make such a fuss about it. When I watch something on Crunchy Roll, I like the ads because it gives me time to think about what I've seen, plus some time to check up on other things before the episode starts back up.

Granted, what I'm about to say is going to be a bit biased because I'm currently a writer/reviewer for a news site, so say what I take with a grain of salt.

I personally think ad blocker shouldn't be used for sites that people are making a living on, whether it be news blogging or providing entertainment. These people are making a living off of the ad revenue, just like how people go to their daily jobs. The only difference is that their job is to provide you with information, entertainment, or sometimes both. It is the money that also keeps the site running.

Ad blocker has it's place, but it definitely interferes with people who need those ads to be seen in order to make money. I don't get paid for what I do, but it is nice to know that there is an official domain for the site that I work on, and that my work is helping generate revenue to keep the site going.

And yes, there are some sites that are backed by major companies. One of my favorite sites, Spill, does movie audio reviews, and are owned by Hollywood.com. They are able to provide some money to them, along with ad money, but they aren't able to get everything. They had to do a special fundraiser for the video game section of the site in order to get their two reviewers to E3 this year. They made way over what they asked for and beyond, but they shouldn't have needed to ask for donations from their fans.

I like to support what I like, and in turn, I'm helping them make sure that they are still there to provide me entertainment. It's a give and take relationship between the consumer and the creator. It's a market that is still not all that explored, and is still new, so some people may think it's nothing, but it could soon cause certain places to make drastic changes.

 

I've got no problem with ads. Personally, I think ads are better than commercials. They're not as long, and some are fun. As for the pop-up ads, I normally close those right away. Any legitimate site isn't going to have ads that cause viruses, unless there are people really dedicated to giving them a bad name.

I personally don't like adblocker, because like you said, sometimes those ads are the only source of income sites have. If it's a site you enjoy or are frequently visiting, you should be able to sit through a ninety second ad to help them out.

 

what

and on the topic, I use adblock, but I disable it for websites I visit frequently, and I ALWAYS disable it when I watch a video, because it's only fair they get the money they earned

 

Maybe I was wrong, the critic said that some countries like Canada have no ads. But maybe he was wrong and/or it's only certain parts of the country. I live in the U.S. so I don't know what happens in Canada and ads, tbh.

I will always support a website for making videos. I actually go out of my way and try to find the best way to give them the most money via ads. I.E: Their website, or actually Youtube if you have a paying account with them apparently.

 

I use adblock, but my laptop died on me a few months ago, Now I browse with my PS3 and I have to click skip on youtube. Btw, do they gain money if we click skip ? I hope they do : once I' ve seen the advertiser' s name the job is done, whether I bother sitting through the rest or not. If they didn' t manage to catch my interest in those 5 first seconds it' s their fault, no one else' s.

Back when I installed adblock I had no idea youtubers could actually gain money from ads, and since I never ever click on any ad I suppose whether I can see them or not doesn' t make any difference. I just grew tired of those obnoxious popups. I' m willing to pay for good content, but I won' t sit through crap if I can avoid it. Sue me.

This ad system is just too flawed. For starters the guy who uploaded a content isn' t necessarily its creator, Also, those ad revenues usually aren' t enough to make a decent living, not even close. I mean who really gets da big money in this picture, even if you do watch the ads ? Basically Google, Youtube, and providers, those who provide content access. The guys who actually create that content have to fight to get the few crumbles they left.

Our politicians speak of creating an internet and/or computer tax, but how the hell would you share that cake ? It would be a nightmare to decide fairly who gets how much.

For now I think you only have three options : become big enough to earn decent ad revenues, or make a name for yourself and then either get hired as a professional or start providing paying content. But then it' s not that different from any other artistic or journalistic endeavour now, is it ? Millions of wannabes and couldbes for a handfull of actuallyares. That industry has always been a game of musical chairs won by sharks or out of sheer luck, just because the internet now gives anyone and everyone its chance doesn' t mean that rule suddenly ceased to apply.

 

For more information on this debate from the side of a website can be found here. It's an interesting read - http://www.destructoid.com/half-of-destructoid-s-readers-block-our-ads-now-what--247904.phtml

Personally I don't have an issue with ads in general. There could be bias on my side since I'm in the marketing field, but even before then it never really bothered me all that much. In the past yes it did bother me. But even though there are mores ads these days, they are far from annoying as they used to be. Advertisers are getting better at making them less obvious and better adapting them to the look of websites. Because of people's inability to handle a very very slight annoyance they are impacting the lives of the very sites they love to visit. The value of PPC is already declining and ad-blocker is only making this process faster.

Digital Marketing is changing, with ad-blockers and consumers becoming more savvy, we need to find a new way to gain revenue from the internet as the current method just isn't working. The issue now is, people don't know what to do to replace it.

I get it, it's within your right to use ad-blockers but you must understand that by doing do they are damaging the lives of the sites you block. I think this quote from a Destructoid employee says it best.

