That did not change people's perception though.

Or provide a cautionary remark against abuse, but that is a different topic.

RE: banner advertising

In my niche the "banner blindness" seems to have worn off and is now selling as an alternative to the adblocked scripted ads. My banner space marketing has arisen from the ashes; so much so it now competes with Adsense CTR. One of the few upsides of adblocking for me.

@keyply, spot on. Been mining that "revived" venue for the last four years. Fun stuff (and ka-ching, too).

The problem with what you said about Adsense however is that it started in 2003 when the damage was already done by C-suits that think they can get away with anything on the web. Adsense started because Google found out a huge market hole dug up by idiotic publishers who ruined the banner marketplace. So Google made it right (for the most part). That did not change people's perception though.

Techs and webmasters might remember the bad old days of banner ads and browser hijacks but I doubt the general public does. Adsense and its banners are relatively safe. And if users are ad blind then it's news to me (the 728x90 is by far my most profitable unit). The few direct ads I sell are also banners and my clients don't want other sizes.

@tangor

What I'm waiting for, since this a NYT thread and their attempt to cajole or force folks to view their ads, is how that is progressing. So far I've not seen any metrics to either success or failure in that regard.

I read it daily, a few articles, I see no changes. uBlock/NoScript.

They only block you if you have cookies disabled or start bugging you after a few pages to subscribe.

The most annoying part of experience on NYT is on a Tablet in a landscape mode when they try to redirect you to the next page/article, sliding up the screen after you read first paragraph of the current page.