If sites made it clear that your patronage while stripping out ads was unwelcome, would you voluntarily stop using all those websites...? Or would you hide behind the "running on my machine" argument while gleefully skimming their content?
I stop visiting websites that prevent me from seeing any content if I'm using an ad blocker. Wired, for example. I was never an avid reader of Wired but they do publish some interesting content and I would find myself reading maybe three or four articles a month. Since they made it clear that people blocking ads are no longer welcome on their site I stopped clicking on Wired links.
I know there are ways around such blocks but I don't bother using them. If a site prevents me from seeing its content if im blocking ads I close the page and make a mental note to not click on links to that site anymore.
I'm not "hiding" behind anything, and trying to imply I am doesn't help your argument.
I probably would stop using that site, I think it's important to support sites that make meaningful progress possible. But again, that doesn't really have any impact on my decision to make sure foreign code doesn't run on my machine.
If sites make it clear, i stay out or pursue alternatives they offer. For example i don't use bild.de. And for other sites i've started contributing to payment schemes like Patreon. Mobile apps i often by the upgrade to remove ads, even though i can just block them altogether.
That's good for you! The truth is that most people don't do that at all. I feel that either we need to pay for content or ad companies need to sponsor us for the content. If some sites have terrible ads it's really not that hard to just not go there.
I think that'll come over time. Right now the problem is that the "value" of a page view is far below a single dollar, and paying so little in a way that isn't negated by the costs is very hard to solve still. At the same time full-on subscriptions often don't make sense if you're just gonna look at a certain site a handful of times per year.
Patreon is a big step towards fixing that, since it allows me to pay small amounts to people whose work i enjoy very occasionally. It is however not the end game yet, and i think if that path is pursued further, ads can become a part of the past.
Also the "just don't go there" thing is hard to do in reality. If only because to find out that a site is bad, you need to first go there. Then there's the cost of remembering in the future that the site is bad. Then there's the social cost of getting linked to a thing. etc. etc. etc.
