uBlock Origin is giving up the fight to keep ads off Facebook • Hacker News Board

Re: uBlock Origin is giving up the fight to keep ads off Facebook

#931

Post by ndriscoll » Fri, Aug 14, 2026, 4:11 PM UTC

RestlessMind wrote: post #930

ndriscoll wrote: post #866

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The underlying technology enablers are from companies like Intel, AMD, Qualcomm, TSMC, Micron, all sorts of ISP/cell providers, etc. They're the reason why computers are over 10x faster than they were 10-15 years ago, storage is 1000x faster, networks are 100x faster, etc. The technology is cheap because of actual technology companies. You don't need a centralized service for video calls. You need lots of bandwidth b…

> The underlying technology enablers are from companies like Intel, AMD, Qualcomm, TSMC, Micron, all sorts of ISP/cell providers, etc And they exist because of demand from the consumers. All those providers have no incentive to invest and upgrade their offerings if there is no demand. Said otherwise, without the likes of YouTube and Whatsapp video chat (and many other ad-funded social media apps), we would be stuck i…

Those companies have been developing hardware with exponential improvements for generations now. They wouldn't have stopped if not for youtube. Youtube and Whatsapp became possible because of them, not the other way around.

Phone companies are literally a concrete, non-theoretical demonstration that call signaling doesn't need to be centralized for a good experience. There's also already XMPP which works like email: you can add your contacts and just start video calls over it just like you can just send emails. It works today. It scales today. You can use it right now, but the monopolists lock everyone into their networks.

Your "counter-example" proves my point: giving youtube away for free canabalizes youtube premium.

Re: uBlock Origin is giving up the fight to keep ads off Facebook

#932

Post by lrvick » Fri, Aug 14, 2026, 5:25 PM UTC

dofm wrote: post #916

lrvick wrote: post #861

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No Hypothesis needed. I lived it. I have at various points made a living with various combinations of PC repair, electronics recycling, museum displays, day labor, retail, trucking, telemarketing, street and restaurant entertainment, food service, mailroom work, vending machines, factory assembly lines, craft sales, construction, home AV, and I have probably forgotten a few. And those are just the low-tech gigs. I ca…

And things have changed . People don't answer cold calls! They increasingly don't read emails. There are no classified ads worth a damn. They work from home! They ask AI more than they google. The remaining stuff is on Facebook. It is pointless arguing people shouldn't look to Facebook to find these kinds of jobs and get those recommendations, and preaching the morality of independence to, say, a gel nail technician…

I did all those jobs when Facebook usage was at its peak. It is not crucial to networking, and engagement is plummeting in these walled gardens as content is mostly ragebait, spam, and scams now.

I know the breadline well. Worked my way up from living in my car and eating out of trash cans. I do not personally know anyone who has come up from a lower place than me, and my advice remains constant because people are still the same even as technology evolves.

You can network at meetups, giving talks, trade shows, workshops, classes. Nothing converts higher than meeting people in person. That was true 20 years ago and may be even more true 20 years from now as human generated content on the internet drops to near zero.

Never build a business on hoping an algorithm someone else controls is nice to you.

Re: uBlock Origin is giving up the fight to keep ads off Facebook

#933

Post by pull_my_finger » Fri, Aug 14, 2026, 6:50 PM UTC

c7b wrote: post #727

snickerer wrote: post #549

Ads are an attack, aimed at your brain. They try to inject malware into your thinking, manipulating your worldview and your actions. That's horrible, worse than attacking a machine with malware, damaging persons and societies. Decades of ad propaganda have tricked people into seeing them as something 'normal'. But we shouldn't accept being under constant attack of brain worms. I propose a sane rule for all humans: if…

There is some utility to ads. Knowing that my favorite shop has a promotion, that a movie, game or book I've been waiting for is out, or something other that might interest me has some usefulness. The problem isn't the ad per se, it's optimization through A/B-tests and the like, mass psychological experiments with all the rigor of scientific studies and none of the academic ethical safeguards for human subject experi…

I agree with this take. Sites used to sell banner space, negotiate a price and place the ad themselves. There was human review of what was being placed. Now apps and sites just let ad providers inject whatever they want, seemingly without oversight from the app owner and different ~~ads~~ payload depending on who's viewing. I have no issue with the tech blog I'm reading advertising the web host they use and support, or a wiki site advertising merch for the subject of the wiki. I'd bet those kind of ads get better returns on their investment too. What I find unconscionable is when my kids are playing some kids game on a tablet and they're bombarded with ads for GTA-like games idealizing violence and meaningless chaos interspersed with overly sexualized dress-up games or even political advertisements depending on your geolocation. Totally outrageous and I am eternally grateful for people like R. Gorhil (uBO) and Steven Black (for his curated hosts lists) that at least help me mitigate as much as I can, knowing that without 100% standing over the shoulder of my kids at all times when they touch a device it's almost impossible to otherwise avoid.

