Websites must apply to get “whitelisted,” and an Adblock Plus employee then works with the site to make sure that the selected ads comply with the criteria. Ben Williams, a spokesman for Eyeo, told me that 700 publishers and bloggers have been whitelisted. The whitelist is how the company makes money. Eyeo charges large for-profit publishers a cut of ad revenues to be on the list, a scheme some critics have called extortion. Williams declined to say who is paying or how much, but the Financial Times recently reported that Google, Microsoft, and Amazon were among those paying Eyeo for their acceptable ads to appear to Adblock Plus users.
網站首先必須通過「安全名單」﹙whitelisted﹚的認證，然後Adblock Plus的員工會和該網站篩選，確保被選中的廣告符合所有條件。Eyeo的發言人Ben Williams告訴我，已經有700家媒體業者和部落客被列入安全名單，安全名單代表著這些媒體業者可從中獲利，他們付了大筆的廣告收益金給Eyeo，以確保自己可以在安全名單內，一些批評者稱之為勒索。Williams拒絕透露有哪些媒體業者參與和實際金額，但據英國金融時報﹙Financial Times﹚報導，包括像Google、微軟和亞馬遜（Amazon）等公司，都選擇支付Eyeo一筆費用，以讓他們的廣告可以不被Adblock Plus所阻擋而顯示在網路上。
Adblock Plus has released a browser for mobile Android devices that blocks ads, and it’s planning to release a similar product for Apple devices. But Adblock Plus might not be the biggest threat for publishers on mobile. Shine, an Israeli company, isn’t targeting users fed up with annoying ads. It’s going after mobile operators like Verizon and AT&T, whose networks are stressed by data-heavy ads that constantly ping towers for location. Shine has developed technology that allows mobile operators to block ads before they even hit smartphones—in browsers and in standalone apps. Imagine this: A mobile operator lowers a user’s bill if she agrees to block ads, freeing up network resources.
Adblock Plus最近推出了一個適用Android作業系統的瀏覽器，用來過濾網路廣告，緊接著也將推出適用Apple作業系統的方案。但是，對媒體業者來說，行動裝置市場最大的威脅並不是Adblock Plus。一家以色列公司Shine，不認為擾人的廣告是目標，而是電信系統業者，如Verizon和AT＆T－其電信網路受到龐大廣告流量所影響，早已不堪負荷。Shine 已研發一種新技術，不用消費者親自動手，電信業者將搶先一步過濾廣告。我們可以預見的是，假使用戶同意過濾廣告，電信業者將會降低用戶的帳單費用，並可以釋出更多的網路資源。
Roi Carthy, the company’s chief marketing officer, told me the software is in pilot testing with mobile carriers, but he declined to say which ones. The idea would undoubtedly face regulatory scrutiny in the US if mobile operators attempt to use it. Net neutrality advocates have already expressed concern. But Carthy says the company is prepared to fight. “The desire to figure out how to bring ad blocking to mobile consumers is a worldwide phenomenon,” Carthy told me. Ad blocking, he said, “is an inalienable right.”
Shine公司的行銷長Roi Carthy告訴我，該軟體目前還在測試階段，但他不願意透露跟哪幾家電信業者合作，而如果電信業者嘗試在美國使用此軟體，無疑將面臨美國主管機關的監管審查，也讓網路中立性的擁護者表示擔憂。但Carthy認為一切已準備就緒，他還說：「如何讓將廣告過濾的想法，傳遞給行動裝置消費者已經是一個全球性的現象了，廣告過濾是一個不可剝奪的權利。」
SEAN BLANCHFIELD certainly doesn’t share Carthy’s views. He worries that ad blocking will decimate the free Web.
Sean Blanchfield肯定不同意Carthy的觀點，他擔心廣告過濾將會對免費網站帶來全面性的毀滅。
A longtime online gaming engineer—he worked on Call of Duty and Guitar Hero—Blanchfield noticed something odd happening a few years ago: There was a 30 percent discrepancy between his games’ pageviews and ad views. He investigated and found that 1 in 3 of the ads were being blocked, a mortifying revenue hit. Ad blocking was still largely unique to gaming then, but Blanchfield correctly sensed it would spread. “Users are inadvertently putting their favorite websites out of business,” he told me.
