> Chrome will track user data for the benefit of advertisers. The entitlement mentality towards user behavioural data is wild
Why?
Google Chrome just rolled out a new way to track you and serve ads
371–380 of 435 posts
Re: Google Chrome just rolled out a new way to track you and serve ads
#372Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Can anyone explain to me why this is worse than third-party cookies? How about thinking the other way around: Can you, or anyone else for that matter, explain to me why this is better than commercial interests not following us around at all ? > turn off third-party cookies, but a bunch of the internet breaks if you do that Most of what breaks is just tracking for ad serving purposes. I'm fine with that breaking. So…
> Can you, or anyone else for that matter, explain to me why this is better than commercial interests not following us around at all? Because people prefer free, ad supported content on the internet. Once you accept that premise, then it's a matter of balancing privacy, volume of ads, and payments to creators (ad tech companies are going to get theirs). Do you think the majority of people would prefer fewer, better t…
> Because people prefer free, ad supported content on the internet.
I have no objection to adverts based on what I am looking at at the time, or more random blanket advertising⁰, as long as they are not too obtrusive or intrusive: flashing ads, auto-playing audio, and so forth, are out.
Unfortunately modern ad tech is apparently inseparable from following us around our online existence logging everything we do, which is on the list of things I consider to be too intrusive.
> as long as it is tracking them anonymously
Yes. But call me a cynic if you will: I don't trust that the proposed system is as guaranteed to be anonymous as is claimed (or at least implied).
> payments to creators?
Remuneration for creators is why I don't use sponsorblock and such. Sponsor segments aid the creators without having to track me wherever I go online.
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[0] though I am getting tired of seeing adverts for Temu everywhere, anything broadcast en-mass to the point of annoyance¹ well never result in me buying a product or using a service
[1] I could name several others, Temu is just the most recent example
Re: Google Chrome just rolled out a new way to track you and serve ads
#373Earlier quoted context omitted.
I use Chrome at work and Firefox on personal devices (including my Android phone). As a heavy user of both browsers, as far as I can see there is really no downside to Firefox. In fact, even though presumably there are way more engineers working on Chrome than on Firefox, I guess most of Chrome's engineering effort goes towards benefitting advertisers, not users. While Chrome seems entirely stagnant since I adopted i…
Chrome Mobile is the largest reason I would not recommend an Android (specifically Pixel) device to friends or family. I bought one, and I found myself actively avoiding browsing the web on it. Even after installing Firefox you can’t get rid of the Google Chrome web search bar on the home screen, and in-app web views are Chrome, so you’re never really free from Chrome. I do understand the why of ads, and I’m okay wit…
I mean, you bought a hardware device from the same company that sells ads. Of course it is going to be encumbered with mechanisms to get those ads in front of your eyeballs. That's like complaining about getting bit when trying to pet the snarling foaming at the mouth dog.
Re: Google Chrome just rolled out a new way to track you and serve ads
#374Earlier quoted context omitted.
I genuinely don't believe that 700 people work on Firefox because if that were true the quality would be much different and things would be done faster.
The main bottleneck to any parallel process is aggregation.
I was just sitting here wondering how the logistics of coordinating the time of all of those developers worked.
Re: Google Chrome just rolled out a new way to track you and serve ads
#375Earlier quoted context omitted.
I can comment that FF feels slower on iOS but it makes so little difference these days. We’re talking small fractions of a second.
Don't all browsers on iOS have to use Safari for rendering?
I believe you're correct but and maybe it's placebo but there is some process of loading and viewing a web page that feels faster in safari. maybe safari does some sort of pre-fetching? i barely use it so even my anecdotal sample size is not large
Re: Google Chrome just rolled out a new way to track you and serve ads
#376... does this article seem a little low quality to anyone else? > By far the most private browsers are specialist non-tracking browsers that prioritise no tracking, such as DuckDuckGo... wha??? > Tracking technology can arguably benefit us as well. For example, it could be helpful if an online store reminds you every three months you need a new toothbrush, or that this time last year you bought a birthday card for yo…
The comment about DuckDuckGo seems fine?
... wuh?
OH THEY MADE AN ANDROID BROWSER.
ok. In my defense I did consider "DuckDuckGo made a browser"? and googled it before I posted this comment, but I did not find any results. Your comment made me dig deeper to find the Android one.
I still think that sentence is a bit stilted though, it's got some department of redundancy department vibes. But I yield the point on that one.
Re: Google Chrome just rolled out a new way to track you and serve ads
#377Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Can you, or anyone else for that matter, explain to me why this is better than commercial interests not following us around at all? Because people prefer free, ad supported content on the internet. Once you accept that premise, then it's a matter of balancing privacy, volume of ads, and payments to creators (ad tech companies are going to get theirs). Do you think the majority of people would prefer fewer, better t…
If there was only a single choice for advertisers to place a completely static banner on the page, they would still be happy. As long as no other advertiser had more capabilities. Restrict them all and the money would still flow as the ads would increase sales just as much.
It boils down to greed. Targeted ads are proven to have larger profits, which increases the more precise the targeting is.
No advertiser wants to go back to dumb ad campaigns like they used to run on traditional media, simply because they're far less profitable.
Which is why they're concerned about the restricted and more general profiles the Topics API will give them. They want even more granular topics[1], and Google can do this at any point once the controversy has died down, and this feature gains traction.
Make no mistake that if this turns out to be less profitable, many advertisers will still resort to cookie tracking, fingerprinting, and any other shady mechanism, as long as the browser and lack of regulation allow them to do so.
[1]: https://searchengineland.com/googles-topics-api-advertisers-...
Re: Google Chrome just rolled out a new way to track you and serve ads
#378Earlier quoted context omitted.
Chrome Mobile is the largest reason I would not recommend an Android (specifically Pixel) device to friends or family. I bought one, and I found myself actively avoiding browsing the web on it. Even after installing Firefox you can’t get rid of the Google Chrome web search bar on the home screen, and in-app web views are Chrome, so you’re never really free from Chrome. I do understand the why of ads, and I’m okay wit…
Of course you can get rid of the "web search bar". Not sure what launcher the Pixel is using, as I have a Samsung device, but you can install a different launcher if needed. The in-app views can be Firefox by just setting it as the default browser. Lest we forget, at least Android has an actual Firefox implementation, versus iOS which does not. Not sure what you're talking about, but if you bumped into certain cases…
FWIW, you can now install PWA apps with Firefox. The implementation is not as polished as chrome, though.
Re: Google Chrome just rolled out a new way to track you and serve ads
#379Earlier quoted context omitted.
There are definitely sites that don't work in Firefox, although they are pretty far and few between. Mailgun is one of the worst offenders. when I mentioned to their support that auth among other things was broken in Firefox, their response was "use chrome"
I heard "avoid mailgun"
Yes that is good advice. I wouldn't use Mailgun again if I was starting from scratch today. The email sending infra is pretty solid, but their web UI is really fragile and routinely has outages. And of course, does not work in Firefox.
Re: Google Chrome just rolled out a new way to track you and serve ads
#380Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, and raise prices for everyone?
Maybe paying $10/mo for email or $199 once for a browser is a good thing. Maybe if people didn't feel like browsers and email and search were human rights that should be given to them freely, moral hazards be damned, the internet wouldn't be the clusterfuck that it is now?
There are millions of people in the world who buy unsubsidized Android phones for less than $60 a year in developing countries.
Even in the US, the median cost of an Android phone is less than $300 and then you expect them to pay $200 for a browser?
Besides, it’s never just a one time purchase. Is that one time purchase going to get you security updates and if so, for how long?