Adblock Plus has partnered with Flattr to offer web surfers a way to compensate content publishers that they visit most often. Flattr, a service launched in 2010 by Pirate Bay founder Peter Sunde, is a microdonation platform allowing users to create a monthly budget that is paid to the content providers they prefer and visit often. By partnering with Adblock Plus they will reach a huge audience of millions of users that have downloaded the plugin over 500 million times.
To use the service simply go over to Flattr and sign up. No fee is required to set up your account. When you are ready you can add your credit card and set a monthly donation budget which Flattr will use to pay the content providers you visit the most. You can customize the settings to pay certain publishers more than others. It’s designed as a way to give back to publishers who’s ads are being blocked by your use of Adblock Plus.
From a publishers perspective it might be seen as a feeble attempt to pay them peanuts while still blocking their ads which actually support the content production and employees which work at the online business. Publishers look at users with ad blockers as a sort of an online version of shoplifting, which they put up with and write off as a part of doing business with paying ad viewing visitors.
In 2011 AdBlock Plus introduced an “Acceptable Ads” program to allow what they deemed non-intrusive ads to be whitelisted under the extension’s default settings. Whitelisting is free for small websites while large sites must pay a fee. This has generated considerable controversy with publishers.