This quote makes no sense in the virtual world where everyone can build his own planet without ads if he wants to. Space is not limited here.

To use your analogy, your computer is your planet. If websites don't like that their ads can't get past your customs officers, that's their problem.

What's next: let the cooking magazine pay your electricity bill, because you decided to try out their recipe? Let the cinema pay for your glasses?

If your memory, screen or CPU is precious, don't visit that site. You know the deal and you have a free will. Use it.

Your cooking magazine argument is specious: you're not requesting the website pay your bills. The analog would be a magazine which assaults you with inserts, pop-ups, fragrance scents, a 90:10 advertising-to-copy ratio (and most of the copy is product placements), and charges you $10+ for the privilege.

Oh yeah: that's what they do. Which is why I don't buy magazines (with very rare exceptions).

You could say this about the in person advertising that Banksy describes too.

For the record, I hate ads too, but I see it as a fair exchange.

Below, I've streamlined and abstracted the quote. If you stuck "women" where I say "insert target," this would mirror a lot of really repressive hate speech that's going on in many parts of the world.

>> People are taking the piss out of you everyday... [They] take a cheap shot at you and then disappear... [They] make you feel small. They make flippant comments from buses that imply you’re not sexy enough and that all the fun is happening somewhere else. They are on TV making [you] feel inadequate. They have access and they bully you with it. They are (insert target) and they are laughing at you. You, however, are forbidden to touch them. Asking for permission is like asking to keep a rock someone just threw at your head... You owe [them] nothing. Less than nothing, you especially don’t owe them any courtesy. They owe you. They have re-arranged the world to put themselves in front of you.

> Any advert in a public space [is] yours to take, re-arrange and re-use.

I feel pretty confident in saying AdBlock is not what he had in mind there.

Ironically, you just manipulated his words to your advantage, which is exactly what he advocates in that quote.

On the other hand, what we're talking about here is explicitly choosing to request content from a webpage and then complaining that the ads are an intrusion. There's no analogue to "walking through a public space": no fundamental right to view content that other people made on exactly the terms that you deem acceptable. As poor a comparison as it may be, the comparison to shoplifting is FAR more accurate than the comparison to what Banksy is describing.

If the business model of the advertisers requires that they trust that my computer displays their ads then I see it as their fault for misplacing their trust.

Who cares if it's _your_ computer? It's _their_ product or service you're using, which is offered to you under well-defined terms of use. You're free to not use it if you don't agree with the terms of use.

Let's assume that breaking the terms of use is illegal or immoral. Then how does doing it on _your_ computer absolve you of responsibility? A person's basement is also _his_ private space. Should he have free reign to hold people there against their will? Having a private space doesn't give you carte blanche, especially when other people are involved (e.g. the people who built the products or services you're using).

> If the business model of the advertisers requires that they trust that my computer displays their ads then I see it as their fault for misplacing their trust.

The essence of your argument is that whenever you can screw somebody over and they're powerless to stop you, it's their fault when you screw them over. This is not an argument I'd be proud to make.

By this logic, a local convenience store that hasn't installed security cameras is at fault when you steal from them, because they misplaced their trust in their customers. A woman walking alone at night is at fault when someone attacks her, because she misplaced her trust in society.

By the way, I use AdBlock. But I don't think your attempts at ethically justifying AdBlock hold any water.

I would argue that terms-of-service "agreements" which assume I will cede control of my computer to a third-party are immoral. I find it offensive that anyone would argue that it's alright for others to tell me what I can do with my computer. I wish more people would take a stand against attempts to control how owners of computers use their devices. We might not have gotten ugly legislative constructs (like the DMCA in the US) if people had cared more about their rights.

The "essence" of my argument is this: Private owners get to control their computers (at least right now). It is a false reality to think things are different.

I don't think your analogies about unlawful detention of persons, theft of scarce physical goods, and some kind of victim-blaming rape accusation follow at all. I certainly can't formulate how to respond to these non sequiturs. Code executing inside a computer has very little to do with kidnapping, theft, or rape. I certainly don't see any of them as even remotely equivalent or analogous.

I might have made an argument about the "morality" of skipping commercials using digital video recorders (DVRs), which seems a lot closer to analogizing altering how a web site displays on my computer. Television producers are learning that owners of DVRs skip commercials and, rather than (for the most part) making arguments about taking away the rights of owners of DVRs, are moving to other business models (like product placement).

Rather than assuming my computer will display their Customers' ads (or doing odious things like trying to get laws passed to make private ownership of general purpose computers illegal) I'd rather see website operators move to new business models. If that means that some "free" services disappear then so be it. If a service can't finance itself by having its users be its Customers then I'd argue there's probably a pretty good chance we're better off without it.

(I do find it exceedingly amusing that you admit to using AdBlock yet make the argument you do. I haven't ever used any advertisement blocking software. I simply eschew services that I find inundate me with advertising, or just "look around" the ads when a service is compelling enough to use.)

I do like the television analogy, though. Presumably you'd argue that I shouldn't be permitted to mute the audio, change the channel, or skip ahead or back in the video stream when the "owner" of the video being displayed says I shouldn't. Does that "owner" have some kind of moral right in how I "consume" their content? Sounds like an argument for the "broadcast flag" and even more draconian restrictions to make the television that I paid for and own "belong" to someone else. Yikes! I wouldn't want to "consume" that content or buy a television that had that kind of functionality in it. (I'm already frustrated enough at DVDs with "unskippable" material that, effectively, punish me for using a legally-licensed media in a legally-licensed player.)

Arguing that I shouldn't be permitted to alter how a website displays on my computer is, effectively, arguing that I don't actually own my computer when a third-party says that I don't. "In consideration for viewing our website you agree that you don't own your computer." I definitely wouldn't visit that website. Nobody says that kind of thing out right, though. Website operators just require silly things like DRM-plugins (Silverlight for Netflix, for example) that erode my control of my owner computer. I don't partake of those kinds of "services", personally, and I definitely wouldn't recommend them to others.

The internet is.