"I honestly think people don't realise that by eliminating what is a mild annoyance from their lives, they put ours in jeopardy"

 

Actually, I know several critics who make a living off of this. If they went and found a real job, they would not be able to post the videos that people want as often or at all.

The whole TGWTG crew is mostly supported by their revenue from the ads. The critic who spoke up about the ads does this for a living and said honestly it pays his rent. It's the same of a group of people who recently LOST their ad revenue from Youtube and was telling people they might have to close the show if they didn't manage to find another way to raise money via Blip and their website.

There's others who are starting out who are doing this as a side thing but are hoping if they get enough support and money it'll become their living. I do agree with you, there are pirates who take the videos made by others and post them to get money. Hell, when this site started we had a shitload of problems with that before we made a logo in the corner of all our vids. I don't know if we do that anymore, though. It was hair-pulling for the owner and he was getting massively pissed about it.

I do have to agree with your article, DA... They want everything for free and to be easy. When it's not, they say you're bitching and begging for money despite the fact you sit down and watch every one of our videos. It's pretty sad.

 

It might be easier when you target an English speaking audience and/or create content that takes little time to do (me and my webcam), but I had le Joueur du Grenier in mind (the French AVGN, he had a few Nostalgia Critic cameos in his latest vids). He said repeatedly that, as popular as he is, what he earns on youtube isn' t even close to minimum wage paychecks.

As for what DA said, I forgot to mention that skipping ads is not exactly something people didn' t do before adblock. I was already barely giving them a glance in magazines and peeing or zapping during TV commercials. Surely I wasn' t the only one. Adblock just made me more efficient at skipping ads I wasn' t actively looking for, what really changed is that now they can see if I skipped them or not. As DA said, it' s up to advertisers to up their game.

 

I think they still get the money if it's skipped. Even if you don't, you can just let the ad play, mute it and go check your e-mails or something. Even the critic said that in his own video, he'll still get paid for it.

No that you mention it Patman, there is only one or two french people on the site. Benzai being one of them, and I have a feeling he lives off it, but it might be he lives in the U.S. now and can. Maybe in the U.S. they get a better cut or something.I do know they do use effects in some of the series, one I constantly watch for the story always has extras and guests coming on along with special effects. So maybe they get paid more or something else.

I think the Adblock thing is mainly because people want the choice or don't want to sit through a 60 second ad. Though it's funny they want to sit through 90 seconds of silence instead of a 60 second ad instead.

 

I think you may be confused by what a "whitelist" is. It generally is when you have an adblocker that can specify what you are willing to watch with ads. Like, say you go on littlevideomakerfriend.com, and they are a blogger or something, and you want them to get supported, you add them to your "whitelist" and it makes adds appear on the whitelisted site.

And that is what I generally use when I want to support someone. In cases such as youtube, even with adblocker, the view count goes up and makes it easier for people to find that video and they get ads and whatnot. I go on a lot of websites that have advertisements that like to refresh themselves and start singing when I am in the middle of watching something, and that is why I originally got it.

But in my honest opinion, if your life depends on the check you get due to ad revenue, that person is screwed and I would encourage them to find profit in another form... or get an offline job.


edit added: encouraging people to mute the audio on an ad and check their emails instead of watching the ads is considered ad fraud and Critic can get seriously in trouble for encouraging it.

edit two: read you sentence wrong, thought you said that countries without ads were called Whitelist. Whoops... sorry.

 

Maybe it was the comments who did that. It's been a while since I saw it so might have gotten mixed up. I wouldn't blame the critic since it might've been my fault.

People do say that, but then say: "Why do you take so long making videos? Why are you no longer making videos?" These videos take time, I know one critic who makes a series in his spare time of basically once a year because it takes him so long to do it, another group of critics are doing the same with another set of videos. If they cut back on what they do to make the videos to please their fans and have a job, it will lose the appeal of a lot of fans who watch it. One of my favorite critics I mainly watch for his fantastic storylines. He doesn't do it often, but when he does, it's well written and a pleasure to watch. If he found a job and tried to make videos, he wouldn't have time to do half the stuff he does in his videos.

If you take the example of the three critics. Their whole humor is mostly based on what happens AROUND them. They are doing it in a cartoon setting with a lot of cartoon humor thrown in. That takes a lot of time to draw all those scenes since their reviews can run 45 minutes or longer. Not including them collaborating together and writing out these stories, jokes and ideas. If they had a job, they couldn't do 90% of the stuff they're doing in the videos.

People love this entertainment. If they didn't, these videos wouldn't have survived as long. You wouldn't have people going into this business. Them asking for money is so they can sit down every week/month/year and make it for people to enjoy it. They take that money and ensure it continues without problems on a good schedule, if they had a job, they could do none of that and then people would STILL be complaining about why the videos now suck and/or are taking so much longer because they were too cheap/thought they were too lazy to find a "real" job.