Adblocking people and non-adblocking people experience a different web • Hacker News Board

Re: Adblocking people and non-adblocking people experience a different web

#151

Post by 20after4 » Mon, Jan 31, 2022, 5:39 PM UTC

DamnYuppie wrote: post #32

vbezhenar wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm using my own simplistic adblock at home (mostly because youtube ads driving me nuts) and I don't use any adblock at work (mostly because I'm too lazy to configure it). I'm not a fan of using browser extensions, especially those which require full access to every webpage, that's too much of attack surface in my opinion and ads are not that bad on websites I visit.

I use Firefox with Ublock Origin, Ghostery, and the YouTube Enhancer plugin. I get zero adds on YouTube with this setup!

uBlock alone seems to do the trick for YouTube.

Re: Adblocking people and non-adblocking people experience a different web

#152

Post by tardismechanic » Mon, Jan 31, 2022, 5:39 PM UTC

MarkusWandel wrote: post #50

I stopped watching network TV in the 1990s when it reached about 25% ads (i.e. 7.5 minutes of ads in a 30 minute window. May have been only 7 minutes, memory is fuzzy now). The web was a relief. You could actually consume content and tune out the (then primitive, usually just a banner at the top) ads. The web, specifically un-adblocked Youtube, is now at about the same point as where I quit TV. Just not worth the agg…

I seem to remember maybe 5 30sec ads so must be 2.5 minutes.

I even vaguely remember this was lampshaded in Fresh Prince (?)

Uncle Phil is having a heart to heart chat with young Nicky and in the middle says something like "ok nice talk see you in around 2 1/2 minutes" which I thought was hilarious

Re: Adblocking people and non-adblocking people experience a different web

#153

Post by soco » Mon, Jan 31, 2022, 5:39 PM UTC

whoibrar wrote: post #134

apricot wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I feel zero guilt about ad blocking. The amount of guilt I feel about ad blocking is equal to the amount of guilt advertisers feel about bothering me with their ads.

This is the way

No post body was provided.

Re: Adblocking people and non-adblocking people experience a different web

#154

Post by giaour » Mon, Jan 31, 2022, 5:39 PM UTC

TheIronMark wrote: post #51

reincarnate0x14 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel zero guilt about ad blocking. There was some period of discussion on the subject back in like 2003 but the ad companies went to war against human civilization and there's been no going back. It corrupts and twists everything it touches into a constant hustle for eyeball-cash and an entire generation has now reached adulthood knowing nothing but that hustle touching every bit of media they ever interact with. W…

Quoted post unavailable.

I don't. I subscribe to the publications that I regularly read, but their websites are still mostly unusable without an ad blocker.

Re: Adblocking people and non-adblocking people experience a different web

#155

Post by chrisseaton » Mon, Jan 31, 2022, 5:39 PM UTC

bee_rider wrote: post #137

chrisseaton wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No? I'm not sure that's the gotcha you think it is - I also don't read random web pages that I'm not interested in, and I don't sit and 'read' adverts on pages I am reading.

I guess I assumed too much, then -- where's the dubious morality come from?

Because the implicit agreement of a site with adverts is that the content's available to you with the adverts on it. If you don't like that you don't have to read it, but if you remove them automatically then I think it's hard to argue you aren't breaking an implied agreement.

Re: Adblocking people and non-adblocking people experience a different web

#156

Post by stn8188 » Mon, Jan 31, 2022, 5:40 PM UTC

gigel82 wrote: post #103

warner25 wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I run Firefox with uBlock Origin, and spend most of my time on pages like HN and other old-school forums that are mostly just text. My wife runs Chrome with all defaults and spends a lot more time in the mainstream web. Whenever she wants to show me something on her laptop, I think to myself, "how can she subject herself to this all day?!" For me, the experience in her browser is like being assaulted. She doesn't wan…

Sounds familiar. Installed uBlock on hers and whenever a website doesn't work for any reason I get an earfull about my "damn adblocker"... :)

Same... Used to have a Pi Hole on the entire network but had to remove it for this reason.

Re: Adblocking people and non-adblocking people experience a different web

#157

Post by bun_at_work » Mon, Jan 31, 2022, 5:40 PM UTC

TheIronMark wrote: post #102

reincarnate0x14 wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why don't I get paid for my HN posts? Do I owe you for your reply? Do you owe me for this reply? You work out how we commoditize every interaction into tiny micropayments so MBAs are happy with our time allocations and let me know. Ads were tried, and it's been an absolute fucking disaster.

> Why don't I get paid for my HN posts? That's between you and HN and has nothing to do with my consumption of your comment. > Ads were tried, and it's been an absolute fucking disaster. No one likes ads, but expecting free content is silly.

Who is saying they expect free content?

I'd pay a monthly fee for unmolested search results. I pay for Youtube Premium. I only watch ad-free content that I pay for.

I don't want the content for free - the free stuff is usually worse in quality anyway. I just want to be left alone by advertisers. I don't need what they are selling and the reduce my ability to think. The sheer amount of noise they add to the world makes them a problem.

Re: Adblocking people and non-adblocking people experience a different web

#158

Post by vehemenz » Mon, Jan 31, 2022, 5:40 PM UTC

coldpie wrote: post #28

led76 wrote: post #24

I have no Adblock on my phone and it’s unbelievable how many ads some sites put up. Many times I have to hunt for the second half of the article past five or six full image ads and sponsored content. This feels like a death spiral - the more Adblock the more ads they’ll put up to get seen by a smaller segment of users.

Firefox for Android supports uBlock Origin. Works great, highly recommended. iPhone solutions seem less advanced, unfortunately, but they exist. Personally I use one called "Adblock Pro," but that's not an endorsement, just the one I tried that has stuck.

Adguard for Safari does the trick for Safari on both iOS and macOS.

I've tried others, and they don't seem to do much. Adguard works as well as uBO 90% of the time.

I only see a difference when visiting actual malicious sites, like pirated sports streams, where Adguard might occasionally lets a pop-under through.

Re: Adblocking people and non-adblocking people experience a different web

#159

Post by redml » Mon, Jan 31, 2022, 5:40 PM UTC

Tenoke wrote: post #63

zuminator wrote: post #7

I've had YouTube Premium since its inception. Whenever I'm around someone else who puts on a free-tier version of YouTube its rather shocking how frequent and intrusive the commercial ads are.

In all fairness, if the rest of us didn't run adblockers, they probably wouldn't need to be so aggressive with the ads for those that currently don't.

There was a time back in the IE6 era where firefox didn't really have any market share and adblockers weren't really a thing.

The advertising industry was really aggressive even then. Some publishers put as many popups and banner ads as they could. I'm not saying all publishers would do this, but I have to admit the worst actors are the ones I strongly remember.

Only difference now is that there's a lot more tracking and ads are more insidious where they blend in with content now.

Re: Adblocking people and non-adblocking people experience a different web

#160

Post by Zak » Mon, Jan 31, 2022, 5:40 PM UTC

Macha wrote: post #77

knaik94 wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thankfully, with android, firefox still has addon support so ublock origin can still be used regardless of price point.

I wish it had full addon support though, rather than just Mozilla's curated selection of 20 or so. I have to install an app to do twitter -> nitter redirection when it could just be a browser extension.

I switched to Kiwi because of this.

I occasionally check to see if Firefox has unbroken extensions on Android and won't be back to using it as my primary browser on my phone until it does or Kiwi ceases to be an option.