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Ads chew through half of mobile data

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Re: Ads chew through half of mobile data

#41
post #19

ads aren't chewing though my mobile data. I generally don't go to any sites with ads. The few times I open a link and it's covered in ads I close the link.

You might not be seeing visible ads but you're going to plenty of sites that are using tons of tracking pixels and making a lot of requests with and about various data you are providing. That might not be as data intensive as auto playing a video ad but it certainly makes a big impact overall.

Re: Ads chew through half of mobile data

#42

Fantastic example of a negative externality. Question: if the data costs were internalised, would an advertising-based revenue model be sustainable?

Advertising doesn't inherently imply wastefulness or even being spyware or a malware & scam vector.

If all the negative externalities were properly priced in, a lot of bottom-feeding crap at all layers of the stack will die off, but advertising itself will remain and would actually become better as a result for all parties involved.

Re: Ads chew through half of mobile data

#43
post #33
post #19

ads aren't chewing though my mobile data. I generally don't go to any sites with ads. The few times I open a link and it's covered in ads I close the link.

I’m going to take a wild guess that most of the world ain’t you?

Trivially true for all individuals. But also, anyone can use this solution.

Re: Ads chew through half of mobile data

#44
post #24

I love that the mobile version of the brave browser tells you how much data it saved you and how much time too.

Despite all their crypto bullshit and internal ad networks (which you can ignore/turn off), Brave mobile is great at blocking ads.

For instance ive never paid for YouTube premium to get rid of ads on mobile and allow background audio (yes they charge for background audio). On Brave mobile you can turn on background audio for all media and ive never seen/heard a YouTube ad.

Re: Ads chew through half of mobile data

#45
post #24

I love that the mobile version of the brave browser tells you how much data it saved you and how much time too.

I agree, that is a pretty good feature. You start feeling good when the data saved is in the gigabytes and time saved viewing ads is in the hours

Re: Ads chew through half of mobile data

#48

AFAIK, a lot of mobile ad blockers work by proxying your traffic through their servers. There may be more, but the only one I know works totally local is Firefox Focus. You can install it, set it as the ad blocker for iOS Safari and never actually use it as a browser. It’s not 100.0% effective. But, it makes a big difference with minimal hassle.

uBlock Origin is supported by Firefox on Android: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/android/addon/ublock-origin...
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