Forum Moderators: martinibuster
It also displays its own content-targeted text ads.
[edited by: Jenstar at 8:58 am (utc) on Jan. 9, 2004]
[edit reason] language [/edit]
But if someone is replacing ads on our pages with their own, they're even worse PARASITES than the scum who spawn popup windows on other people's sites.
It kills Adsense banners, nothing appears there at all. On my sites it produces an empty div, which looks really dumb when there's a border around it since it's all squished together.
It's not replacing, per se. Their ads run in a strip under the tool bar.
Wonder if they got their idea from the Opera Browser. [webmasterworld.com]
Place it in front of anything else in your web-page.
<?
if (strstr(getenv("HTTP_USER_AGENT"),"Netcaptor")) {
echo "<HTML><HEAD><TITLE>Browser blocked</TITLE><META NAME='ROBOTS' CONTENT='NOARCHIVE'></HEAD><BODY BGCOLOR=white><P><font face='Verdana' size=4 color='#000066'><B>Browser blocked</b></font></p><P><font face='Verdana' size='2' color='#000066'>Sorry. This website blocks Netcaptor, because it blocks the ads that we use to pay for this service.<BR><BR>Please use an alternative browser, like <a href='http://www.mozilla.org'>Mozilla Firebird</a>, which offers the same functionality as Netcaptor, but without stopping us having the chance of paying for your visit.</font></p></BODY></HTML>";
die;
}
?>
NetCaptor 6.5 final allows you to turn off the NetCaptor user agent identification value by adding a string to the registry.
"...Because of NetCaptor's popularity, and because it can block PopupWindows, images, and ads by URL (in registered mode), some sites are blocking access to the NetCaptor browser...."
Look over NetCaptor's site for their permanent recommended solution to any efforts we might make.
Seems like we'll all have to think hard about this one.
Incidentally, anyone can block Google ads just by editing a simple file in their Windows system directory.
A couple of differences I can see offhand, though:
1. Netcaptor is apparently showing competing contextual advertising in its toolbar.
2. Almost everyone hates popup ads, and in fact many people don't know how to get out of "popup hell" other than rebooting. I doubt many people have strong feelings about AdSense ads.
Part of what is different is the displaying of their own content-targeted ads while turning off yours. Many of us are not thrilled with ad blockers, but then again, we chalk it up to user's choice: if they don't want to see ads, let them block the ads. We can always do an htaccess-protected or otherwise members-only site if we want to force visitors to help pay for the site, or we can block various user agents, etc.
If the site becomes too expensive, I'll just take it down. That's always my choice, and remains so regardless of ads/no ads/ads blocked, etc.
BUT.
When you overwrite my ads with your own ads, you're not just allowing the user the choice to not see ads, you are stealing from me. You're basically hijacking my content to make money off of it.
Would I be irritated at NetCaptor just for blocking the ads without showing any others? Maybe a little.
Am I irritated at them for blocking MY ads on MY site and showing their own? You betcha.
I think you may also find that there's also a bit of ... shall we say, "moral relativism" in the ad blocking controversy. For example, it's okay for Google to block popup ads because "everyone" knows they're annoying, but it's not okay to block MY text ads because they're less annoying.
Also they're MINE.
I think there's a certain amount of the same outrage I've seen in programmers who have no problem burning copies of commercial software, but freak out when someone pirates their code. :-)
JK
I posted a note in a software e-list I belong to, damning Netcaptor for blocking AdSense ads in its free version.
Here's what I got back:
- A note from an existing Netcaptor user who sees AdSense ads just fine.
- An indignant note from the author of Netcaptor, saying that the free version positively DOES not block AdSense ads, and that he's disgusted people spread such vile rumors.
I decided to test this out for myself by downloading and installing the new Netcaptor 7.5 Free, and -- lo and behold -- it sure DID strip AdSense ads!
So what's going on here? It seems odd to me that this program's author would categorically deny what so many of us Webmasters have witnessed with our own two eyes. Have others of you tried this program and confirmed that -- for you as well -- AdSense ads are blocked?
I downloaded it and on first boot...no adsense ads.
edited for wrong word. Used and instead of at. No caffeine yet.
[edited by: varya at 5:47 pm (utc) on Jan. 11, 2004]
I could get Adwords to show up in the Google serps, but AdSense just vanished from pages, both for regular publishers and premium publishers.
There also seems to be some ad blocking in Netcaptor, I was seeing the different standard sizes of banner ads (ie. buttons, banners, leaderboards) also vanish off pages, also leaving empty spaces.
So I did some more checking, and checked the list of ad blocking URLs that come installed with this version, and guess what - pagead2.googlesyndication.com was blocked (although ads coming from google.com were not).
