Website publishers cannot monetize the ad impressions that are prevented by ad-blockers. Publishers can then employ anti-ad-blockers that force users to choose between either accepting ad impressions by whitelisting the website in the ad-blocker, or leaving the website without accessing the content. This study delineates the mechanisms of how willingness to whitelist/leave the website are affected by the request’s sensitivity to recipients as well as the users’ psychological reactance and evaluation of the website advertising. We tested the proposed relationships using an online panel sample of 500 ad-blocker users, who were asked about their willingness to whitelist/leave their favorite online newspaper after receiving a hypothetical anti-ad-blocker request—four alternative requests with different sensitivity levels were created and randomly assigned to the participants. The results confirmed that (a) the request’s sensitivity can improve the recipient’s compliance, (b) users’ psychological reactance plays an important role in explaining the overall phenomenon, and (c) a favorable evaluation of the website advertising can improve willingness to whitelist. These findings help to better understand user response to anti-ad-blockers and may also help publishers increase their whitelist ratios.

Ad-supported websites face an increasing loss of monetizable ad impressions due to the rapid spread of adblockers, which allow users to get desired website content without unwanted advertising. As a countermeasure, many of these websites use anti-adblock filters, which detect adblock users and prevent their access to website content unless their adblockers are disabled. Users may certainly respond by disabling their adblockers but also by leaving the website or trying to bypass the anti-adblock filter. To better understand the choice among these responses, we propose a conceptual framework that combines psychological reactance theory along with uses and gratifications theory. We also hypothesize the influence of four user-related factors: (a) more positive (negative) attitudes toward online advertising encourage adblocker deactivation (website abandonment); (b) longer adblock usage experiences enable filter bypassing; (c) wider (narrower) scopes of online activities stimulate filter bypassing (website abandonment); and (d) greater online privacy concerns discourage adblocker deactivation. These hypotheses were supported by a survey conducted by the Spanish advertising industry, but the influence of breadth of online activities was negligible in practice. Our findings suggest the importance of improving attitudes toward online advertising, reducing online privacy concerns, and searching for alternative ways to monetize website visits. First published online 29 October 2020 Keyword : anti-adblocking, advertising avoidance, online privacy, advertising management, psychological reactance, uses and gratifications theory

En medio de la actual pandemia de COVID19, hay una necesidad inherente de considerar los efectos en la educación en las regiones más pobres del mundo. Los estudiantes de los países occidentales y de entornos más privilegiados han conseguido seguir aprendiendo, aunque las Universidades hayan cerrado debido a la pandemia. Sin embargo, los estudiantes de regiones desfavorecidas se quedaron, a menudo, aislados cuando su institución cerró durante la pandemia. En este artículo, las autoras discuten una iniciativa socialmente innovadora que permite construir una comunidad de aprendizaje internacional basada en una metodología popular llamada COIL (Collaborative Online International Learning). Basada en el uso de plataformas online de libre acceso que permiten conectar digitalmente a estudiantes y profesores, poniendo así los recursos de aprendizaje a disposición de los estudiantes sin importar su ubicación. Permite un entorno de aprendizaje entre pares y promueve el trabajo en equipo virtual sobre casos y tareas reales.