Google engineers want to make ad-blocking (near) impossible • Hacker News Board

Re: Google engineers want to make ad-blocking (near) impossible

#281

Post by jeroenhd » Wed, Jul 26, 2023, 12:05 PM UTC

People get mad at Google for implementing something Apple already implemented up to a point, that the economic driving force behind the free internet is asking for.

It's a shit idea but honestly Google isn't even the bad guy here. Everyone is mad at the theoretical anti-adblock usage of theoretical websites. Be mad at those websites instead!

Almost every free service out there runs on ads. If you pay your subscriptions, you probably won't even notice these shitty websites. There is exactly one group of people who will be hit the worst, and that's people who want everything for free with no ads and no requirement to provide anything of value in return. Guess what? No business can operate like that!

Google is in some very deep shit if the alleged ad fraud stories are true. They need to be able to verify that people are human or they will collapse under lawsuits.

We wouldn't need this crap if we, as a society, hadn't decided that we want everything for cheap or for free. Remote attestation can actually be valuable (i.e. for company owned devices entering a corporate intranet) but the fact everyone fears getting locked out of everything is a symptom of a much bigger problem with the internet today, one we're probably not willing to face.

I'm all for killing the big tech giants and bringing back competition, but Google quickly going bankrupt will be disastrous. Youtube and about fifteen years of human existence will disappear from the internet, billions of phones will stop receiving updates, gmail.com will disappear and businesses all over the world will be ruined as a result.

Even if this falls through, Google will still need to validate real browsers somehow. Expect CAPTCHAs for every news article instead. Maybe solve some puzzles before you can comment. This is their user friendly, unobtrusive attempt to get this tech through; if it fails, I expect their next attempt to be much worse. The web may very well end up being like browsing through Tor.

Re: Google engineers want to make ad-blocking (near) impossible

#282

Post by calgoo » Wed, Jul 26, 2023, 12:05 PM UTC

erklik wrote: post #201

edg5000 wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I switched over to a fully open source environment, at least for mobile/desktop OS, browser, almost all software as well as cloud file storage etc. But with a notable exception where I still use Google Search. Perhaps with the rise of LLMs, one day I will run my own LLM to complete the move to being no longer reliant on monopolists.

Depending on the use-case, I find DDG is far better in many cases in returning sane search results. Might be a option to try. Not entirely open-source but better than the GOOG.

Same here, been using DDG for several years now and have not had any issues. I have tried switching to google a few times when im not finding what i need, but get turned off by their recommendations as well as just bad search results. I remember it took be a few weeks to get used DDG when i first switched. In a way it felt like going back to how search used to work, more keyword based, less trying to guess my life story to try to figure out what i really want.

Re: Google engineers want to make ad-blocking (near) impossible

#283

Post by gettodachoppa » Wed, Jul 26, 2023, 12:06 PM UTC

mozball wrote: post #234

edg5000 wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree, I use Firefox everywhere. But we must not forget the following: In 2011 Mozilla income was 85% derrived from Google, through the primary search engine deal. Around a billion was paid over three years as part of this deal at some point. Appearantly there was bidding by Microsoft for making Bing the default, which pushed up the pricing. So every time Mozilla speaks out against Google, it is a bit awkward, sinc…

Mozilla should really double down on Mozilla VPN. Judging by all the NordVPN ads on every major youtuber's video, the profit margins must be astronomical (or their business model must be suspicious). It should provide a good income stream for Mozilla. The entire space is shady and filled with dubious actors. It is just begging to be disrupted by a trustworthy organization. I can't think of a single candidate other th…

VPNs are barely gonna make a dent in their income. What do you think the market is for VPNs? 99% of people don't know what VPN means.

Of the remaining 1%, most don't need a VPN for anything personal. It's literally just a handful of geeks who need VPN (mainly for secure piracy, or accessing different regional Netflix catalogs), and maybe a few dozen journalists living in dictatorships.

Mozilla needs to gut spending. Get rid of all the diversity /hr/evangelism people bloating their employee headcount and funneling people's donations to divisive causes like that org that doesn't hire white men (forgot the name but it made me cancel my monthly donation to Mozilla). They shouldn't need more than 25% non-technical staff, and the purpose of those 25% should be exclusively to support the technical staff. Instead they became another bloated Big NGO that's basically welfare for liberal arts majors in California.

Re: Google engineers want to make ad-blocking (near) impossible

#284

Post by merricksb » Wed, Jul 26, 2023, 12:06 PM UTC

Earlier discussions:

Web Environment Integrity API Proposal – https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36817305 (618 points/4 days ago/442 comments)

Google Chrome Proposal – Web Environment Integrity – https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36778999 – (117 points/7 days ago/94 comments)

Web Environment Integrity Explainer – https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36785516 (87 points/6 days ago/44 comments)

Re: Google engineers want to make ad-blocking (near) impossible

#285

Post by mozball » Wed, Jul 26, 2023, 12:06 PM UTC

concordDance wrote: post #255

mozball wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an example, Can you recommend a good tech/hacker video channel that is available somewhere else other than Youtube?

