Ad blocking update from MNHQ

[YetAnotherBeckyMumsnet]

Like all ad-funded sites we rely on advertising revenue to keep the site free to use, hence we don't allow ad-blocking software in our ts&cs.

From today those using ad blockers to access MN will start to see some ads again. All of the adverts adhere to Better Ads Standards created by the Coalition for Better Ads.

The Coalition’s Better Ads Standards identify the ad experiences that fall beneath a threshold of user acceptability and are most likely to drive users to install ad blockers. More than 150,000 people have participated to date in the Coalition’s research to develop its set of Better Ads Standards.

If you’d like to completely cut out all display ads there’s the option to sign up for Premium.

Thanks, MNHQ.

What do you mean you don't allow ad blocking software in your T&C's?

I think it is worth explaining 'display' vs 'native' ads for Premium as not all users will be familiar with the distinction.

I thought premium users still see ads? Where’s the incentive to sign up?

Just had a look for this and (assuming I'm looking at the relevant sets of ts&cs) all I can see is "We reserve the right to display advertisements in connection with your User Content ..." , which I suppose (in effect) means (among other things) that they are stating they are under no obligation to cooperate to ensure the effectiveness of ad blocking software. That seems a v v reasonable position for them to take, but I don't understand how that can be equivalent to saying that ad blockers aren't permitted. I can't find anything that says users are breaching the ts&cs if we use them.

It feels very uncomfortable to me, because I wouldn't want to think I was violating some implicit contractual agreement by using a blocker. And I also wouldn't understand why I was able to access the site without disabling my blocker, if it was in violation of my contract with MN.

Is there another set of Ts and Cs I should be looking at??

Yes please!

Basically the display ads are designed to stand out, so 'classic' ads around and within the content. Native is where they are designed to blend in with the content, such as the ad threads and articles.

I understand where you're coming from, but referring to people who are contributing significant content for free as "freeloaders" is a bit much (not here, but in Becky's other thread about ad blockers).

Forums like Mumsnet don't provide any (or minimal) content of their own, they rely entirely on user-generated content. Content from Mumsnet is regularly used in the press, which generates a lot of valuable advertising for Mumsnet, yet the content creator doesn't get paid and often has their privacy violated by having their posts stolen without permission.

The reason MN is able to set the advertising rates you set is due to being a high traffic site, I assume like any other advertising supported site that you have standard marketing parks which highlight how many unique users you have per month.

Those unique users are the reason you can charge advertising in the first place, so it's a bit off to refer to the people whose unpaid content you're using for your own financial benefit as "freeloaders."

A big problem nowadays is websites with overly intrusive ads. There are websites (the Independent is the worst one) that I won't use at all, because the sheer scale of ads makes the site almost physically impossible to use. I've stopped visiting lots of sites and forums because they used too many ads, and I'd hate to see Mumsnet driving posters away due to intrusive ads, or because posters were being made to feel unwelcome.

Would be interested to know the percentage of people who actually pay attention to the ads and from that how many people either click on them or buy something due to the ads on here. I certainly don’t. So would be interested to know percentage wise

I understand where you're coming from, but referring to people who are contributing significant content for free as "freeloaders" is a bit much (not here, but in Becky's other thread about ad blockers).

Is that how those of us who don't pay for Premium are thought of in MNHQ @YetAnotherBeckyMumsnet ?

I actively avoid buying from companies whose adverts are intrusive and distracting. So whether I see them or not, it makes no difference, I won’t buy from them

Bit bloody rude isn’t it?

Purely a guess but I’m willing to bet the forums attract more people than the vague articles and lists MN hosts.

on the whole, it’s a dynamic I’m perfectly happy with. Or was till that comment, it certainly doesn’t want me want to upgrade myself from a freeloader to premium content contributor.

Yep, Premium users still see banner ads for things "promoted by Mumsnet" and about 20% of the threads in their active convo display are ads for all sorts of shite. There's pretty much no incentive to pay for it these days, which is a shame.

