Stuart Elliott: Ad Blocking? More Like Ad Blockheads

Oh that39s not what you thought I39d be writing about Well isn39t it awful that it took this long for New York City to consider replacing Taxi TV which bothers so many passengers because the adblocking buttons usually don39t workOkay I know I39m supposed to address the fracas over adblocking software that has grown intense enough lately to generate nicknames such as Adblockalypse and Blocktober What sent the issue into orbit was Apple39s recent approval of ad blocking apps for its iOS 9 operating system by now it ought to be a given that anything Apple does sets off a media feeding frenzyStill Apple ought to be thanked for however inadvertently turning ad blocking into Topic A on Madison Avenue and finally getting marketers agencies adtech firms and the rest of the digital ecosystem to confront an ugly truth Ad blocking indeed may be heinous quota potentially existential threatquot and quotrobbery pure and simplequot as described by Randall Rothenberg of the IAB jeopardizing the ability of publishers to pay for worthwhile editorial content but that39s not the worst of itThe reality few wanted to acknowledge until now is that ad blocking is a symptom of the disregard disdain and even contempt for consumers among phalanxes of advertising marketing and tech executives Their greed has flooded the web and devices with unnecessary ugly and obnoxious ads that play automatically at high volume slow loading times for pages drain batteries and interfere with reading the content that brought consumers online in the first placeThe user experience has been reduced to a cross between bathing in a cesspool and diving into a dumpster It39s another example of how Madison Avenue can39t resist taking a hatchet to the goose that lays the golden eggs akin to how overstuffing pods with spots and promos has alienated TV viewers and turned expensive commercial time into a waste of moneyTo be sure consumers always have sought methods to avoid ads John O39Toole a leader of Foote Cone ampamp Belding and the Four As once cautioned that quotit39s best to think of yourself as an uninvited guest in the living room of a prospect who has the magical power to make you disappear instantlyquotYou could make a case that ad blocking is a highertech version of leaving for a snack when a commercial appears on TV switching radio stations when an announcer begins a pitch skipping an ad page in a magazine tearing up a piece of direct mail or trying to find the right button to turn off a Taxi TV screen Maybe it39s not unlike changing channels with a remote when a commercial comes on or using a DVR to zip through spotsThe difference is that while consumers expect interruptive ads with traditional media they fervently hoped that hucksters on the Internet computers and mobile devices would be less intrusive annoying and irrelevant Their attitude brings to mind a book about the Doonesbury characters during the Vietnam era quotBut This War Had Such PromisequotWhen consumers compare the promise they anticipated with what they get they39re angry especially when taking into account what they pay for Internet service and cellphone plans That39s especially true I believe for the older folks who are quotdigital immigrantsquot and have less patience than their younger counterparts for spinning circles or messages about longrunning scriptsAnd just imagine if when you turn on a TV set you had to wait for a commercial to load and play before you could watch the channel you wantAll those consumers who are in the quotNetworkquot mode mad as hell and not going to take it anymore are finally being heard quotWe must swallow our pride and recognize that ad blocking represents consumer outragequot Bob Liodice head of the ANA said Oct 15 during its annual conferenceAnd two weeks after calling ad blocking quothighway robberyquot Scott Cunningham of the IAB waved a white flag in the form of a succinct mea culpa quotWe messed upquot he confessed twice and quotlost track of the user experiencequotLooking back nowquot Cunningham conceded quotour scraping of dimes may have cost us dollars in consumer loyaltyquot He outlined new guidelines for ads that would be among other changes quotlightquot and quotnoninvasivequot but they39re only alternatives to existing IAB rules not replacementsIn other words to quote an old joke they39re suggestions not commandments Holy Moses More must be done and soon before the aggrieved minority that uses ad blockers becomes an even noisier majorityThe opinions and points of view expressed in this commentary are exclusively the views of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of MediaVillageMyersBizNet management or associated bloggersamp160

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Stuart Elliott: Ad Blocking? More Like Ad Blockheads

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FEMA and the Ad Council Encourage AANHPI Communities to Enhance Disaster Preparedness in New PSAs - Ad Council InSites

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