Digital Ads and the Adblocking in Portugal – To appropriate or not to appropriate, that is the question

Abstract

The operative dynamics of the contemporary media sector are, in the digital age, increasingly susceptible to new tensions. On the part of financial structure and business models, few phenomena will be as relevant to investigate as the use of adblocking software, which has been increasing consistingly. This article addresses this issue in two ways: a) a theoretical review with a focus on the most recent and still scarce literature and b) to test the relevance of these contributions in the portuguese case based on an exploratory study to a non-probabilistic sample. The relevance of this approach is related to the need to understand a phenomenon that has in Portugal, like the rest of the world, a strong impact both in the sector’s business models and in the relationship of Internet users with informative content. The theoretical review and data analysis demonstrate the rele- vance of the subject as well as the increasing tension between companies, content and users in the context of increasingly common and easy to operate technological resources in digital ecosystems. The increase of the digital critical literacy index coincides with the users’ awareness of concepts such as identity, privacy and content relevance.