Post 9 (or, my feelings on advertising)

Advertising, in all of its forms, can be intrusive if executed poorly or it can be clever if executed well. While I struggle to define my stance on advertising I feel it best to explore the spectrum of emotions and reactions to advertising both in individual examples and as a whole.

 I do not mind advertising as long as it is not intrusive. For instance, electronic billboards are, in my opinion, an eyesore. Besides some examples being poorly designed (which I will touch on later), I find them distracting and sometimes even painful to look at. I do not mind ads in magazines as long as they are not mixed with articles since I can simply flip the page and not have to look at it but advertisements on the internet are perhaps what I loathe most in the world. Pop-up ads, spam ads, ads embedded in news articles which are sometimes difficult to distinguish from the article itself, noisy ads – these are the bane of my existence.

I use Adblock when I browse the internet to subdue all advertisements because ads on the internet are so intrusive. They interfere with the browsing experience and tend to be extremely unimaginitive. I am, of course, referring to ads which read “Drivers in California don't know this one simple trick” or some such clickbait nonsense. I feel most ads on the internet are misleading and harmful to personal computers and thus should be eliminated but the money involved means that will not become a reality. I feel I am completely justified using browser add-ons such as Adblock because internet advertisements are intrusive and, well, everybody hates pop-ups.