Perhaps, the height of irony; Adblock Plus, the software you use when you do not want to see ads on sites you visit, now wants to serve you ads. The move is part of a newly launched service by Adblock that will serve users only the ‘acceptable ads.’
What falls under the definition of ‘acceptable ads’ is anything that is not a bad ad; not too big, too shouting, quite ugly, and not too intrusive. These ‘acceptable ads,’ according to Adblock Plus definition will be good ads, small ads, subtle ads, and ideally, not annoying ads.
Adblock Plus will now be serving you ‘acceptable ads’ through a newly launched service dubbed the Ad Marketplace. The new service will enable blogs and others sites to pick out ads that meet the definition of ‘acceptable ads’ and have them placed on their pages. Users using Adblock Plus will be able to view these ‘acceptable ads’ while visiting such sites and blogs.
“It allows you to treat the two different ecosystems completely differently and monetize each one. And crucially, monetize the ad blocker on their own terms,” said Ben Williams, the Operations and Communications Director at Adblock Plus.
Marketplace is actually an extension of the Acceptable Ads program the company has been running from as early as 2011. As it works out, Adblock Plus works with site owners to whitelist ‘acceptable ads’ that will show up on the sites even when visitors have turned on the blocker.
Related: Opera Becomes The First Popular Browser To Natively Integrate Ad-Blocker
However, the Acceptable Ads program has been relatively limited in scope. Mainly because it requires site owners, ad networks, and publishers to work in close collaboration with Adblock Plus in selecting the ‘acceptable ads.’ In addition to them paying Adblock Plus to serve the identified acceptable ads on their sites. Obviously, that is a time-consuming process and additional overheads for many ad networks, publishers, and site owners.
The announcement of Adblock Plus starting to serve ads was not well received by Google and AppNexus, which have both pulled their support for the software. Google made a press statement expressing its intentions to terminate its relationship with ComboTag; a company that works with Eyeo Gmbh – the parent company to software.
