Partnering with Publishers: Restoring Ad Revenue and Building a Fairer Internet

Online advertising is at a crossroads—users are frustrated by intrusive ads, publishers are losing revenue, and advertisers struggle to connect with engaged audiences. Traditional ad blockers offer relief for users but cut off monetization, forcing publishers to rely on ineffective paywalls and ad recapture tools. At Pie, we’re solving this with Fair Ads and Unblock—two solutions that restore balance. It’s time to move beyond ad walls and brute-force blocking—let’s build an internet where advertising works for everyone.

What We Believe

The internet runs on attention, but the current system is broken. Advertisers and publishers struggle to maintain revenue while frustrated users increasingly turn to brute force ad blockers that close the door on revenue. At Pie, we believe in a more balanced and sustainable approach.

• Publishers have the right to monetize their content. Quality journalism, creative content, and innovative platforms require sustainable revenue streams.
• Advertising is the primary enabler of a free and open web. Ads provide critical funding that keeps much of the internet accessible to all.
• Users should have the right to opt out of systems that do not respect their agency. People should have control over how their data and attention are leveraged.

Pie is looking for partners to help build a three-sided attention marketplace where advertisers, publishers, and users all benefit. By compensating users directly for their attention, we create a sustainable ecosystem that aligns incentives across the board.

Why Is the Current System Broken?

The modern digital ad economy is failing all three of its key stakeholders—users, publishers, and advertisers. The rise of ad blockers is a direct response to an ad-saturated web experience where users do not feel their attention is equitably engaged.

• Ad Saturation Is Driving Users Away
  • The average user's online experience is ad-heavy, and poor return on attention value leaves users frustrated and fatigued.
  • This frustration pushes users toward ad-blocking solutions like "ad-filtering" extensions that offer minimal revenue recapture, or brute force ad blockers that seek to eliminate 100% of ads from the web.
• Brute Force Ad Blockers Are Degrading the Free and Open Internet
  • Most of the world's 900+ million ad blocking users have adopted brute force ad blockers, which block all ads and ad walls indiscriminately.
  • If the majority of internet users opt for brute force ad blockers, publishers will be forced to put content behind paywalls, eroding accessibility.
• Current Ad Filtering Solutions Severely Limit Publisher Revenue
  • Over 100 million users use "ad-filtering" extensions, which seek to solve for revenue recapture by allowing some non-intrusive ads from partner publishers.
  • This system only allows publishers to recapture 5-10% of lost ad revenue, as only the lowest-value ad placements meet "acceptable" standards.
• Ad recapture tools like ad walls are expensive and ineffectual
  • The industry leader in hard ad walls charges a 30% commission on revenue recapture.
  • Dismissible soft walls have a less than 20% success rate, and hard walls trade higher recapture rates for high negative user sentiment.
  • When confronted with hard ad walls, around 25% of users choose to leave the site, and more than 10% go searching for stronger ad blockers.

Two big ideas from Pie

Fair Ads

We believe in a balanced alternative that unlocks 100% of ad impressions for publishers and advertisers when users are opted into ads. This ensures the user continues to see ads as a value-add and not a detractor.

How It Works

Pie Adblock allows users to opt into advertising, but only if they are compensated for their attention through our Fair Ads program. So far, over 80% of our users have opted in. We charge a commission on ad recapture that is much lower than leading ad wall rates, and pass that revenue back to Pie Adblock users.

Why This Matters:

• Our users WANT ads. We consistently get feedback from Fair Ads participants asking for more sites to be included in the Fair Ads program.
• Unlike ad-filtering solutions, which recapture only 5-10% of lost revenue, Pie enables 100% impression recapture.
• Unlike brute force ad blockers, Pie isn’t advocating for a world without ads—we're advocating for a fairer ad ecosystem.
• Unlike ad walls, Pie repositions advertising as an incentive rather than a frustration. While ad walls create negative sentiment and recapture revenue through user attrition, we drive lasting ad engagement and interest through user collaboration.

Fair Ads is still in the pilot phase, and we are looking for publisher partners to help us refine our reporting and publisher tools. We're happy to offer zero commission rates for publishers interested in joining our pilot.

Unblock

Pie understands the challenges of a web dominated by brute-force ad blockers, which strip publishers of revenue and remove user choice. That’s why we created Unblock, a solution that directly buys your ad-blocked impressions—because we believe so strongly in the value we offer to ad block users.

Unlike traditional ad walls that force users to disable their blockers, Unblock empowers them to unblock ads for the publishers and creators they want to support. Our on-page prompt reaches existing ad block users, offering a seamless way to switch to Pie. When they do, publishers regain 100% of their ad impressions—without the friction of hard paywalls or restrictive ad standards.

Brute-force ad blockers take the choice away from users and revenue away from publishers. Unblock puts both back where they belong.

By integrating Unblock on your site, you will join a partnership that

• Enables Higher Revenue Recapture
  • Unlike ad-filtering users stuck at 5-10% revenue recapture, over 80% of Pie users allow for 100% impression recapture.
• Supplements Your Blocked Ad Income
  • By promoting our call-to-action to users of other ad blockers, publishers earn extra revenue for every visit from ad blocking users.
• Reduces the Instability of Ad Blocking Circumvention
  • The constant battle between ad blockers and ad recovery tools creates an unreliable revenue model. Every user that switches to Pie is one less user circumventing ad walls.

A Better Relationship with Users and Ads

Digital advertising needs a reset—one that works for everyone. Pie is making that happen by creating a sustainable, user-friendly ad blocking alternative that benefits advertisers, publishers, and users alike.If you're a publisher looking for a smarter way to monetize in the age of ad blocking, Pie can help. Let’s create a better, more balanced internet—together.