How to make your potential customers like you.

Well, I don't see the ad, but I understand the frustration. I have AdBlock Plus on Firefox, but it is set not to block ads on sites that I like (ScienceBlogs is one of these) because they get their revenue from those ads, and I'd hate for these sites to disappear for lack of funding. However, I also use NoScript, another Firefox plugin. It allows the user to selectively block JavaScript execution. One source of scripts that I always block, regardless of the site, is doubleclick.net. I generally find their ads annoying to the nth degree.

Your blog has ads?

Thanks Dan, for making me feel all guilty. I keep meaning to adjust my adblocker, but I am easily distracted and it's not high on my priorities list.

One source of scripts that I always block, regardless of the site, is doubleclick.net.

Chalk up another one for Linux. My machines use a local DNS server (caching is so convenient.) There are, however, a few domains that have earned the distinction of acquiring a local zone, and doubleclick is one of them.

One of the big honking annoying floating ads on SB is what finally pushed me to putting ad blocker in all my firefoxes, just last week.

-kevin

If I might ask, D.C., how do you manage your dns settings?

If I might ask, D.C., how do you manage your dns settings?

Badly.

Seriously, I have some ancient zone files that a friend set up years ago, and all I end up doing is making substitutions. Some of these days I really should learn to run a nameserver properly, but you know how that works.

From the ad company http://www.dynamiclogic.com/na/ :

Research Trends Suggest Web Users Are Growing
More Accepting of Over-Content Ads

As part of the AdReaction 5 Study on consumer perceptions of specific forms of advertising, Dynamic Logic research shows that consumers continue to feel that the "appropriate" number of ads that appear over the content of the Web pages they are browsing is two per hour. This number is consistent with the results for the same question asked in the previous AdReaction 3 & AdReaction 4 surveys, conducted in 2003 and 2005, respectively.

I fully support your intent Greg but, sending email to the marketing department of a marketing company?

Here's their list of advertisers:
American Express
Buena Vista Pictures
Cadbury Schweppes
Coca-Cola
Conagra
Continental
Coors
Dell
EA
eBay
ESPN
Gap
General Mills
Georgia-Pacific
GlaxoSmithKline
GM
Google
Hewlett-Packard
IBM
Intercontinental Hotels Group
Johnson & Johnson
Kraft Foods
Microsoft
Molson
NBC
Nestlé Purina
Paramount Pictures
Pepsi
Philips
Procter & Gamble
Progressive
Samsung
Sara Lee
SC Johnson
TD Ameritrade
Unilever
Wal-Mart

There certainly are several companies there that I can buy less product from. Note to corporations: Beware of who you hire to advertise for you

Oh, Greg. It's 'the company whose ad it is', not 'the company who's ad it is'.

I thought you went to Harvard?

Another Ad Block Plus user here. Third-party pollution of content (not just floating ads, but linking) is what caused me to install it in the first place. I don't mind seeing fewer lurid ads as an added benefit. And now and then some site wants to play some music (yes, there are still some web designers who think that's "cool"), or obscure the content with a horrible background image; Ad Blocker makes it a snap to permanently block any content on a page I don't like while letting the rest through.

I thought you went to Harvard? I did. I have a masters degree and a double PhD. None of this in English, tho.