Arent everyday astronaught, practical engineering and tom Scott available on their own websites?

I visited Practical engineering and tom scott's websites and AFAI seen they embed youtube videos in their websites. I couldn't find astronaught's website. Its not even linked to in his youtube channel.

Re: Google engineers want to make ad-blocking (near) impossible

#286

Post by bell-cot » Wed, Jul 26, 2023, 12:06 PM UTC

bradley13 wrote: post #142

nfriedly wrote: post #57

I hate to say it, but if you used Chrome to read this, then you're part of the problem. Awful stuff like this wouldn't stand a chance if Google didn't have such a near-monopoly position. For the sake of the open internet, please switch to a different browser. IMO, Firefox is best*, but even something chromium based is probably fine. Just not Google Chrome. * On desktop - Firefox is a bit weaker on Android, with an ex…

Web standards are a part of the problem that few people think about. Existing rendering engines grew along with the standards. However, the standards (especially CSS) have become so absurdly complex that implementing a new engine would be nearly impossible. Even Microsoft caved, and Edge is now essentially Chrome. Some will point out that Chrome is based on open-source software. In reality, however, Google has a huge…

THIS...except "a part of the problem" is miserably understated.

Extreme technological complexity is just about the best possible moat a huge business can have. Though in this case "walls around the prison in which the users are incarcerated" might be a better analogy.

And all the prisoners, who just can't resist the endless shiny new goodies added to the web standards, are forever building their own prison walls higher...

Re: Google engineers want to make ad-blocking (near) impossible

#287

Post by hcks » Wed, Jul 26, 2023, 12:07 PM UTC

jwr wrote: post #56

Unfortunately, we will all happily accept this. Because using Chrome is "convenient". People will accept anything for convenience — WhatsApp is a good example, where millions of people worldwide happily share and sync their entire phone book with Facebook/Meta. If you care, stop using Chrome. If you criticize this evil move, but continue using Chrome, you are part of the problem.

Please explain the terrible consequences of sharing my phonebook with Meta

Re: Google engineers want to make ad-blocking (near) impossible

#288

Post by skydhash » Wed, Jul 26, 2023, 12:07 PM UTC

meepmorp wrote: post #203

detourdog wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's important to remember they are only commercial efforts. If you can value something other than money it doesn't matter what the corporate web is doing compared to human ingenuity and the internet. Let them waste their time and money write their specs.

Normal people interact with the “corporate web,” because they feel compelled to do things like banking, buying stuff, etc.

I don't mind in these cases. Because I already have to present my ID card or my driver's license, when I'm doing most of this. I'd buy a cheap laptop, label it as a banking and ecommerce laptop/tablet, and use it to browse the corporate web. More friction, yes, but I'd welcome it as it would make me reluctant to interact with them. Any other sites that try would just end on my blacklist.

Re: Google engineers want to make ad-blocking (near) impossible

#289

Post by codedokode » Wed, Jul 26, 2023, 12:07 PM UTC

jeroenhd wrote: post #200

mozball wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

iirc remote attestation is reliant on hardware attestation, which means these websites will only run on authorized DRM-enforcing hardware and architectures. Only Intel, AMD, Qualcomm and the like. No open-source firmwares, architectures or hardware.

What attestation the website accepts entirely depends on the configuration. There's nothing in the spec that will prevent attestations for Linux computers. Linux already works perfectly fine with secure boot and such, I don't see why a signed bootloader starting a signed attestation engine wouldn't be trusted by third party websites. It'll kill open platforms like the rare open source RISC-V implementations, but for…

> I don't see why a signed bootloader starting a signed attestation engine wouldn't be trusted by third party websites.

Do you mean a kind of Linux where root cannot do anything he wants? Like Android?

Re: Google engineers want to make ad-blocking (near) impossible

#290

Post by rationalist » Wed, Jul 26, 2023, 12:08 PM UTC

systems_glitch wrote: post #225

liendolucas wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But my point is that you do have plenty options in the industry! For sure if you're in charge of something like this you can have a pretty decent job elsewhere. You sound as if those people have nowhere else to continue their careers... Am I wrong?

Yeah, you're kind of a little wrong. Sure, there are options. They don't pay like FAANG, like order of magnitude difference.

Lots of people get by fine with less-than-FAANG pay.

(FAANG salaries are not an "order of magnitude" higher than salaries at other U.S.-based companies for similar jobs.)

FAANG salaries are just at the level at which those companies discovered people are willing to sell their souls, or that is high enough to attract naive people who won't question why it pays more.