But is that much different from now? There are already a couple of reasons why someone would click on an ad without "honest interest".
I, for example, sometimes click on ads from companies I don't like, so that they have to pay for the click. Everytime I see an ad for Microsoft, Oracle or something along those lines I like to click on it to punish them a little for being stupid (in my opinion). I can't be the only one who does that?
I wonder why Anonymous hasn't picked that technique up as an alternative to DDoS. Maybe it's not effective enough, I'm not sure. But in the end I have better things to care about.
When you click on an ad to "punish" the advertiser, you are doing one of a few things that are really counter-productive to what you're trying to do:
1) You're rewarding the advertiser by implying interest in what they have pitched, therefore encouraging them to blast you with more ads.
2) Assuming you're not using AdBlock, you've probably just added yourself to a much more targeted cookie pool of "people who are interested in Microsoft because they clicked". Enjoy the MS ads that will now follow you all over the web through one of the many behavioral retargeting networks.
3) You did nothing to hurt MS because they bought based on CPM so the impression was paid for in the first place, clicks don't hurt them.
4) You hurt the site you saw the ad on. Let's assume this site is a site you visit frequently. People click but no one buys, the ad agency compares the performance on this site vs. others with a less punishing audience, and decide that the money is better spent elsewhere thus depriving this site of much needed ad revenue.
I, for example, sometimes click on ads from companies I don't like, so that they have to pay for the click. Everytime I see an ad for Microsoft, Oracle or something along those lines I like to click on it to punish them a little for being stupid (in my opinion). I can't be the only one who does that?
I wonder why Anonymous hasn't picked that technique up as an alternative to DDoS. Maybe it's not effective enough, I'm not sure. But in the end I have better things to care about.