Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions • Hacker News Board

Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions

#451

Post by 0des » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 12:17 PM UTC

Jenk wrote: post #122

dkdbejwi383 wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Can't we have one piece of good software that doesn't try to shove "relevant" "suggestions" from "trusted" "partners" down our throats? If you pay for it, yeah. But you can't have that and have the software be £free to use

Many people would pay for firefox. I don't know if it's enough people to offset what advertisers are willing to pay, nor if adding that would dissuade too many users but it'd be nice to have the option to pay so we can support the development of the browser directly, and avoid adverts. Donating to the foundation feels a bit like donating to the WWF because I want to help a specific Panda I met at the zoo.

If there were an option to pay 1-2 bucks a month and not have Pocket or anything third party, I'd pay that. I am curious why they seem hesitant to approach this model. It isn't like most of us never purchased Netscape before.

Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions

#452

Post by drdec » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 12:20 PM UTC

OneTimePetes wrote: post #397

toyg wrote: post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's unsustainable. It's what some projects already try to do with Chromium, and it just doesn't work: every time Google steers a bit more towards evil, the downstream burden increases significantly, and sooner or later the bad patches creep in anyway. There is an institutional problem at Mozilla, we should focus on fixing that rather than trying to come up with even more complex sticking plasters.

Whats needed is a rebirth, basically the Mozilla team quits, creates a new mozilla inc and leaves the old one behind to go full chrome appocalypso. Basically what nature does when the elder generation acquires to many parasites and dna damages, spawn a new generation and die, taking most of the parasites with them.

Yes, the new browser would rise like a phoenix from the ashes, a firebird if you will...

Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions

#453

Post by soundnote » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 12:21 PM UTC

teddyh wrote: post #442

rglullis wrote: post #435

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Really? That is quite odd. Users receive crypto if they join the brave rewards system. The rewards are directly related to Brave's revenue from their ad network - the notification ads. Advertisers put money for a known reason and a quantifiable investment. It's all opt-in. Users don't need to put any of their own money to be able to withdraw the rewards they receive. It's as much the opposite of a scheme as it can be…

Any system which involves money and is not immediately obviously simple to understand is almost always created in order to steal people’s money.

The Brave system is pretty simple, though? They sell ad space, people buy ad space. Brave shows you ads and keeps a cut, they give their users a cut. Brave has a tipping service which lets users tip sites they like. End result is advertisers can advertise, and people making content get some of the ad money, the setup's just built to not track people.

The big concern there is that ads that don't track are generally less valuable so even widespread adoption of Brave's system would cause a decrease in ad revenue, same as Apple's recent anti-tracking changes.

Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions

#454

Post by 0des » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 12:21 PM UTC

huhtenberg wrote: post #111

eCa wrote: post #4

As someone who has used Firefox since v0.* I really, really, really dislike the language they have used lately. > relevant suggestions from our trusted partners The suggestions are not relevant to, and the partners not trusted by, me.

> RELEVANT suggestions The fuck with this? How can they make _relevant_ suggestions without spying on my (s/browsing history/activity/), profiling it and phoning back to the mothership? (Edited, "browsing history" -> "activity")

The trick is, you can't, unfortunately. You can have relevant ads that encroach on your privacy, or you can have possibly irrelevant ads that don't. If we are considering all possibilities, they could have precomputed some magic to do it all locally, but I have doubts about that because it seems more difficult to do that than just slap an identifier on your keystrokes and consult their ad-partner API.

Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions

#455

Post by ayushnix » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 12:21 PM UTC

dividedbyzero wrote: post #353

neuronic wrote: post #251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Brave is Chromium...

I was under the impression that Brave was a more privacy-friendly variant of Blink/Chromium?

