Use HOSTS file to block ad/mal wares?

(From a post originally titled "Network Solutions down ?"  I responded to
it, but it appears the response went only to CPF0000.  Hence this "new" post
to PC-tech...)

On 10/23/06, Jones, John (US) <John.Jones@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Update your hosts file: http://www.mvps.org/winhelp2002/hosts.htm

Basically, add the contents of http://www.mvps.org/winhelp2002/hosts.txt
to c:\windows\system32\drivers\etc\hosts to resolve a lot of ad, pr0n,
and other sites to localhost - 127.0.0.1.  Doing so causes the ads to
not load as they aren't found on your local PC.  It should speed up your
browsing.

Wow, I've never heard of this.  Do all browsers "refer" to the hosts file,
or just IE?

How often do they update this?

I'm going to look into this later, but, wow, good post John!

- Dan