Google to restrict modern ad blocking Chrome extensions to enterprise users • Hacker News Board

Re: Google to restrict modern ad blocking Chrome extensions to enterprise users

#121

Post by ronsor » Wed, May 29, 2019, 11:08 PM UTC

ljm wrote: post #98

user17843 wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed, almost the entire ad-blocking market is controlled by the company behind Adblock Plus (eyeo GmbH), who has contracts with Google. It appears they also own AdBlock, and uBlock (not confused with uBO), so during the last years they basically tried to capture the entire market. The fact that Eyeo has >150 employees tells us something about the amount of money to be made from ad blocking. Although they have only…

This is why it’s so unfortunate and frustrating that people are depending so much on Chromium/Blink. Electron, various browsers that are just skins over the embedded framework... We were still dealing with legacy IE6 (and IE 7/8 by that point also) in 2013! Almost a decade since we got Firefox and the first version of Chrome. The web has empirically suffered through homogeneity and the lack of strong competitors in t…

People depend on Chromium/Blink because there's no other options. You can't really embed Gecko, and WebKit (Safari) can sometimes lack desirable web platform features.

Re: Google to restrict modern ad blocking Chrome extensions to enterprise users

#122

Post by tyingq » Wed, May 29, 2019, 11:09 PM UTC

panarky wrote: post #32

redwards510 wrote: post #13

Google is essentially saying that Chrome will still have the capability to block unwanted content, but this will be restricted to only paid, enterprise users of Chrome. Never heard of a paid version of Chrome before! Can anyone elaborate on this? I gotta say I'm kind of glad Google is doing this. It will force me to finally abandon Chrome, something I should have done awhile ago.

This is essentially not true. Content can still be blocked with extensions, but it will be more difficult to handle large block lists. See this comment from the author of uBlock Origin and uMatrix. https://github.com/uBlockOrigin/uBlock-issues/issues/338#iss...

"Content can still be blocked with extensions"

Well, without live heuristics. Chrome ad blocking is basically now limited to a dumb, limited list of URI patterns. Better than nothing, but much less capable than before.

Re: Google to restrict modern ad blocking Chrome extensions to enterprise users

#123

Post by dymk » Wed, May 29, 2019, 11:09 PM UTC

tty2300 wrote: post #64

JohnJamesRambo wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean we would be paid for viewing ads this way instead of being paid nothing as it is now, and losing all our privacy instead. Seems like a win/win to me. Advertisers would actually pay the eyeballs that should be paid for seeing ads instead of the middleman in the attention economy. The technology in the Basic Attention Token performs all the functions instead.

I get paid for working a job. I don't want any ads on my screen.

"I get paid for working a job. I don't want to pay road tolls"

"I get paid for working a job. I don't want to pay the grocery store for my food"

Re: Google to restrict modern ad blocking Chrome extensions to enterprise users

#124

Post by shadofx » Wed, May 29, 2019, 11:10 PM UTC

Causality1 wrote: post #60

Ugh. Now I'm going to have to switch my passel of family members, neighbors, and friends who rely on me for tech support over to Firefox. Not that Firefox isn't going the same way eventually. Firefox crippled the ability for real customization with Firefox 57 and it's only gotten worse since then.

Pale Moon exists if you want the old school Firefox add-in capabilities

Re: Google to restrict modern ad blocking Chrome extensions to enterprise users

#125

Post by EastSmith » Wed, May 29, 2019, 11:12 PM UTC

I wonder what MS will do with Edge(Chromium)?

I've been using it for couple of weeks now as a secondary browser to Brave (separate sessions etc) and it is looks and behave like a normal Chrome.

Hope MS fight this.

Re: Google to restrict modern ad blocking Chrome extensions to enterprise users

#126

Post by ndiscussion » Wed, May 29, 2019, 11:12 PM UTC

bradstewart wrote: post #93

irrational wrote: post #85

I don't get it. I've used Firefox and Chrome for years. Firefox is easily as good and capable as Chrome. The barrier to switch from Chrome to Firefox is almost non-existent. Is Google counting on the majority of people not being knowledgeable enough or motivated enough to switch browsers?

I've been using Firefox for the last two weeks or so. It's fine, but noticeably slower (on a 2018 MacBook Pro) when opening new tabs and especially dragging tabs into new windows. It also seems to get stuck resolving DNS sometimes, which is probably an artifact of the corporate network, but Chrome doesn't have that problem.

I know this is contentious, but I think the problem might be that you're using a razor-thin device with extreme thermal throttling problems. I experience no such slowdowns on a 2011 Acer econobook with an i5 and 4gb ram.

Re: Google to restrict modern ad blocking Chrome extensions to enterprise users

#127

Post by whalesalad » Wed, May 29, 2019, 11:13 PM UTC

I recently setup Pihole as the DNS server for my entire home network and said farewell to my Adblock extensions. It's glorious.

Re: Google to restrict modern ad blocking Chrome extensions to enterprise users

#128

Post by mediocrejoker » Wed, May 29, 2019, 11:14 PM UTC

Improvotter wrote: post #117

jressey wrote: post #5

Here are browsers that aren't just 'not Chrome,' they are better. Brave: https://brave.com/ Firefox: https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/

The only thing I'm missing on Firefox is when I am on my Macbook, is that fling when using my touchpad. It's essential to any MacOS app and it feels weird not to have it. I'm used to it on Linux and Windows though.

By fling, do you mean the two-finger horizontal scroll to move back and forward through history? If so, I miss it too.

Re: Google to restrict modern ad blocking Chrome extensions to enterprise users

#129

Post by snek » Wed, May 29, 2019, 11:18 PM UTC

bradstewart wrote: post #93

irrational wrote: post #85

I don't get it. I've used Firefox and Chrome for years. Firefox is easily as good and capable as Chrome. The barrier to switch from Chrome to Firefox is almost non-existent. Is Google counting on the majority of people not being knowledgeable enough or motivated enough to switch browsers?

I've been using Firefox for the last two weeks or so. It's fine, but noticeably slower (on a 2018 MacBook Pro) when opening new tabs and especially dragging tabs into new windows. It also seems to get stuck resolving DNS sometimes, which is probably an artifact of the corporate network, but Chrome doesn't have that problem.

Firefox is often faster than chrome for me on my 2015 MacBook air

Re: Google to restrict modern ad blocking Chrome extensions to enterprise users

#130

Post by codethief » Wed, May 29, 2019, 11:18 PM UTC

bradstewart wrote: post #93

irrational wrote: post #85

I don't get it. I've used Firefox and Chrome for years. Firefox is easily as good and capable as Chrome. The barrier to switch from Chrome to Firefox is almost non-existent. Is Google counting on the majority of people not being knowledgeable enough or motivated enough to switch browsers?

I've been using Firefox for the last two weeks or so. It's fine, but noticeably slower (on a 2018 MacBook Pro) when opening new tabs and especially dragging tabs into new windows. It also seems to get stuck resolving DNS sometimes, which is probably an artifact of the corporate network, but Chrome doesn't have that problem.

I'm having the exact opposite experience with Chromium: Sometimes, two to three tabs (regular websites, no videos, no fancy stuff) already make it freeze. My Firefox, in contrast, runs smoothly even with dozens of tabs open.