More of why the Net won’t save papers

This post could be subtitled, “Why online advertising is e-junk mail.”

The L.A. Times reports on the latest hideousness in Internet advertising ideas.

Basically, the Online Publishers’ Association is saying, if you won’t look at banner ads, we’re going to get even more in your face. And, major media such as the New York Times and ESPN are already signing up.

But, online technology is a form of warfare when it comes to advertising.

“Sdies show we ignore banner ads,” said Jose Castillo, a new media consultant in Johnson City, Tenn. “Making them bigger and more intrusive won’t work. We will tune those out as well.”

In short, they’re the electronic form of junk mail.

And, here’s where the electronic warfare comes in.

If you’re using Firefox, not IE, or Google Chrome (I hope you have made the right choice), of course, you have your ad block settings. You also have your controls to turn off both JavaScript and Flash.

If you don’t have the plug-ins to do that, get them. If you don’t have them activated, do so. If you don’t have them turned “on” to stop JS and Flash, do it.

Trick No. 2, if you don’t know about it? A hosts file. PCs come with a basic one; Macs with an even more rudimentary one.

Basically, it’s a list of websites and other Internet addresses, all preceded by “127.0.0.1,” which is the “home” address for your computer whenever you’re online.

Your computer and ISP treat every URL on that hosts file as already downloaded and cached, so it won’t load “again.”

Find the URL sources for these annoying new ads, and add them to the hosts file.

That, then, is why Internet advertising won’t save old media.

Anyway, here’s a precreated hosts file, updated just last month. Or another, updated today.

The second hosts file has info on how to use it with OS X Macs, too.

Google for more.