Recently I was at my brother’s house using their computer for a bit of surfing. I have gotten used to my computers having ad blockers on them and I rarely see an ad for anything questionable. It was a shock to my system to see so many advertisements show up on screen.
I decided to write a tutorial for them on how to get rid of the ads. I hope it helps others.
This will be dependent on you using Firefox as a web browser. There are probably other solutions for other browsers, but I use Firefox and that is all I currently recommend. I am also going to be working through this on Windows so I can get the steps right for them.
Start by having Firefox open. Select Tools | Add-ons from the menu. Click the tab that says “Get Add-ons” and do a search for adblock plus. On my search, it was the first hit returned. Click the “Add to Firefox” button and go through the installation procedure. Once that is installed then restart Firefox.
When Firefox restarts it will give you a list of filters that you can apply to Adblock Plus. Choose the Easy List (USA) option. Then get back to the Add-ons section (it was still open after the Firefox restart on my machine). Now look through the search results and install the Adblock Filterset.G Updater. Again you will have to restart Firefox. When it comes back up the filterset updater will be up and running and will install the latest update. Exit out of those windows and you will be ready to use Adblock Plus.
Notice that there is a small red octagon beside the search box on the top right of the screen. This is where you can make changes to the way Adblock Plus operates. As it is, it will eliminate the vast majority of advertisements. But there may occasionally be a site that needs extra tweaking to get rid of especially offensive ads.
I know there is controversy as to whether you should block ads on websites. Many sites are able to be free because of the ads that support them. I understand that. But, I also don’t want my kids nor myself to be inundated with ads for activities which are not appropriate for our family. When I do use someone else’ computer to touch the Internet I am always shocked at the lewdness of advertisements on-line. With an adblocker I am able to control most of what comes across my computer screen.