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what happens when an ad is blocked it that the spot where the ad was shows up as a blank spot, the page layout is preserved.

If you need a software based firewall, i strongly reccommend netbarrier, it works really well, and it has ad/site/data blocking built in. i use it to block ads, some get through because they are named funny or come from an unusual site, but otherwise i dont see them... no matter which browser i use.

The question is badly put together. I had to answer "Yes" because it's true in the sense the questioner meant. In reality, the internet does not need to "support itself". It would be there whether we like it or not - at least until a bad sun spot or a huge magnetic pulse comes along. But, if we want many sites to remain largely free, then yes, ads are an evil necessity - but no, pop-up ads are an insideous cancerous growth on the buttocks of society.

Ask a better question, please.

I've never blocked image adds, because many adds are based on load counts, not click counts, so not loading the add deprives the site of revenue. Most adds aren't that obtrusive anyway, and are easy enough to ignore. As for pop-ups, the guy who invented those should be hung from a rooftop by his scrotum.

I think that any browser can block ads for only so long.  Then the ad companies get smart and find a way around it.  Its only a matter of time.

Uh no. Safari has POP UP AD blocking. Not in page ad blocking which is what we are mainly talking about.

I think ads are an annoying necessity. I think they'll always be around, forever. Companies can't rely on word of mouth alone. They'll always be advertising, and always finding new and more intrusive ways of doing it.

The more annoying it is, the more you notice it. The more you notice it, the more they've succeeded.

(And I've heard some statistics that say people actually click pop ups. Yuck.)

Especially those evil ones that look like alert boxes, and have you clicking on the "OK" part of the window, which then takes you to another site with more pop-up windows.

I felt bad for my dad when he told me he got some pop up at work. It was one of those "You've been approved for a computer upgrade... yadda yadda click here to continue." And he called his tech guys and the IT department and everything. He said he spent a couple hours trying to figure it out.

He's just too naive to understand it was a trick. Poor guy.

I've never blocked image adds, because many adds are based on load counts, not click counts, so not loading the add deprives the site of revenue. Most adds aren't that obtrusive anyway, and are easy enough to ignore. As for pop-ups, the guy who invented those should be hung from a rooftop by his scrotum.

I believe even browsers who block ads do send requests for the images, but that they just don't go through the act of displaying them.

I am fine with ads as long as they don't pop up, pop under, flash, screw up layout, look like OS GUIs, or make sounds.

I would like it if safari could load the images but would have a filter similar to omniweb but instead it would load the images but would stop animated gifs from animating or the movies from making sounds.

That way you won't get the strobing "YOU might HAVE WON!"

Downloading advertising images, even for static images, consumes a lot of my bandwidth. I'm on a 56k modem, so I like to maximise my signal to noise ratio. Blocking pop-ups is a start, but banner ads, site ads and other stuff wastes my download time.
Also, ads on a well trafficked site would have a big effect on the Internet (maybe not noticable in the overall picture, but at a local level). The ads are loaded for every viewer, at least once. That's a lot of bandwidth devoted purely to advertising, when the useful stuff (usually the text) requires far less to get information across.
Living in an ad-free world is unreasonable, but I don't have to like the hundreds of ads that present to me every day. I certainly try to avoid buying from those companies, especially if their ads animate.

Actually, what bothers me most about ads is that they write cookies to your drive.  Actually, I delcine them, but you'd be surprised how often you get cookie attempts by servedby.advertising.com

They track your interests, and try to advertise accordingly, which is a good start at least so you don't see ads for runnber ball keychains, but I don't the intrusive nature of it.

Pop-up ads are annoying and should be wiped off the fsce of the earth. Regular ads are still dumb, but at least are easy to ignore. I think society is becoming too commerical anyway. Next think you know, there will be ads built into operating systems (sounds like something microsoft would do). Apple has been pretty good with this, like iChat doesn't have ads, right? I don't really know for sure cause I don't have it, but I think that's true.

Anyway screw commercials, screw money too. We should abolish money, and everyone should work towards making society better. Money only serves to force the lazy people into doing something.

It'd be great if they implemented ad blocking.  I really don't think that ads belong on the internet.  Especially damnable pop-up ads.