Some sites hate ad-blockers...

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  • VHS quality is alright I guess compared to DVD, but ultimately, I'd rather use it than DVD. DVDs are extremely annoying with the logos, setup, menu, unskippable ads, etc. Not to mention the amount of times the disc just randomly starts to fuck up and will start skipping for like 5 minutes non-stop. If any of you watch(ed) AVGN, you may have seen his video about them. At least digital video through iTunes is pretty good, as there's no bullshit, and the video quality is better plus weighs less (and the compression is actually not bad). Like a DVD allows 480i/576i output on movies weighing sometimes the full 4.7 GB, while digital usually gives you 1080p and the file weighs 2 GB max (and often lower-quality video is also available for cheaper and weighs less).

    I probably should actually find and get a VCR one day.
  • I have seen that video before and he does have a lot of valid points... but I solve most of those by just ripping the DVD or Blu-ray.

    VHS? DVD? Blu-ray? Fuck all that physical media. It's 2016... I don't want to get up and grab a movie off a shelf... open it... stick it into a player of some sort... change inputs on my TV... fuck that. I want to click on a file, have the movie load instantly and not have to deal with menus or physical media that degrades over time or can be destroyed by a faulty player.

    The only disadvantage, of course, is the ever increasing amount of hard drive storage needed to maintain my library of media... but it's still better than dealing with a VCR eating my only copy of a movie I loved.
  • BlueSun wrote:
    I have seen that video before and he does have a lot of valid points... but I solve most of those by just ripping the DVD or Blu-ray.

    VHS? DVD? Blu-ray? Fuck all that physical media. It's 2016... I don't want to get up and grab a movie off a shelf... open it... stick it into a player of some sort... change inputs on my TV... fuck that. I want to click on a file, have the movie load instantly and not have to deal with menus or physical media that degrades over time or can be destroyed by a faulty player.

    The only disadvantage, of course, is the ever increasing amount of hard drive storage needed to maintain my library of media... but it's still better than dealing with a VCR eating my only copy of a movie I loved.

    I still got a magnavox combo player (for VHS dubbing) but I mainly use a sony Trinitron TV/VCR from 1994 as my main source for watching films. I have only had 1 portable VCR eat tapes but that was due to the Idler wheel. But what would happen if you got a file encrypting ransomware or the Hard drive killed itself? You'd lose all of those films, and sometimes physical media is alright depending on what the player is and how old the media is and how old the player is. AFAIK, I think it's a lose/win or lose/lose if your drive died.
  • If you're putting all your eggs in one basket (especially ones unreliable like cheap flash media or mechanical disks) you're crazy. I back up anything I can't easily replace, and I put my stuff on networked storage. (I don't have redundancy set up though.)
  • Any sane person has scheduled regular backups for their computer data. That way you don't have to worry about data loss.

    Hell, even I think that my backup setup for my computer is bad, it's been a while since I had the hard drive on me to backup my data, and I don't have secondary backup for my projects and work, which I really should have because they mean a lot to me. I should probably get one, but jesus, I don't really have much money and usually the cheapest ones start at $100.
  • But what would happen if you got a file encrypting ransomware or the Hard drive killed itself?

    I'd restore the files from backup. I've been bitten by data loss in the past and I do my best to make sure it doesn't happen again.

    All of my movies and TV shows currently have two backups... I backup regularly to a backup file server that is only powered on when the backup job runs. I then have a secondary backup to an external hard drive which is backed up less frequently. Both the file server and backup server are running RAID6. Well, the file server is actually RAID-Z2... but essentially the same idea... I can lose two physical disks per server. I have cold spares for both on standby.

    Really, really, really important files are stored on my desktop. The data drive is automatically backed up to a secondary drive in my desktop. I also back up to my file server, which is backed up to the backup server as mentioned above. The super important files are also replicated to my NUC, my laptop (full disk encrypted), my work machine (full disk encrypted) and to my VPS in Canada (also full disk encrypted), in addition to the backups I already mentioned.