I’d happily pay for Premium but I just don’t trust that my personal and financial details will be safe with MNHQ, due to past security breaches.

Why not just stop Adblocker users accessing the site at all, like lots of other sites do? It doesn’t come across as very professional to make sideswipes about ‘freeloaders’ and imply there is something in the Ts & Cs to prevent using one.

When ads on a site swamp the Talk facility, drain device batteries and freeze the screen, maybe all the ads should be filtered through the Better Ads Standards? They were never so intrusive (and sometimes downright offensive, which is always handwaved away as ‘Ad Choices, nothing to do with us’) in the past.

Also, is a ‘freeloader’ someone who ignores all ads and would never, ever click through to one? Because that sounds a bit……odd. Yet it’s no different to using an adblocker, surely?

I really hope not, because that is so rude and disrespectful. The users are what keeps the site going.

This may be a stupid question - I don't currently have an ad-blocker installed - but if it is possible for Mumsnet to override the ad blocker software, how is it that all websites don't do the same?

I think it depends on the level of your adblocker, or what you check or uncheck within it.

A lot of websites will have a pop up asking you to turn your as blocker off but MN needs people to post here - we are the product after all, so preventing people from posting isn’t in their interest

Eventually the Chatbots will talk to the Chatbots.

Lol, absolutely this. Cutting out the feeble fleshy middleman would be a good way for MN to go. I'm sure it would be possible to programme some desires into the consumer-replacing chatbots, as well as a 'belief' that they could meet these desires by purchasing add-on software from the marketing chatbots. And then the consumerbots could just shell out some bitcoins from their pocket money.

It would be a very ethical business model for MN because flogging software to consumer-replacement chatbots would be more carbon neutral than flogging physical goods to us fleshbots.

And we fleshies could just go back to hanging out at the park or wherever. The park's owners would 'reserve the right to display advertising' but I don't think they would interpret that as a duty on our part to actually see the adverts, so we wouldn't be called freeloaders for finding way not to look at them.

Having said all that, I'll be interested to see the new oragnic fairtrade Better Ads Standards ads. Hopefully they will be something quite tolerable so that we can all bumble along with it.

Better Ads Standards seems to be run by companies and trade organisations with an online media presence. It’s all a bit Mr Wolf Advises Little Pigs About House Construction.

All of this, as well as the posts from MNHQ, signals a massive shift in the relationship between MNHQ and its users, aka content providers, I feel.

Gone is the chatty, friendly and equal relationship between the Community Mods (and Justine, and Carrie, when she was part of Mumsnet), and now we have a distant and patronising 'parent', who sounds like they really don't like the fact that its users (content providers, remember?) are here very much.

Well.. this 'freeloader' has been using MN for 16 years, and ALWAYS used an adblocker, i'm Autistic/ADHD and even the unintrusive ones bother me with the way they pop in after loading.. my choice to block them is down to the fact they bother me on a sensory level.

If my choice to accommodate my disability means @YetAnotherBeckyMumsnet and the @MNHQ team think i'm a freeloader, then so be it.

I will keep using my adblocker.

I must say i intensely dislike the lie in the OP about it being against their terms and conditions though.. Is it the usual habit of @YetAnotherBeckyMumsnet to lie to posters?

Do your adds also include the huge add to vote Labour at the top and sides of the entire MN threads.
Thought you weren’t political

There are other threads on this but you haven’t commented on any that I can see so hoping this post gets a response from MNHQ please.

Yes! This is advertising just like advertising from any other business.

The political parties are all over social media right now - that's the best place for them to be spending their money efficiently given that a) fewer people read physical newspapers and that b) television advertising is disproportionately expensive.

Just because MN takes TLP's money doesn't mean they endorse them, any more than it does if they take advertising for L'Oréal or Boden or Clark's shoes (for example).