Annoying Ads Be Gone…Enough is Enough!

These days the use of Myspace has become almost as necessary as e-mail.

Lately however, my frustration with Myspace ads has taken me to the brink of saying “Enough! I’m done!”. Those ridiculous ads of young girls in provacative poses blasted right in my face has continued to rise my ire with this system. Yeah, I know - it’s a free service so this is how they make their money - through ads. But to my thinking, these forms of ads reek of irresponsibility and the overt objectification of women is downright shameful. By not giving the customer (me) the choice to make choices of what kind of ads are blasted on my screen has driven me crazy.

Well, a little digging today produced a SOLUTION! Yes, a solution to the problem.

For some of you, this solution may not be new and some of you may already employ this method of ad filtering but for those out there who are like me and hadn’t really had much of a need until the advent of Myspace, here’s a trick to keep that smut off your screen and the intrusion out of your mind.

Here’s a step-by-step method and I’m going to make this super simple. Oh, and this process will cost you nothing but a few minutes of your time.

1. If you haven’t already, download and make the free Firefox browser your default web browser (your computer will thank you).
2. Once you download and install Firefox (or if you already have it), click here to download an add-on to the Firefox browser called Adblock.
3. Once installed, you’ll need to close and reopen Firefox for Adblock to activate (to avoid losing this page, add this page to your bookmarks before you close).
4. Before you set-up the Adblock, you’ll need to download a simple Filter. Click here to download a simple .TXT file and save it someone where you can easily find it.
5. After you re-open Firefox, from the top menu, click Tools > Adblock > Preferences.
6. In the Adblock Preferences window, click “Adblock Option” and select “Import Filters”.
7. Find and select the .TXT file that you downloaded in Step #4
8. Now you’re ready to cruise Myspace. You’ll find both performance improvements and a reduction in the amount of junk ads. If you encouter more ads you don’t particularly like, just right-click the ad and you should have a new item on the drop-down menu with a method to add that ad to your “leave me alone” list.

Note: When you add more ads to block, here’s a trick to make the blocks stick. Since these ads are coming from just a few marketing sites that blast out tons of different ads, you can lock down a bunch in one fail swoop. When you right-click an ad, click “Adblock [name]…” and it will show you a path. It’s asking you to confirm to block that particular ad. You can go one step farther and with a simple wildcard addition, you can block everything from that ad website.

BEFORE: http://annoying.marketer.com/pagead/imgad?id=COGh

By removing everything after the “.com/” or “.net/” and inserting a “*” you can block EVERYTHING from that site.

AFTER: http://annoying.marketer.com/*

Ahh…peace of mind. I love Firefox…and you should too.

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