    I plan to take things a step further in the future with regularly scheduled offsite replication to a NAS stored at a family members house. But I haven't got around to it yet. The external drive for the video files won't last long... it's going to run out of space eventually. But even if it fills up and I lose both my file server and backup server, I'll at least have something to start with.

    And actually, now that I think about it, I have another archived backup of my videos on another external drive.

    A lot of people don't bother backing up their media files (well, actually, a lot of people don't backup at all..) and they usually give the argument, "well, I can just download it again" but that never sat well with me. I mean, yeah, sure, I could probably re-download a lot of it, but there's a lot of stuff I have that's really hard to find or next to impossible to replace (VHS rips of old home movies that are nothing short of a miracle I was able to get digitalized in the first place). It would take years to rebuild my collection and I don't fancy starting from square one.
  • I'm in the boat of, I don't do back-ups since it's too damn expensive.
  • Ah, I haven't made many back ups of my files on my main system, despite the fact I have 2 SATA drives, I should probably do so... oops. It probably wouldn't help that I don't have another working system that uses the SATA interface, since most PCs I have are IDE.
  • Back in the day when the newest computer I had access to was a Dell 2350 with a P4 and I didn't have very many files, I used to back up to a CD-RW.

    These days, there's so many different ways to do backups that it's just silly not to. Dropbox and the like have free accounts and if your files are small enough, you can use those to provide a backup.

    You could set up a glusterfs cluster on an army of vintage computers and have replicated storage.

    Also, there's services like Backblaze. Only $50 a year for unlimited storage of one computer.
  • BlueSun wrote:
    Back in the day when the newest computer I had access to was a Dell 2350 with a P4 and I didn't have very many files, I used to back up to a CD-RW.

    These days, there's so many different ways to do backups that it's just silly not to. Dropbox and the like have free accounts and if your files are small enough, you can use those to provide a backup.

    I don't want my files in the cloud.
    BlueSun wrote:
    You could set up a glusterfs cluster on an army of vintage computers and have replicated storage.

    Not everybody has an army of vintage computers, I certainly couldn't afford one.
    BlueSun wrote:
    Also, there's services like Backblaze. Only $50 a year for unlimited storage of one computer.

    If you can spend the $50 in the first place, then why not just get a 1TB WD Blue drive instead?
  • dosbox wrote:
    BlueSun wrote:
    Also, there's services like Backblaze. Only $50 a year for unlimited storage of one computer.

    If you can spend the $50 in the first place, then why not just get a 1TB WD Blue drive instead?

    Because it doesn't scale well. Especially once you start backing up media.
  • BlueSun wrote:
    dosbox wrote:
    BlueSun wrote:
    Also, there's services like Backblaze. Only $50 a year for unlimited storage of one computer.

    If you can spend the $50 in the first place, then why not just get a 1TB WD Blue drive instead?

    Because it doesn't scale well. Especially once you start backing up media.

    If you're like me and have a 500GB drive, then I don't see how "scaling" would be an issue for backing up to a 1TB drive.
  • dosbox wrote:
    BlueSun wrote:
    dosbox wrote:
    BlueSun wrote:
    Also, there's services like Backblaze. Only $50 a year for unlimited storage of one computer.

    If you can spend the $50 in the first place, then why not just get a 1TB WD Blue drive instead?

    Because it doesn't scale well. Especially once you start backing up media.

    If you're like me and have a 500GB drive, then I don't see how "scaling" would be an issue for backing up to a 1TB drive.

    Yes, it's fine... until you upgrade that 500 GB drive...

    I was you a few years ago. Had a 250 GB data drive and a 250 GB external to back it up. Then I upgraded to a 1 TB internal drive and a 1 TB external... then a 2 TB internal and a 2 TB external... then 2 x 2 TB internals and 2 x 2 TB externals... then I upgraded to a file server with ~10 TB usable storage and a backup NAS with about 10 TB usable storage... now I'm at 17 TB usable on the file server with a 24 TB backup server.

