Windows Secrets Newsletter

Brian Livingston runs a Windows Secrets newsletter. There is a short, free version of this newsletter and a longer, paid edition. I was mentioned in the paid edition of the December 2, 2004 issue. As this is not available to the general public online, I published it here: 
 

Advanced ad-blocking techniques

Michael Horowitz is the proprietor of ComputerGripes.com, a site that's described above in our lead story on the "Secrets of Firefox 1.0." He wrote in about the recent Datamation column entitled Getting the Most Out of Firefox:

• "The things I do to every new copy of Firefox are: customize the toolbar (which does take some getting used to), change the home page, lower the cache (I think the default of 50MB is a bit high), prevent 3rd party cookies, customize the download behavior (not to save on the Desktop and to always show the download manager window), and install the Adblock extension.
  
  "Then I have to go to the Web sites often used by the user of the computer and individually and generically block the ads (it's hard to explain). How you do this is not hard, but it is really not documented at all, the last time I looked. For dial-up users, this is a real must."

We prevailed upon Horowitz to share with us his techniques for ad-blocking in Firefox. Here are his pointers:

• "After installing the AdBlock extension, the process of blocking ads is manual, not automatic. Most ads on a Web site come from a limited number of sources. For the Web sites you visit the most, it pays to take a little bit of time and prevent the ads from loading.
  
  "To block an ad, right-click on it and select 'Adblock image' from the pop-up context menu. Then make a note of the URL of the ad. For example, an ad from the LA Times' Web site is:
  
  http:// www.latimes.com/ images/ ads/ topofthetimes_140x120.gif
  
  "Blocking a single ad is not worth the trouble. However, if you delete the end of the URL and shorten it to:
  
  http:// www.latimes.com/ images/ ads/
  
  then you will likely block many ads on the Web site. There is a slight chance that you may block an image you want to see.
  
  "Just between us, this is a poor man's Tivo for the Web. Like Tivo, if too many people do it, it could change the way advertisers advertise. Publicity may not be a good thing."

Well, we're going to publish it anyway and hope our readers can take advantage of this before all the advertisers figure out a way to defeat it!