As with most things in life, ad blocking is… complicated. Reductionism comes off as smug and entitled. The truth is, most people on earth benefit in some way from the current morass of annoying ads, privacy invasion, and other crap. Anyone who uses Facebook to connect with family and friends is able to do so for free because of ads and privacy invasion. And even sites that boast about memberships, native ads, and premium ad networks benefit from products and services that worsen or at least maintain the status quo.
When things are grey, we all have to draw our own line in the sand and justify it to ourselves. Explaining where you drew your line, and why, moves the conversation forward. Insulting the intelligence of people who came to different conclusions is not only counter-productive, but shows a lack of self-awareness that one’s own line is merely a lighter or darker shade of grey.
My Mirror app shows ads (iAds even) for apps like Game of War that I think psychologically manipulate people into spending money they can’t (or shouldn’t) afford. I agonize over whether or not to pull ads completely, block certain ads, or find some other solution. But in the mean time that app helps me provide for my family and have the freedom to pursue other things that I think are more beneficial to society. If I ever do decide to pull those ads, I’m certainly not going to smugly insinuate that I’ve taken the moral high ground and that other developers should follow my lead.
Because even if I do remove ads, my comfortable middle class existence is still dependent on hundreds of thousands of low-wage workers in China building iPhones for entitled knowledge workers (like myself) all over the world. And on thousands of migrant workers who harvest the fruits and vegetables I eat. And on the guy who drives by my house every week to pick up the mountains of garbage I create.
Anyhow, I’m off to build myself a hut in a remote forest where I can live happily ever after at peace with my integrity. But I won’t be able to tweet and blog about it.