I'm using DNS66 on Android to block ads at the DNS level. I wouldn't browse on mobile without it.
This and Firefox on Android with uBlock Origin
Ads chew through half of mobile data
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Re: Ads chew through half of mobile data
#92(Video portals aside) The text you want to read: a few kilobytes. The (oeconomical, an economical) cost of the ads surrounding it: several dozen to a hundred megabytes. You cannot convince me that this _isn't_ unsustainable quackery that got out of hands really, really bad.
Unsustainable for who? The websites use CDNs for dirt cheap bandwidth, mobile providers love that 20gb doesn’t go as far as it used to. It inevitably creates a synergy, between stuff like news websites and local telcos, and YouTube love it too. hell, it’s not like all bandwidth cost the same, especially when major orgs will cache + colocate or peer to your isps.
If you’re a consumer you might be right, but your opinions and feelings aren’t of importance to those in power.
Re: Ads chew through half of mobile data
#93It's immoral that you cannot turn off videos in a browser and/or that this isn't the default option on phones.
I use Stopthemadness to stop video autoplay
The fact that we need a "stop the madness" app for Safari is proof of Safari's insanity.
If Stopthemadness actually works reliably, it is also an existence proof that blocking video autoplay is possible, and that Apple is simply not fixing the "never auto-play" setting in Safari.
Perhaps Apple and Mozilla should just remove the "never auto-play" settings in Safari and Firefox and say that they are doing so in order to empower web sites and adtech companies (including Google/youtube, who pays them a lot of money) to force you to view unwanted video advertisements.
Re: Ads chew through half of mobile data
#94Earlier quoted context omitted.
As someone who switched from Iphone to Android, Adguard is very poor compared to uBlock, and it was in fact one major reason (of several) why I switched. But now that Google is killing adblockers, I might just stop browsing the internet entirely.
Firefox on Android does work and does run uBlock Origin all right. I only start Chrome if some very stubborn (usually financial) site fails to work with Firefox + ad blocking; this happens maybe 3-4 times a year.
But how long is manifest v2 going to survive on Firefox?
Re: Ads chew through half of mobile data
#95Earlier quoted context omitted.
Does it have an in-frame modal that pops up immediately after page load to beg me for my email address? What about an embedded video window that covers the bottom 2/3rds of the content and follows with scroll? Oh and I hope you've not left out the absolutely mandatory "Read More" button that spawns a user interaction and auto-plays everything on the page. Those are all of my favourite things on the web and I really e…
I hate intrusive ads as much as the next guy, but denying that ads have benefits and people overwhelmingly choose ad-supported services over paid ones is simply sticking your head in the sand.
Saying people overwhelmingly choose ads is conceptualizing things wrong. Take this blog: it just copied a BI snippet about a study some other party did. No one even linked to the original study.
People correctly value this at $0. This post is noise, and things like it just make web crawling/search harder to scale.
Re: Ads chew through half of mobile data
#96Worst example I've seen is an app called Foodora here in Norway (like Uber Eats, Door Dash, etc). On the order confirmation page where you're following your order status, following the driver on the map, etc, they would have video ads playing _uncached_. It was literally using like 1 MB/s of traffic continuously while you were checking the order page.
Re: Ads chew through half of mobile data
#97Fantastic example of a negative externality. Question: if the data costs were internalised, would an advertising-based revenue model be sustainable?
The biggest negative externality of advertising is the fact that it drives mass overconsumption.
Re: Ads chew through half of mobile data
#98A solution: AdGuardHome and WireGuard running at home. WireGuard connects on-demand when I leave home. I choose to run it at home because there are cases where services and/or sites block datacenter IPs, and I have complete control over what and how I block, no proxying through any blocking service.
How do you set this up? I have no experience but would like to do something similar.
Re: Ads chew through half of mobile data
#99Earlier quoted context omitted.
You can try adguard on iOS. It’s an app that you buy as an extension for safari but the block lists are very good and you can enable DoH systemwide as well.
As someone who switched from Iphone to Android, Adguard is very poor compared to uBlock, and it was in fact one major reason (of several) why I switched. But now that Google is killing adblockers, I might just stop browsing the internet entirely.
I tried to switch from android to ios earlier this year. The browsing experience was so awful that I didn't make it a day due to the lack of ublock.
Re: Ads chew through half of mobile data
#100Fantastic example of a negative externality. Question: if the data costs were internalised, would an advertising-based revenue model be sustainable?
Yes - advertising is very profitable. Increasing the cost would lead to a short term reduction in spend by advertisers, which would squeeze the adtech industry. They’d respond with improvements to their specs which reduce bandwidth and return levels closer to normal. Totally fixable problem with the correct incentives.
Interesting note, the privacy sandbox apis that google (was) is pushing were extremely bad for bandwidth to the point that in early tests our servers often did not respond in time to successfully bid in an auction. This occurred in many steps different steps of the auction (ssps as well). Google of course kind of moved away from this set up before fixes were implemented. (If the time between a user loading a page and the result of a programmatic auction is too long, ads may not be served)