    External drives couldn't keep up with me at the time. Of course now I can get a 6 TB external easily and even a 10 TB external. But regardless you're still limited by the capacity of a single drive. That's why I say it doesn't scale.

    Yes, there are external drives with multiple bays but at that point you really ought to just build a NAS.
  • Uhm, I think we've gone way out of subject... time to get back on topic with one thing that I really want to know...

    Why do sites complain about ad-blockers? And why do they want you to turn it off? The reasons for that haven't been said here yet and I really want to know.
  • Bry89 wrote:
    Uhm, I think we've gone way out of subject... time to get back on topic with one thing that I really want to know...

    Why do sites complain about ad-blockers? And why do they want you to turn it off? The reasons for that haven't been said here yet and I really want to know.


    The answer to those questions lies in just it simply being greed/self-entitlement
  • Bry89 wrote:
    Uhm, I think we've gone way out of subject... time to get back on topic with one thing that I really want to know...

    Why do sites complain about ad-blockers? And why do they want you to turn it off? The reasons for that haven't been said here yet and I really want to know.
    Simple. They are so money-hungry that they HAVE to ask you to remove the ads otherwise they can't get the extra pennies. Most websites I've seen who've either intruded my experience by using a pop-up to tell me that I should probably disable my adblocker so they can have the extra money, and some go as far as to prevent me from entering. An (occasionally) successful business decision since disabling my adblocker for this website is easy, but often I feel that it's not worth supporting such practices.

    Ultimately, the websites where I will disable my adblocker and maybe even purchase an ad-free membership for like a dollar are the ones that are self-run, with no major income, and who provide with a good service without straight-up annoying me into disabling my adblocker.
  • Bry89 wrote:
    Uhm, I think we've gone way out of subject... time to get back on topic with one thing that I really want to know...

    Why do sites complain about ad-blockers? And why do they want you to turn it off? The reasons for that haven't been said here yet and I really want to know.

    I thought the answers were obvious.

    They complain about it because they earn less ad revenue. They want you to turn it off so they can earn more ad revenue.

    Now why is that important? Because it's one of the many ways sites earn money. Why do they need money? Because they're a business. They need to pay for hosting costs and staff to run the website, plus all of the other business expenses. At the end of the day, many of these sites are for-profit businesses and blocking ads hurts their bottom line. It's not necessarily about greed.

    Now any smart business will diversify their revenue streams so that they can afford to take a pay cut from the ad revenue and still be able to run the business effectively. Depending on the site / business this may be easier said than done, so they get desperate and start begging you to turn off adblockers.

    Sites that outright prevent access when you have adblocks running is just plain stupid. It's bad press and it results in less traffic given the popularity of adblockers (Well, actually, that's the real question here... Does it really result in less traffic as people get pissed off and leave? Or do people actually just disable the adblocker because they still want to view the site? It might be effective, which drives more sites to adopt this practice. I'd need more data to know for sure). Traffic is an important metric that you can use when you sell ad space on your site.

    It's much better when it's a small, unobtrusive notice and doesn't impact the usability of the site. Of course it's best when they do nothing at all, but I think a nice compromise are the sites that show the adblocker notice in a small unobtrusive way but also offer a donate button so you can support them directly.
  • BlueSun wrote:
    At the end of the day, many of these sites are for-profit businesses and blocking ads hurts their bottom line. It's not necessarily about greed.
    Maybe the people really care about revenue in order to support and keep their site alive but, why should I care about? If one day a site shuts down because of lack of revenue done by ad-blockers, then that's their problem. However, I am for the "Donate" option should people want to dispense their care for said site. Don't know if there's actually any sites that beg for revenue in the name of greed. That said, I'm surprised Microsoft hasn't done this tactic yet...

