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Pale Moon blocks AdNauseam extension

forum.palemoon.org

111–120 of 263 posts

Re: Pale Moon blocks AdNauseam extension

#111
post #42
post #19

The motto of Pale Moon is "Your browser, Your way". But apparently not very so... The current ad system is broken and, although I understand Google decision to protect its own profits, I don't see why an open source project that aims to provide an unbiased browsing experience would follow suit.

How is "modify about:config" not having it "your way"?

Personally I can't tolerate for too long a software that I have to fight with everyday to make it work the way I want.

With Firefox it started with a few small changes but in the end I have found myself working on an userPrefs.js with hunders of lines, compiling the source with custom build flags and patches just to have a browser that doesn't spy actively on me.

I really hope it won't happen with PaleMoon too but this isn't a good sign.

Re: Pale Moon blocks AdNauseam extension

#112
post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One might argue that you do agree, when you make use of their services.

No, Google terms of service does not forbid you from blocking Google ads. And no free rider argument please, I am perfectly willing to pay for Google's service. If Google wants to get paid, they can make Google Contributor available in my country. I already pay for YouTube Red.

Blocking is much different than fraudulently clicking.

Re: Pale Moon blocks AdNauseam extension

#113
post #16

I've never heard of this fork before and Im not sure why its on the front page of HN.

I don't use Pale Moon but it has been around for a while. It got a boost when Firefox switched to the Australis interface and people who didn't like it switched to Pale Moon. And it has been getting another boost because of Firefox getting rid of the old extension model.

Re: Pale Moon blocks AdNauseam extension

#114
post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're hurting the publishers. I'm a software developer at a local newspaper. We've been dealing with floods of fake ad clicks for about a year now, and they severely hurt our bottom line. We don't even use an ad network a la google, we sell our own ads to local businesses and such. You're not sticking it to the man, you're punishing me and my colleagues and friends for writing content that you wanted to read. You're…

People installing AdNauseam probably want to hurt you and your colleagues, so it's working as intended. That is, there are people who believe ad-supported publications on the web should die. If their choice causes your ad-supported publication to die, mission accomplished.

Nailed it. If your business doesn't have a product so you only profit through advertising, you shouldn't be trying to make it a business.

Re: Pale Moon blocks AdNauseam extension

#115
AdNauseam is foolish because if this is a success adnetworks go back to the good old days of the ugly in your face ads to ensure they count you as seeing there ad on each impression. Remember the exit ad that loaded after you left the page? Remember the expanding full page banner? They will be back.

Re: Pale Moon blocks AdNauseam extension

#116
post #48
post #19

The motto of Pale Moon is "Your browser, Your way". But apparently not very so... The current ad system is broken and, although I understand Google decision to protect its own profits, I don't see why an open source project that aims to provide an unbiased browsing experience would follow suit.

But thats just it. The extension, by trying to provide a "unbiased browsing experience" to the user but sending false clicks to the networks, is punishing the author/publisher in the middle. This is a bad analogy but the closest I can find: Its like saying I don't like big book publishers so I'm not going to pay for the book at the independent book store. Again, that analogy quickly falls apart but the initial point…

It's more like when the book store asks you for your phone number, home address, and driver's license before they will accept your credit card, and so you simply pay them with cash.

Re: Pale Moon blocks AdNauseam extension

#117

>Generating this kind of traffic does not achieve its intended goal (providing protest against ad networks or causing advertising to fail for ad networks) since the ones punished are the publishers (those who rely on this revenue) and not the ad networks. I don't think I follow? People don't like the ad networks and want them to change or fail. That's achievable by forcing change at either the advertiser, the network…

Yeah, no. This sort of purposefully doing fake clicks at websites you're a fan of thing ups the chances of that website of getting banned from their ad network. Which is paying their hosting bills. Which simply puts them out of business.

Yes, it might put those sites out of business - the websites which rely solely on web traffic use fake titles, sensationalist headlines, click baits, troll baits, fake news i.e. most of what is wrong with the internet. It harms them in the short term... and the most evil company in the history of the world in the long term. I see it as win-win.

Re: Pale Moon blocks AdNauseam extension

#118
Never heard of adnauseam before, the developers deserve a Nobel Peace Prize. The argument saying that it damages the publishers and not the ad networks is pure nonsense. By damaging the publisher's ability to make money of ads you also damage the ad network - how is this not clear?

ALL and I mean all advertisers can die a slow agonising death as far as I care. They are adding nothing of value to the civilisation. And if your reply is "well, how about I start charging you for my website?" then I'm absolutely fine with it. Please do.

Re: Pale Moon blocks AdNauseam extension

#119
post #19

The motto of Pale Moon is "Your browser, Your way". But apparently not very so... The current ad system is broken and, although I understand Google decision to protect its own profits, I don't see why an open source project that aims to provide an unbiased browsing experience would follow suit.

> After investigating the AdNauseam extension's behavior and the results for web publishers, the extension has been added to the Pale Moon blocklist with a severity level of 2 (meaning you won't be able to enable it unless you increase the blocking level in about:config to 3).

They block it by default but you can still disable the block manually. Its hardly an unreasonable form of protest.

Re: Pale Moon blocks AdNauseam extension

#120
post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, Google terms of service does not forbid you from blocking Google ads. And no free rider argument please, I am perfectly willing to pay for Google's service. If Google wants to get paid, they can make Google Contributor available in my country. I already pay for YouTube Red.

Blocking is much different than fraudulently clicking.

Google terms of service does not forbid users from producing invalid clicks either. (Point 1, it's called invalid, not fraudulent. Point 2, Google does forbid website owners, but not users.)

I am just objecting to your statement that when one uses Google's service, one is making any sort of agreement that one wouldn't block ads or produce invalid clicks. There is no such agreement.

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