If you're looking for a privacy friendly fork of Chromium, the only option that's worth considering is Ungoogled Chromium on Desktop and Bromite on Android.

https://github.com/Eloston/ungoogled-chromium https://github.com/bromite/bromite

Brave has crypto ads and a lot of other unnecessary stuff built in. They've also made questionable decisions in the past, like inserting referral codes in links. If anything, Brave is a worse choice than Firefox in terms of privacy even after enabling this new ad suggestions feature.

Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions

#456

Post by mblock » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 12:22 PM UTC

samizdis wrote: post #128

eCa wrote: post #4

As someone who has used Firefox since v0.* I really, really, really dislike the language they have used lately. > relevant suggestions from our trusted partners The suggestions are not relevant to, and the partners not trusted by, me.

> I really, really, really dislike the language they have used lately. That is exactly the problem I have with it - weasel words and euphemisms; FF is scoring an own-goal here and eroding trust. Why not just tell it like it is. "We need funding and are lining up deals with third parties to display their ads/messaging in the address bar search. We vet these third parties by holding them contractually to these standard…

Why are we shocked about marketing?

Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions

#457

Post by gear54rus » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 12:22 PM UTC

mszcz wrote: post #68

davidsergey wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn't know about it, thanks. But I'm software engineer, and I didn't know about it. I don't think most (as in 95%+, even in tech) people would know difference to care. My point is visibly – firefox seem to be just as ad-hungry as competition. They could be better behind the scenes, but customer wouldn't know it.

You know what I miss? Software I can pay for. I'd happily shell out couple of bucks a year for a browser. Or a social network. I'd be more than happy to pay regularly for something that requires regular, constant, maintenance, upkeep, servers, salaries. But no, somehow humanity landed on free+ads. Ugh. Yeah, I'm sorry. I'm just grumpy.

If they were sure enough people would pay for something they'd just make it paid AND shove ads in it.

Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions

#458

Post by andrepd » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 12:23 PM UTC

cabalamat wrote: post #403

samizdis wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I really, really, really dislike the language they have used lately. That is exactly the problem I have with it - weasel words and euphemisms; FF is scoring an own-goal here and eroding trust. Why not just tell it like it is. "We need funding and are lining up deals with third parties to display their ads/messaging in the address bar search. We vet these third parties by holding them contractually to these standard…

> Why not just tell it like it is. Indeed. Mozilla should be honest. That's what builds trust. We all know they need money, so if this gives them money to improve FF, fine by me. But they need to quit the marketing bullshit-speak.

They need money to improve FF so they will get it by fucking up FF? Sounds counterproductive to me.

Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions

#459

Post by kiryin » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 12:23 PM UTC

It's sad to see Mozilla go down this road, one time after another.

I don't mind it if they need the money (they don't, look into their finances and come tell me with a straight face that this non-profit isn't making the ends meet), it's comparable to default search engine placement and search suggestions, can be turned off etc.

What I have a problem with is the dark-pattern-esque language, like "relevant suggestions" and "trusted partners." I'm used to seeing that kind of messaging from the FAANG boogeymen, not Mozilla who's supposed to be the last fortress of the open internet. After years of conditioning it very strongly implies untrustworthiness to me, makes me immediately suspicious of some nefarious scheme.

I would vote with my feet but there are no options left, any other choice would mean betraying my values even further. I am being held hostage.

Re: Mozilla to put ads in Firefox address bar suggestions

#460

Post by executesorder66 » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 12:25 PM UTC

daveoc64 wrote: post #194

huhtenberg wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> RELEVANT suggestions The fuck with this? How can they make _relevant_ suggestions without spying on my (s/browsing history/activity/), profiling it and phoning back to the mothership? (Edited, "browsing history" -> "activity")

> How can they make _relevant_ suggestions without spying on my browsing history, profiling it and phoning back to the mothership? If you search for "hotels", they'll show you suggestions that match "hotels". Doesn't seem that complicated to me.

They didn't ask how can they make relevant suggestions. They asked how can they make relevant suggestions WITHOUT SPYING ON MY BROWSING HISTORY.

Try again.