    EDIT: Just came across a site myself that has now disallowed me from entering because of my ad-blocker... Thesaurus.com. I've been using this site for years and I can't believe that's now next in line. No matter what you say, site owner, I'm still not turning it off. Plus, why should I care about petty wee offers anyway? This has gone beyond stupid and I now think this is all for the sake of the "modern web". If more and more sites end up like this, then this is the last straw.
  • Bry89 wrote:
    EDIT: Just came across a site myself that has now disallowed me from entering because of my ad-blocker... Thesaurus.com. I've been using this site for years and I can't believe that's now next in line. No matter what you say, site owner, I'm still not turning it off. Plus, why should I care about petty wee offers anyway? This has gone beyond stupid and I now think this is all for the sake of the "modern web". If more and more sites end up like this, then this is the last straw.


    I just attempted to go to the site now and it loads fine for me even though I'm blocking ads.
  • Well for me, it loaded fine until seconds later I am redirected to the "Why am I seeing ads?" page. Unless you have something else that made it load up perfectly.
  • Bry89 wrote:
    Well for me, it loaded fine until seconds later I am redirected to the "Why am I seeing ads?" page. Unless you have something else that made it load up perfectly.

    I'm using Ublock Origin, and I'm also running the Anti-adblock killer script.
  • Can confirm it's working fine for me as well. I'm not running any anti-adblock killer script... just uBlock origin.
  • Looks like I better get one of these then... as I've always had AdBlock Plus for years. Not sure about replacing it with uBlock Origin, or just append the Anti-AdBlock Killer script to what I've got. However, I am aware that it's not the universal solution to all sites and their dirty schemes.

    EDIT: I have added it but upon entering the aforementioned site and, the same issue happens. I forgot to mention: the ad-block message only appears seconds after you perform a word look-up on it, not when you just enter its home page. Sorry about that.
  • Bry89 wrote:
    Looks like I better get one of these then... as I've always had AdBlock Plus for years. Not sure about replacing it with uBlock Origin, or just append the Anti-AdBlock Killer script to what I've got. However, I am aware that it's not the universal solution to all sites and their dirty schemes.

    EDIT: I have added it but upon entering the aforementioned site and, the same issue happens. I forgot to mention: the ad-block message only appears seconds after you perform a word look-up on it, not when you just enter its home page. Sorry about that.

    Yeah, still not doing it for me.
  • Well, I've revisited the site myself and performed another look-up, and now it's normal for me now. Don't know what just happened there... maybe the AaK List worked at last?
  • I often have to use citation machine for college, and it allows me to make 1 ad-free citation before locking me out until I disable my ad-blocker. Then again, most of the adademic ads aren't intrusive so I don't mind it all that much.
  • So, as it's been a month since I had the AaK List, things have been fine until when going back to that same site I mentioned before, it seems that its people are trying to bypass its filters, giving me ads again. When I manually blocked them, I see that damned "ad-blocker page", AGAIN. I've been using that site for years and now, my faith in it has lost. This can't go on... and if I see any more sites doing the same thing, I swear, I will limit my Internet usage much less to the point it could come to nothing and to be fair, I don't want that. I just can't believe this is happening... all for the sake of the "modern web", eh?
  • Bry89 wrote:
    So, as it's been a month since I had the AaK List, things have been fine until when going back to that same site I mentioned before, it seems that its people are trying to bypass its filters, giving me ads again. When I manually blocked them, I see that damned "ad-blocker page", AGAIN. I've been using that site for years and now, my faith in it has lost. This can't go on... and if I see any more sites doing the same thing, I swear, I will limit my Internet usage much less to the point it could come to nothing and to be fair, I don't want that. I just can't believe this is happening... all for the sake of the "modern web", eh?

    It has nothing to do with the "modern web" and everything to do with the fact that servers and bandwidth are not free and many of these sites are run by companies that need to pay employees to maintain the site... not to mention other operating expenses and yes, profit as well.
  • Still if a site has nothing better to do than advertise at you, it is a sure sign that site/company is going to be gone soon anyway. Seen it so many times it is not funny.

    Plus, a site that is so hell-bent on making sure you see their ads probably won't think twice when they decide to make a few more bucks and serve up malware.
  • I have found that adding sites to a "restricted sites" list in Internet Explorer will usually cause those ads (from those specific sites) to not display. If you are using Internet Explorer, you could try that. Other browsers might have similar features.
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