The full blocked list was:
*.adforce.com
*.doubleclick.com
*.doubleclick.net
*/ads/
*/banner/
*/banners/
*/smartbanner/
*link4ads.com
adfarm.mediaplex.com
ads*.*.com
ads*.*.net
ads.*.com
ads.*.net
pagead2.googlesyndication.com
Basically, any image file with the word banner, banners, ads in the directory is blocked (* is used as a wildcard).
So while NetCaptor is allowing ads from google.com (by $www.google.com* in their banned file, with $ meaning to allow) it is specifically banning anything called from the pagead2.googlesyndication.com URL which all AdSense publishers have their code come from, hence stripping out AdSense.
NetCaptor Pro does have ad blocking, and some users may configure it to block AdSense and many others types of ads, but that is up to the user. The free version of NetCaptor definitely does not block any ads except some popups.
Until today I was not a subscriber to WebmasterWorld, but I thought I needed to defend the honor of our product.
Thanks!
Adam Stiles
Stilesoft Inc.
Perhaps you could address the direct testing that is and has been done that disagrees with your statment? Downloads of the free version done recently show that adsense is being blocked on any pages but google direct serps. I would be interested in your followup comments before taking any actions.
I'm glad that you came here to discuss this issue.
I am not erroneously reporting anything. I'm willing to accept that possibility that there is a bug in your product and that you did intend to block Adsense.
I downloaded and installed Netcaptor last Thursday and it is definitely blocking Adsense.
I'd be happy to email you screenshots of the same page in IE and in Netcaptor if you'd like. Send me an address via sticky mail.
Seems to me the energy he spends defending it would be better spent repairing it.
When does the spyware stop? The ad replacement dirty tricks? The outright lies?
Hello Folks, I have been a web author for many years. Self employed, I make my living off of my advertising on the sites that *I* sweated over. Some income is from products and services, but mostly income is from ads. Am I a bad guy? I only deliver one popUNDER to a viewer per day, I have a java ad called invue (1 a day) banners and skyscrapers and adsense. Sounds like advertising hell doesn't it? IF you design pages rich in meaningful free content, and you get email after email praising your site to verify this, then something must be right eh?
Bear in mind Adam, and everyone else *anti* ad, some of us make our living and feed our children from it. I find only the most inexperienced web masters do the *popup hell* thing, and they make it bad for all of us. Why not write your program to target them?
Removing a text based ad is down right wrong imho because it is the most tame of all ads.
Adam, do us all a favor and fix your product so it is not:
a. Parasitic
b. Hard to CHOOSE how ads are displayed.
If you want to compete with IE, then please don't destroy the income from the authors of the web in doing so.
Sorry for the rant...
Back to lurking I go...
this person has just shot his reputation on the web FOREVER! Doesn't matter how good the product is, people, webmasters will always remember NetCaptor and Scumware in the same breath. à la Alexa....they were scummy with their toolbar and won't ever rid themselves of the reputation that will follow them like a bad smell.
There are a couple of issues here, but I would like to try to resolve the issue of whether NetCaptor Free Version blocks AdSense ads. The ethics of a browser blocking ads is ultimately separate. I have no problem with web masters blocking the NetCaptor client if they have a problem with the fact that our pro version blocks ads. If you follow that reasoning, you'd have to block Opera, Mozilla, and a large number of NetCaptor-clone IE extensions.
However, I do take issue with the charge that we are removing AdSense ads and replacing them with our own. That's just plain not true. Ad blocking is only enabled in the pro version of NetCaptor, and in that case you would never see the NetCaptor ads. The ad block list that you see is never loaded or used in NetCaptor Free.
If you are seeing this issue (it appears that NetCaptor is removing AdSense ads), please post a link to the page on which this behavior occurs.
I use NC75 Free version (not Pro) most of the time, and I just tested the behavior on the following sites, and never saw a problem:
I'm happy to take a look at any examples you may offer.
Thanks,
Adam
Adam Stiles
Stilesoft Inc.
OK - I tested a bunch of sites and I always see AdSense ads.
If you could send me the URLs of your sites, I'd like to test out the display of AdSense asds.
Email me at adam at stilesoft dot com.
Thanks!
Adam
The problem doesn't seem to be with the software itself, but with the fact that ad blocking is turned on, with the pageads2.googlesyndication.com added into the block file. If that line was removed from the block file that comes with NetCaptor (and is enabled by default), there would be happy AdSense publishers.
NetCaptor isn't really doing anything different by showing ads on the browser itself - this is also what Opera does, and likely what other browsers do. The issue is that the ad blocking feature which blocked everything coming from pageads2.googlesyndication.com by default.
Perhaps some are running an older copy of the block file - this sounds like something that wouldn't be overwritten with an upgrade, so the problem isn't evident. But the block file of the version people are downloading right now does block AdSense by default, so someone added it to the currently available download version somewhere along the way.