曾參與過決勝時刻（Call of Duty）和吉他英雄（Guitar Hero）等遊戲製作的線上遊戲工程師Blanchfield，注意到一個發生在幾年前的奇怪現象，他的遊戲網頁與一般廣告網頁被瀏覽的次數，有著30%的差距。他調查後發現有1/3的廣告在遊戲網頁裡被封鎖，影響可見一斑。對於遊戲產業來說，廣告過濾仍是不尋常的，但Blanchfield已感受到它的威力，告訴我：「用戶正不經意地，把廣告這種商業行為，排除在自己最喜愛的網站外。」
Blanchfield started a company called PageFair, one of several startups trying to give publishers the upper hand again. PageFair has been helping publishers measure how many users are blocking ads and how much it’s costing them, as well as displaying acceptable ads under Eyeo’s requirements. But PageFair has bigger plans: It has developed new technology that allows publishers to display acceptable ads and to add basic banner ads with images, circumventing the blocking software.
Blanchfield開了一家叫PageFair的公司，是幾個試圖再給媒體業者佔據上風的新興公司。PageFair一直在幫助媒體業者計算有多少用戶過濾廣告，評估所導致的損失有多少，以及提出可讓Eyeo接受的廣告。但PageFair有更大的計劃：它已經開發出新的技術，可以讓媒體業者的廣告被接受，還可以加上一些基本的橫幅廣告圖片在上面，規避過濾軟體。
The strategy lets PageFair play both sides of the debate. It understands the ad blocking community finds many online ads annoying, but it ultimately sides with publishers in their need to show ads, particularly ones that generate a lot of revenue. “Your house, your rules, your ads,” Blanchfield said. Major US publishers will soon launch Pagefair’s software, he said, but he declined to identify which ones.
該策略讓PageFair猶如雙面間諜般，它理解使用廣告過濾的用戶，對線上廣告有多討厭，但它最終又與媒體業者站同一陣線，幫助他們將可以賺取很多收入的廣告顯示在網路上。Blanchfield說：「一切將由你做主。」美國主要幾家媒體業者即將使用Pagefair的軟體，但Blanchfield拒絕透露有哪些媒體業者。
There are other ideas for solutions.
總會想到解決辦法的。
Ben Barokas, a former senior executive at Google, recently launched Sourcepoint, bringing together a team of online ad technologists to develop a product that has both carrot and stick qualities. As the product rolls out in the coming months, Sourcepoint will offer software that lets publishers show ad blockers a message: “One of the consequences of using ad blocking software is that it significantly damages the value exchange between consumers and creators of digital content.” The message then urges users to click a link to disable ad blocking on that site.
前Google高階主管Barokas近期發起了Sourcepoint計劃，集結了一群線上廣告科技專家，開發對正反兩方都有利的產品。這項產品將在未來幾個月內推出，Sourcepoint將會提供軟體，讓媒體業者向廣告過濾用戶喊話：「使用廣告過濾，也傷害了消費者和數位內容創作者之間的價值交換」，該訊息鼓勵使用者取消網站上的廣告過濾功能。
Publishers can also enable a more stick-like approach, telling ad blockers that in order to continue they must restore banner ads, view a video ad, identify and views ads that are useful for them, or just pay up.
媒體業者也可以用更直接的方式告訴廣告過濾用戶，為了要能順暢地使用網路，他們必須恢復網站上的橫幅廣告、廣告影片的觀賞，確認並觀看那些對他們有幫助的廣告，或乾脆就付錢取消廣告。
“We wanted to provide publishers with technology that allows them to provide users with choice,” Barokas told me.
Barokas告訴我：「我們希望提供媒體業者技術，使他們能為使用者提供更多的選擇。」
Publishers must make money. The reader must not be overly annoyed.
媒體業者需要有錢賺，但也不能過度叨擾讀者。
“Otherwise, little by little, content will go away,” Barokas said. “We are not in a sustainable media ecosystem today.”
「否則，內容會漸漸離我們而去」，Barokas這麼說，「我們畢竟處在一個多變難測的媒體生態系統內。」
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作者：Michael Rosenwald
編譯：朱弘川
原文網址：http://www.cjr.org/business_of_news/will_ad_blockers_kill_the_digital_media_industry.php
