I'm all about making educated choices when deciding to do or buy anything. So I did some research on the use of ad blockers.
I found an industry wide debate on whether ad blocking is ethical, immoral, even stealing.
(The premise being some unwritten social contract to view the ads in exchange for website content.)
Here are excerpts and links to some of the better blogs I found on the subject, both pros and cons to using ad blockers.
Why Ad Blocking is devastating to the sites you love.
"Imagine running a restaurant where 40% of the people who came and
ate didn't pay. In a way, that's what ad blocking is doing to us. Just
like a restaurant, we have to pay to staff, we have to pay for
resources, and we have to pay when people consume those resources. The
difference, of course, is that our visitors don't pay us directly but
indirectly by viewing advertising.
My
argument is simple: blocking ads can be devastating to the sites you
love. I am not making an argument that blocking ads is a form of
stealing, or is immoral, or unethical, or makes someone the son of the
devil. It can result in people losing their jobs, it can result in less
content on any given site, and it definitely can affect the quality of
content."
" I believe it should be the users choice if they want to view
advertisements on a web site. In fact, I always recommend people run Noscript, Ad Block Plus, and Flashblock
on their Firefox installations. The fact of the matter is people have a
choice to decide what code they run on their computers. If a user
doesn’t want to run a Javascript/Flash based ad on their computer, they
should not be nudged at and made to feel guilty about it.
I think sites struggling because of ad revenue need to look at their
profit model and maybe think about adapting their profit strategy.
3rd party advertisements have been responsible for pushing rogue
security applications and other malvertisements pushing malware. Why
should users trust ads from 3rd party ad networks that allow this stuff
to be promoted? I block ads, and will continue to do so."
"A web page is managed by someone – more often than not, a
self-employed webmaster/blogger. We work hard at creating the content
and we monetize it (read this as “earn our salary”) by using various
forms of advertising. It’s a fairly simple deal: we provide you with
“free” content and in return you get exposed to the ads on the pages.
You don’t have to buy anything, you don’t even have to click on
anything, just let the ads be there. Personally, I don’t think it’s too
much to ask for, in exchange for quality content.
As a web publisher, I try to serve my users with a fair balance of
quality content, along with ads which are not obtrusive. No pop-ups,
definitely no malware, no flashing banners. I make a large chunk of my
revenue from CPM advertising – so I get paid for you to view the ads.
Turn on the ad blocker and you’re taking away from my invested
resources, without allowing me to create a stream of revenue."
After reading all the articles, the pros and the cons, I can only conclude if you like the WGT site, if you like playing the game, if you enjoy the friends you've made here, and if you like the relatively small investment needed to do it, then don't block the ads.
If we take away the ad revenue stream the fallout could be, increased prices on equipment, less feature and course development, or subscription fees.
I do agree the ads should be unobtrusive and they should be relevant to something members are interested in. I can focus enough to be my own ad blocker without being distracted. I can ignore the ones that don't relate to me.