Thursday, October 1, 2015

A New Threat to AdBlockers

            Within the past year, a new company called SourcePoint has formed and they are currently combating against adblockers.  They claimed to have done business with over 100 companies to slip their ads past the popular ad blocking soft wares that more and more people are beginning to use. 
            Although adblocking may not seem like a huge issue, according to a former Google executive, Google lost about $6.6 billion dollars in revenue last year from adblockers alone.  This goes to show that online advertising is very important for modern companies to stay afloat, as they will pay a very large amount for it.  Another important aspect is how prevalent adblockers are becoming.  They are easy to install and easy to use.  This means nearly any computer user has the ability to block ads, in a time where online advertising is trying to grow.  Although this new technology is helping to push ads past adblockers, there are still some issues such as tracking functionality, because the process involves cloaking ads to allow them past the adblocker.  This can potentially make it more difficult for a company to pay a high amount for an advertisement, because some functionality is lost.

            In my opinion, SourcePoint seems very much like a double-edged sword- it may help advertisers and businesses stay afloat, but at the cost of upsetting Internet users.  SourcePoint is already slipping ads past the most widely used adblocker, but this raises the question- Will new adblockers be designed specifically to combat SourcePoint?  Adblockers are even available on the newly released iOS 9, so the demand for adblockers is definitely there, but the technology to slip ads past adblockers is still a relatively new market.  Will this market be able to grow enough that SourcePoint could possibly bring in competitors to the market?  Lastly, the biggest question that this article left unanswered for me was- Do people really react to these advertisements?  To me, it makes sense that if a user is specifically blocking ads; they don't want to see them and will react negatively to them if they are there.  Just scrolling through the comments of this topic on Business Insider and BuzzFeed, nearly every user said they would not want to see ads and would either use a different browser or use a different website if ads came past their adblocker.  It’s tough to say whether or not there is a bright future ahead for SourcePoint, but as adblocker use increases, new methods of online advertising are becoming increasingly relevant.

Main Source: 
http://www.businessinsider.com/former-google-exec-launches-sourcepoint-with-10-million-series-a-funding-2015-6

Secondary Sources: 
http://www.buzzfeed.com/alexkantrowitz/the-technology-solution-to-ad-blocking-nobodys-talking-about#.fiv0Y0XNVB
http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/sep/17/adblockers-ios-9-app-charts-peace


2 comments:

  1. I think you hit the nail right on the head when you said online advertising was a double-edged sword. As a consumer you feel like you should never have to watch another ad again, but at the same time online ads are the life blood of tech companies; if we, as consumers, want to keep using these amazingly innovative websites and search engines then we may have to endure at least some ads. At the same time, however, the Internet was just recently ruled to be a human right, how can someone or some corporate entity be allowed to make money off something we are born with the right to use freely? We use the Internet to become increasingly connected with each other, its wrong to think that some company can push our rights to the side, and say, "profits come first".

    ReplyDelete
  2. I think you hit the nail right on the head when you said online advertising was a double-edged sword. As a consumer you feel like you should never have to watch another ad again, but at the same time online ads are the life blood of tech companies; if we, as consumers, want to keep using these amazingly innovative websites and search engines then we may have to endure at least some ads. At the same time, however, the Internet was just recently ruled to be a human right, how can someone or some corporate entity be allowed to make money off something we are born with the right to use freely? We use the Internet to become increasingly connected with each other, its wrong to think that some company can push our rights to the side, and say, "profits come first".

    ReplyDelete

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