An honest discussion about ads and blockers

A bit of background information

Like most sites on the web today, we provide access to all our content for free. None of the Softpedia sections is restricted and there are no costs whatsoever for browsing them. You don't even have to register, since an account is only required if you want to use the download basket or watchlist features.

While a very small number of web publications have tested subscription-based access (read: paywall) with varying degrees of success, the vast majority of the Internet is still free to access and, frankly, we've grown to consider it the norm ourselves and would rather have things stay that way.

What ads are good for

Still, if you stop and think about it for a minute, there has to be a catch, right? All these sites, especially large ones, have bills and staff to pay just like any other company out there. And with increased popularity, server, bandwidth and associated service costs go up as well.

The easiest way for sites to generate the income needed to cover those expenses is advertising, which is why the ad-based business model is so prevalent on the web. The problem with that is some types of ads tend to be annoying (remember popups?), while others are simply nerve-wracking and can even slow down or downright crash your browser (yes, interstitials, flyouts and autoplaying videos with sound, I'm looking at you).

Kill it, kill it with fire!

Naturally, the first reaction to intrusive ads is "how do I get rid of this?". And there's really no shortage of solutions for making that happen, regardless of the web browser being used. There are several add-ons that, once installed, will remove or hide advertisements of all types in all web pages you visit.

This often results in an improved browsing experience and we know this first-hand since, why hide it, we've resorted to ad blockers from time to time ourselves. But that's also a problem: since most of these add-ons will block all ads by default, many sites will be affected even though they don't display intrusive ads, sometimes to the point of having to close down.

One way of dealing with that would be browsing with the ad-blocking add-on turned off and enabling it when it's needed the most. While this is the method we've chosen, we do understand it's not very practical, especially if you do a lot of web browsing every day.

The silver lining

All ad-blocking add-ons have something that is essentially the opposite of a blacklist (hence the name: whitelist). This feature puts you in control of which sites can or can't show you ads. So, for example, if you run across a site that you feel is a great resource, you could add it to your whitelist. It only takes a couple of clicks and it's the easiest way to support the sites you love.

If you're still reading, you probably know where this is headed, so here it goes: we're Internet users just like yourself and this is why there aren't any intrusive ads on Softpedia. That's right, no popups, no interstitials, no video ads that start automatically, no overlayers, no pop-out in-text links, nothing of that sort. Just regular run-of-the-mill banners.

So that being said, if you got help from one of our articles or reviews, found a great app or if you just think our site is useful in general, we'd like to respectfully ask you to consider adding us to your whitelist. It will only take a moment (we'll even tell you how to do it, see below) but it would mean a lot to us and ensure we are able to continue to work every day to keep the site updated and add all sorts of cool new stuff.

Finally, if you want to discuss this or any other topic, feel free to use the feedback button on the right side of the page.

Adblock Plus on Google Chrome

Adblock Edge on Firefox

Adblock on Opera