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China forces Mozilla to remove adblockers from its store

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Re: China forces Mozilla to remove adblockers from its store

#11

Post by haunter »

lazyeye wrote: post #4

Sidenote: Why does the west allow China to run a social media app like Tiktok globally whilst China itself blocks all external apps within its own borders? Arguing that if we block them we are just as bad as them is niave to me. Like giving away all concessions in a trade negotiation to gain the high moral ground. Seems like such an obvious question to me.

>Why does the west allow China to run a social media app like Tiktok globally whilst China itself blocks all external apps within its own borders

I never understood why can CCTV, CGTN, Global Times etc. freely upload and stream on Youtube. Same level as RT or even worse.

inb4 "FrEe SpEEch" + "they are a private company and they can do whatever they want"

Re: China forces Mozilla to remove adblockers from its store

#12

Post by wewtyflakes »

ratsmack wrote: post #7
derivagral wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No client has an obligation to let a web site have control over their machine. The way I and many other got into our careers was being able to fiddle around, explore, and customize our own experiences (aka blocking stuff like this, fixing UI issues, etc.)

>No client has an obligation to let a web site have control over their machine. Web sites do not force you to load their content, so I must assume you feel entitled to what ever you want in this regard.

They do if their URL is misleading or is otherwise disguised. Also, it is common to click links without knowing ahead of time what the full content of the page is. That may not be ideal, but this is what it is. Ad blockers give users a layer of protection against malicious, lazy, or overeager websites. You seem to suggest users should just take it all or not visit, but that seems to only make sense if links advertised what users would be getting into (ex: visit this link and let us cryptomine you for content!"). Maybe that would be better and more honest, though I don't see how it would work with how people use the web today.

Re: China forces Mozilla to remove adblockers from its store

#13

Post by hker »

lazyeye wrote: post #4

Sidenote: Why does the west allow China to run a social media app like Tiktok globally whilst China itself blocks all external apps within its own borders? Arguing that if we block them we are just as bad as them is niave to me. Like giving away all concessions in a trade negotiation to gain the high moral ground. Seems like such an obvious question to me.

Not to disagree, but if we go down this direction, we need to then ask [1]:

- What about search? (Baidu vs Google or Bing)

- What about news agencies? (CGTN and Xinhua vs BBC and The New York Times and The Guardian)

- What about the Internet itself? (Great Firewall vs effectively none)

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_websites_blocked_in_ma... "List of websites blocked in mainland China"

Re: China forces Mozilla to remove adblockers from its store

#14

Post by musicale »

lazyeye wrote: post #4

Sidenote: Why does the west allow China to run a social media app like Tiktok globally whilst China itself blocks all external apps within its own borders? Arguing that if we block them we are just as bad as them is niave to me. Like giving away all concessions in a trade negotiation to gain the high moral ground. Seems like such an obvious question to me.

What you're suggesting I think is a tit-for-tat strategy, which has game theoretic advantages, though I'm not sure what the eventual result would be in this case since it seems unlikely that China would allow Facebook, Twitter, NYT, etc..

Re: China forces Mozilla to remove adblockers from its store

#16

Post by neuralRiot »

ratsmack wrote: post #3

I know it is not popular opinion, but it wouldn't bother me if all add blockers were removed. No web site has an obligation to serve pages outside of their intentions regarding advertising. If a website is too annoying and in your face with adds, I just move on and find a site that is more accommodating. Some sites only exist for the purpose of pushing adds using stolen content and they are fairly easy to identify, s…

This is exactly what i do, your site forces me to disable the adblocker? Goodbye.

Re: China forces Mozilla to remove adblockers from its store

#17

Post by akomtu »

ratsmack wrote: post #3

I know it is not popular opinion, but it wouldn't bother me if all add blockers were removed. No web site has an obligation to serve pages outside of their intentions regarding advertising. If a website is too annoying and in your face with adds, I just move on and find a site that is more accommodating. Some sites only exist for the purpose of pushing adds using stolen content and they are fairly easy to identify, s…

By this logic we should ban earphones, as those let people evade audial ads at gas stations, and also ban deaf people (the latter are bigger offenders). Otherwise how does it make sense, that the gas station is selling gas at a discount, hoping to recover the difference with ads, and those deaf freeloaders come over, simply grab what they need and leave, without paying their moral duty of watching ads?

Re: China forces Mozilla to remove adblockers from its store

#18

Post by ratsmack »

akomtu wrote: post #17
ratsmack wrote: post #3

I know it is not popular opinion, but it wouldn't bother me if all add blockers were removed. No web site has an obligation to serve pages outside of their intentions regarding advertising. If a website is too annoying and in your face with adds, I just move on and find a site that is more accommodating. Some sites only exist for the purpose of pushing adds using stolen content and they are fairly easy to identify, s…

By this logic we should ban earphones, as those let people evade audial ads at gas stations, and also ban deaf people (the latter are bigger offenders). Otherwise how does it make sense, that the gas station is selling gas at a discount, hoping to recover the difference with ads, and those deaf freeloaders come over, simply grab what they need and leave, without paying their moral duty of watching ads?

I didn't say anything about banning. People should be able to use any mitigation method that they want. I just personally don't care to use any myself, hence my statement.

Re: China forces Mozilla to remove adblockers from its store

#19

Post by ratsmack »

tinus_hn wrote: post #8
ratsmack wrote: post #3

I know it is not popular opinion, but it wouldn't bother me if all add blockers were removed. No web site has an obligation to serve pages outside of their intentions regarding advertising. If a website is too annoying and in your face with adds, I just move on and find a site that is more accommodating. Some sites only exist for the purpose of pushing adds using stolen content and they are fairly easy to identify, s…

With that attitude we wouldn’t just have ads but the pop-up hell of yesteryear, combined with unstoppable seizure inducing eardrum piercing video ads and all encompassing tracking with no way out. And because it’s a race to the bottom, on every site.

If people would simply not visit sites that are toxic, they would change or go out of business. I would be all for a site that tracked the toxicity of sites as a method of shaming them.

Re: China forces Mozilla to remove adblockers from its store

#20

Post by lazyeye »

musicale wrote: post #14
lazyeye wrote: post #4

Sidenote: Why does the west allow China to run a social media app like Tiktok globally whilst China itself blocks all external apps within its own borders? Arguing that if we block them we are just as bad as them is niave to me. Like giving away all concessions in a trade negotiation to gain the high moral ground. Seems like such an obvious question to me.

What you're suggesting I think is a tit-for-tat strategy, which has game theoretic advantages, though I'm not sure what the eventual result would be in this case since it seems unlikely that China would allow Facebook, Twitter, NYT, etc..

It would put some constraints on Chinese surveillance and influence operations.
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