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Adblocking people and non-adblocking people experience a different web

imlefthanded.com

451–460 of 844 posts

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

#451

Quoted post unavailable.

> In exchange for being exposed to advertising at a restaurant, you get free pizza.

Are you required to sign a contract for this exchange to happen? In that case, you would be breaching a contract, which is not the same as theft. If there's no contract, then I am free to go into a restaurant, plug in my earphones, keep my eyes glued to my laptop/phone and focus on whatever I want & ignore whatever else might be going on in the restaurant. While I sip my free pizza. If they have a problem with that, they could ask me to leave or not give me a pizza next time, but I most definitely haven't stolen anything.

If they continue to offer me free pizza despite the fact that I don't give a shit about all the ads in the restaurant, that's their choice. Hardly any different from websites that continue to serve me despite the fact that I block ads.

I've never signed a contract with a website where I agree to view ads.

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

#452
I experience this on my phone where adblock doesn't work that well. It's absolutely horrible to use the web there. The screen is already small, and then it gets filled with overlays getting me to use an app, ads, autoplaying videos, ...

I'm at the point where my phone is just an alarm, instant messenger and casual camera, since other apps are also full of annoying ads.

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

#453

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…

> It corrupts and twists everything it touches into a constant hustle for eyeball-cash This cannot be overstated. Everything today is a battle for eye-balls and ad money. The corruption is insane. You can't even buy appliances designed perform their function well. Instead you can buy cheap junk for less than cogs because they make money selling your data to ad companies instead of making money by making products that…

There are multiple reasons why it is hard to find good gear online.

In the case of electronics and photography gear it takes a huge amount of reading between the lines to interpret reviews even assuming the reviews are honest.

For instance at the Best Buy website there is a review for a photo printer where the user posted photographs of utterly ruined prints they made on this printer. Well, I've made prints like that too when I put the paper in upside down. That's what happens when you put the wrong side of the paper in.

A decade ago the story about Sigma lenses on Canon bodies was that 90% of them were OK but 10% were defective in subtle ways (like the autofocus doesn't quite lock on) Sigma on Sony today seems to be better. When you're reading reviews though you have to guess "did this person get a bad instance of the product or did this person have the wrong expectations for how this was supposed to perform."

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

#454

In FireFox I have my ad blockers disabled in Private Mode so nothing is getting in the way if I'm testing or some site is being weird. Sometimes it's SHOCKINGLY different how a page looks with the blockers in place. I really can't believe anyone would user a browser without an ad blocker if they knew how things would look while using one. The web is a much better place with a blocker in place. (Yes, I know, we get a…

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…

100% agreed. In fact I would feel guilty about not adblocking by supporting these types of practices.

If a site is responsible I will add them to my white list. How do I know if a site is responsible If I'm blocking you might ask? Well you just know.

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

#455

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you describe the negative consequence of BAT for a website owner that doesn't want to sell ads?

Website owners no longer have a choice. Brave is incentivized to add ads to otherwise ad-free websites, and apparently does so as Matthew Butterick complains about; https://practicaltypography.com/the-cowardice-of-brave.html

But you're not selling ads. The user has opted-in to seeing spamware that gives them OS-level notifications, right? Is this new? I guess I don't see the specific impact on web content producers.

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

#456

In FireFox I have my ad blockers disabled in Private Mode so nothing is getting in the way if I'm testing or some site is being weird. Sometimes it's SHOCKINGLY different how a page looks with the blockers in place. I really can't believe anyone would user a browser without an ad blocker if they knew how things would look while using one. The web is a much better place with a blocker in place. (Yes, I know, we get a…

Honestly this is how I feel about television vs streaming/Plex/ahoy matey. Going to another home and watching live television is a terrible experience because of ads but people seem fine with it because it’s what they’re used to, they don’t know better and it’s harder to do if they know better… probably all the same reasons people don’t use ad blockers and are fine with them.

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

#457
post #130

I've started to think about it differently. I no longer use any ad blockers. I actually want to experience the web (and its decline) the way it is, to take it all in, feel the pain and strengthen my patience in the process. Also, when I visit a website that is truly obnoxious with its ads, I simply leave immediately and never go there. You build your own filter of bad actors, behaviors, and concrete sites. You don't…

No thanks for me. Advertisements if nothing else consume too much of my local compute resources for zero benefit to me. Why should I give them this free compute?

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

#458

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you describe the negative consequence of BAT for a website owner that doesn't want to sell ads?

Website owners no longer have a choice. Brave is incentivized to add ads to otherwise ad-free websites, and apparently does so as Matthew Butterick complains about; https://practicaltypography.com/the-cowardice-of-brave.html

We don't and never have put ads in publisher pages. It's not ethical without site consent and our users don't want ads in baseline Brave.

If Brave users opt into Brave Rewards for private user ads in push notifications (which, contra Butterick, do not belong to any page they might be near or above; they belong to the user's inventory, same as new tabs and unrelated windows of all kinds), we still wouldn't put ads in pages without both publisher and extra user consent (too many users still wouldn't want in-page ads, even if opted into user push notification ads).

HN is full of made up nonsense about Brave, in spite of all the hackers here who can verify our open source, network behavior, etc. etc. This site has seen better days.

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

#459

What will be the long term consequences of majority of us using AdBlocks? And who will fill the void when running a website is economically unfeasible? Think of it like this : a majority of well respected publications are behind paywalls ; so people are consuming information from Facebook memes or WhatsApp posts or worse. And we know how well that is going for us as a society? YouTube ads are freaking annoying. But I…

> And who will fill the void when running a website is economically unfeasible?

You mean who will fill the internet with SEO-optimized garbage and other trash that only exist to serve ad impressions? I sure hope nobody will.

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

#460

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Consumer Reports does a great job at giving honest reviews. They go through multiple steps to ensure manufacturers don't know they're purchasing their products as well (to avoid getting beefed up 'review units'). And no, their service is not supported by ads - You have to pay for a subscription. Consumer Reports needs to be mentioned more IMO. Because even on reddit, there are companies that offer advanced stealth-li…

I use CR, but they do miss the target sometimes. They extrapolate a lot between models, sometimes farther than I think is justified by saying they are 'similar'. And occasionally they make really boneheaded recommendations that I just don't understand. On their recommendation I bought a Samsung washer and dryer pair, which both broke within the first 12 months. A bit of research on the appliance forum, and it turns o…

wirecutter on samsung refridgerators seems like one the fairest assessments i've seen: https://www.nytimes.com/wirecutter/reviews/the-best-refriger...
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