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uBlock Origin becomes top addon on Firefox

addons.mozilla.org

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Re: uBlock Origin becomes top addon on Firefox

#181

Post by KarlKemp »

toastercat wrote: post #62

How do ya'll feel about the idea that adblock can be morally equivalent to theft[1]? I see this argument pop up from time to time in relation to people who use alternative clients to services such as YouTube. But if you're using uBlock Origin, you are probably browsing many, many sites that rely at least partially on ad revenue, so it's a similar case. [1] https://twitter.com/LeaVerou/status/518154828166725632

People find all sorts of arguments that are both logically and morally unsound to justify their behaviour, and it isn’t going to change.

For a while I thought they might notice that they are hurting themselves just as much as they are hurting the publishers, since ad blocking is part of the reason the time of freely reading thousands of high-quality sources is coming to an end. But there is really zero appreciation for the work of journalists. Local papers are already gone in rural areas and it took maybe five years until nobody remembers what they’ve lost.

Re: uBlock Origin becomes top addon on Firefox

#182

Post by freeAgent »

ksec wrote: post #82
openplatypus wrote: post #24

uBlock Origin, with CNAME uncloaking is the most powerful ad/tracker blocking tool. Browsing Internet without it is often time a scary experience. It does block our [Wide Angle Analytics]( https://wideangle.co/documentation/track-with-custom-domain ) tracker about which we are open about. And ... we are not against. Every user should have a right to self determination and control when browsing the Internet. Our track…

My experience with uBlock or in fact any Ad Blocker have been suboptimal. It sometimes uses a lot of CPU resources in places I dot understand and couldn't be bothered to figure out why. In the end I just switch to NextDNS.

NextDNS and uBO are complimentary.

Re: uBlock Origin becomes top addon on Firefox

#184

Post by onemoresoop »

runjake wrote: post #58
dvtrn wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I sometimes wonder if adtech devs also use adblockers.

It is a well-known fact they do. This is why adtech has gotten craftier about ads, and adblockers have had to respond accordingly.

That case is to thwart adblockers abilities to block ads. I think the OP's question was more rhetorical, as in they don't eat their own dog food type of thing.

Re: uBlock Origin becomes top addon on Firefox

#185

Post by ska »

loudtieblahblah wrote: post #177
oauea wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

or even just "they"

Quoted post unavailable.

You aren't going to have a whole lot of company. All of the major style guides have given it the nod because they are practical.

It's a weakness in English, lacking a unique indefinite pronoun - so we're probably stuck with "they" unless a neologism sticks.

Re: uBlock Origin becomes top addon on Firefox

#186

Post by CuriouslyC »

aidanhs wrote: post #34
Buttons840 wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Option 3, let the ad funded internet die and keep the remaining good parts.

Ad funding would never stop because people wanting to make money off content would never stop - it just becomes more subtle. Think sponsored posts, product placement, added bias. Imagine a plain text blog run by an individual, good quality technical content, and a company comes and offers $10k to write a blog post about their product after trying it. If the author decides not to disclose the financial motivation, you…

We already have mountains of shilled astroturf on the internet. I'm fine with it since shill content tends to be low quality and not too difficult to distinguish (except in google SERPS, which is another problem).

Legitimate content creators won't just blindly hop on the shill bandwagon because building a following is hard and takes time, and getting caught shilling can destroy your credibility and cause you to bleed followers VERY quickly. Adding a sponsor call-outs will probably be the ultimate go-to for legitimate content creators, but even that must be done carefully as pushing low quality sponsors will also hurt subscriber numbers.

Re: uBlock Origin becomes top addon on Firefox

#187

Post by Larrikin »

beardog wrote: post #131
Larrikin wrote: post #7

I prefer Ad Nauseum ( https://adnauseam.io/ ) because I don't want to just block the ads I want to ruin the profile ad companies have on me by having all the ads clicked as well.

UBlock Origin is not just an adblocker though, in their own words it is a "wide-spectrum content blocker" capable of blocking things like malware, cookie consent popups, social media buttons, and outsider intrusion into LAN. If adnauseam did those things I would use it (I don't want to run both at the same time). edit: i'm wrong, it is a ublock origin fork, apologies

Ad Nauseum is a wrapper over Ublock Origin. It says so in the second sentence explaining what it is.

Re: uBlock Origin becomes top addon on Firefox

#188

Post by biomcgary »

rpdillon wrote: post #134
planetafro wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I prefer DNS filtering over extensions as they generally want all permissions to essentially impersonate you at the browser level. Am I wrong?

> impersonate you at the browser level This is a new framing for me...I don't think of ublock as impersonating me, but rather representing me, like an agent in a transaction. While it's true that agents that represent you need to be trusted, there is also a huge upside: ublock origin can do things that DNS blocking cannot. Given ublock's (gorhill's) track record, I think this is an excellent deal.

Gorhill's track record is the critical bit. He transferred maintenance responsibilities for ublock to someone who immediately exploited it to make money, which is why we now have ublock origin. In a world of 7.9 billion people, it is amazing that a decent internet experience depends so much on a single person being competent and honorable. He (and the block list folks) are the heroes that run into the virtual dumpster fire and pull us out.

Re: uBlock Origin becomes top addon on Firefox

#189

Post by RedComet »

toastercat wrote: post #62

How do ya'll feel about the idea that adblock can be morally equivalent to theft[1]? I see this argument pop up from time to time in relation to people who use alternative clients to services such as YouTube. But if you're using uBlock Origin, you are probably browsing many, many sites that rely at least partially on ad revenue, so it's a similar case. [1] https://twitter.com/LeaVerou/status/518154828166725632

Ad blocking is analogous to paying someone to cut advertisements out of a magazine you ordered before you read it.

You request something which is when sent to your house. Sure it is via http, but that is irrelevant. It could have just as well been via snail mail.

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