Why It's OK to Block Ads (2015)
7 days ago
- #digital-ethics
- #attention-economy
- #ad-blocking
- Ad blocking has sparked ethical debates, with critics arguing it harms the internet's economic model, while supporters claim it forces ads to improve and protects user privacy.
- The attention economy exploits human attention as a scarce resource, with billions spent to influence what we see, buy, and care about, often at the expense of our personal goals.
- Digital design ethics have focused on information management (privacy, surveillance) but largely ignored how technologies manipulate attention, necessitating new ethical frameworks.
- Ad blockers are one of the few tools users have to resist the attention economy's exploitative design logic, potentially driving a shift toward more user-respectful products.
- The debate over ad blocking's ethics overlooks the deeper issue of whether the attention economy itself is ethical, suggesting the burden of proof should be on advertisers to justify intrusions.