MacKeeper - a new ploy.

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While I agree that the MacKeeper ads are absolutely everywhere, I wouldn't opt to use any sort of adblocker because the internet is free mostly (solely?) because of ads.

I don't understand.. the internet isn't free. You pay an Internet Service Provider to allow you to connect to the internet. The content that is shared is regulated by various laws of varying degree - some of it is free and some of it is not.

Your right to post what you want on the internet is the result of a lack of formal regulation and standard enforcement when the Internet itself was conceived - not the presence of ads.

What part of the internet is free, other than the opinions that people like me 'freely' give out? :Cool:
 
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Sure, ads are a nice way to implicitly support a website but I'm not going to subject myself to advertising for the sake of it.

You might as well say this: money is a nice way to support the grocery store, but I am not going to subject myself to working 9 to 5 just for the sake of it. I want their food for free.
Viewing ads are what you 'pay' to use a website. If you find it too expensive, find a cheaper site. Don't steal from it.

I don't understand.. the internet isn't free. You pay an Internet Service Provider to allow you to connect to the internet. The content that is shared is regulated by various laws of varying degree - some of it is free and some of it is not.

You pay for the connection, not the content. OK, so let's say the content itself isn't free, let's say ads are the sort of money they use. I don't think that, morally speaking, you have the right to decide that you use their content but do not pay the 'price' (ads).

Sorry for not attaching nicknames to the quotes, I do not know how to do multi quotation well.
 

vansmith

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You might as well say this: money is a nice way to support the grocery store, but I am not going to subject myself to working 9 to 5 just for the sake of it. I want their food for free.
Viewing ads are what you 'pay' to use a website. If you find it too expensive, find a cheaper site. Don't steal from it.
That logic is deeply flawed. If content is made available for free, regardless of whether or not it's ad supported, it's still free. I'm not stealing anything if the website owner is making the content available to me at no cost. If I were to employ this logic in every day practice, I'd have to read every single ad so as to ensure that I'm not "stealing" anything from anyone. Now, if I was stealing an internet connection, I'd agree but since I'm not actually taking something that requires payment, I'm not stealing anything.

If ad blocking mechanisms truly were "stealing," there's no way that Google, a company that makes most of its money through advertising, would allow ad blockers to be distributed through the Chrome Web Store (more here). In fact, many of those extensions are targeted at Google products.
 
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I think Google allows it because it makes Chrome suitable for more users - those that won't give up on an ad-free experience. Also, only (and definitely not all), or mostly tech-savvy users use adblockers. I don't think we represent a big chunk of the people-who-use-the-web pie.

Also, when I say 'steal' when I talk about internet content, I do not talk about anything illegal. I talk about what's moral to my eyes. I think a website, most websites, offer you a simple package: content with some (or a lot of) ads. I either take the entire package (and THEN streamline it with the Print button or some reading bookmarklet/addon) or nothing at all.

When I take the highway, I see ads. It's part of the highway experience. If I can't stand the ads I should find an alternative route, but I won't remove those ads even if it's possible to remove them only from my view, and with a simple click of a button.
 
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This thread was originally posted to advise readers of the dangers of MacKeeeper not to generate into a slinging match on the ethics of advertising.
 
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The dangers of MacKeeper

Hi, everyone.

I'm a newbie here. I, too, keep getting popups about MacKeeper. Well, last week my Mac was acting funny. I went on a site {don't remember which one} and it praised MacKeeper to the nth degree. So I {apparently, foolishly} installed it.

Could someone please explain the dangers of it? And how do I remove it?

Thanks in advance for your help.

Sunshine
 
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LadyDunshine, if you did not run MacKeeper then I believe it is safe to say no 'danger' was posed to your mac.

As for uninstalling it, follow this: Uninstalling MacKeeper

Regardless of MacKeeper, if your mac is acting weird, run Onyx's entire suite of processes.
 
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A double edged sword is what we've got. But more than not, it is the owner of any website to decide whether or not they can afford to pay "X" amount of dollars per year for web hosting space in order to offer a "service". But you see, that right there is the catch. If you are offering a "service", then it is a business.

A business as such has the right to ASK their viewership for a membership fee. The Mac-Forums ASKS for a fee per year which if you know anything about the costs of maintaining such a service, is more than enough to cover said maintenance. Ads are supplemental and serve two purposes. One, they do bring in some revenue, especially if the user base is large enough. It's simply a matter of chance and ratios. Secondly, ads are an annoyance and might even sway some towards paying a yearly fee in order to get rid of them!

But please stop getting things twisted. The internet as you know it is NOT free, as others have already stated. You do pay for it. Everyone does. And it's a level playing field. If you can not afford to pay for server space, then don't think that you have the right to force ads on people in order to provide your oh-so special services!

Many internet services are subsidized by their share holders (Google, Facebook etc..) and originally had very sizeable financial backings in order to get started. Business is business and that is fine, but to say that it is stealing by blocking ads is ridiculous. If a website owner feels that they are providing a legit service that others can not do without, then they can absolutely ask for a monthly or yearly membership fee.

The website owner can also restrict the type of access that a person has to their site if they're not a "member". The Mac-Forums does this, and many other sites do this as well. It's called the perks of membership, and if done right, can be a LOT more effective than trying to generate revenue from ads. But then, the site has to have content with real value. This can not be said about most of the sites which kill you with ads.

Doug
 

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