Solution1 - 8:39 am on Mar 14, 2010 (gmt 0)

Some seem to believe that visitors have a moral obligation to view (and not block) advertising on websites.

Visitors, as a matter of fact, do not have such an obligation, as there is no agreement whatsoever that they have to. There is no contract of whatever form, nor a law, that puts visitors in such a position.

That a webmaster puts ads next to what the visitor actually comes for, is a matter of having the power to do that, and the visitor being powerless to do something about it. I can fully understand that a webmaster hates it when visitors happen to not actually be powerless to do something about disrespectful advertising, especially if the webmaster feels powerless to stop them from that.

But this power issue has nothing to do with ethics or morality. Morality is only drawn into the picture to try and restore the webmaster's sense of power.