Re: uBlock Origin is giving up the fight to keep ads off Facebook

#934

Post by devilsdata » Sat, Aug 15, 2026, 2:04 AM UTC

colesantiago wrote: post #683

BenjiWiebe wrote: post #479

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes it does. Hobbyists are willing to spend their own money, hence their blog doesn't need ads. Businesses make money by selling products/services, so they don't need money. Wikipedia is donation supported. GP is pretty much saying - if it can only survive by running ads, let's do without it.

> Yes it does. Hobbyists are willing to spend their own money, hence their blog doesn't need ads. Until it is unsustainable which is the majority of cases due to no funding. > Wikipedia is donation supported. The majority of websites are not as big as Wikipedia, let alone having donations in the tens of millions. The GP talks about Mastodon which hobbyists run and users sign up to instances to have their social ident…

> 9.9/10 times it doesn't work

I'll concede that it doesn't work out a lot of the time. This is not very different from for-profit websites. Also, your number of 9.9/10 is probably pulled out of your ass. I'm note sure what the real number is, but I'd wager it's lower than 9.9/10.

I'm not sure how old you are, but in the early 2000s there were so many community forums; most of them survived. Even if it doesn't, the community can go to another host at some point.

This isn't the counterargument you think it is.

Re: uBlock Origin is giving up the fight to keep ads off Facebook

#935

Post by thunderfork » Sat, Aug 15, 2026, 6:08 AM UTC

ericmay wrote: post #838

lcnPylGDnU4H9OF wrote: post #834

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Use of non-sequitur doesn't apply It does, in precisely the way I described. Your comment was not engaging with the point they brought up. > The flaw in the premise is that you need Facebook or a government fun Facebook to do any of the things the OP suggested. This is not in their premise. Nobody "needs" it for those things, I will grant and have granted. Regardless, some still "use" it for those things. OP never…

> It does, in precisely the way I described. Your comment was not engaging with the point they brought up. Ok that's incorrect because I did engage with the point they brought up in that comment, and then even quoted it specifically. > This is not in their premise. Nobody "needs" it for those things, I will grant and have granted. Regardless, some still "use" it for those things. OP never said people can't replace it…

if it doesn't serve a purpose then why users

Re: uBlock Origin is giving up the fight to keep ads off Facebook

#936

Post by Gareth321 » Sat, Aug 15, 2026, 7:55 AM UTC

account42 wrote: post #917

Gareth321 wrote: post #590

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I couldn't agree more. I suspect 80%+ of all comments now are bots. Paid for by the highest bidder. The entire front page is undoubtedly bought and paid for, as well. Subreddits are only allowed to survive if they don't threaten the paid for messaging and advertising.

But that makes the login requirement just odd. You'd think they want to push their manipulation to as many people as possible.

Reddit charges for bot access now. That's a rapidly growing new business segment for them.

Re: uBlock Origin is giving up the fight to keep ads off Facebook

#937

Post by gfrecvh » Sat, Aug 15, 2026, 11:57 AM UTC

alex1138 wrote: post #476

gfrecvh wrote: post #348

If you're on Facebook, you deserve the ads

Yeah because how dare people actually connect with family and friends and "just get phone numbers/emails" or "just build their own" Stop. Blaming. Users.

People are on Facebook to scroll. For connection you have phones, email, text message, and others.

Re: uBlock Origin is giving up the fight to keep ads off Facebook

#938

Post by pocksuppet » Sat, Aug 15, 2026, 4:19 PM UTC

abirch wrote: post #699

gucci-on-fleek wrote: post #686

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I propose a sane rule for all humans: if you see an ad somewhere, or if you suspect a hidden ad ('influencers' trying to promote something), close the tab immediately and never return to that site. But this very site has lots of ads on it. Up until a few days ago, there was an "Apply to YC Fall 2026" link at the bottom of every page, and the front page usually has ads on it too [0]. So it seems tricky to strictly f…

The difficult thing is people don't want to pay for things. Ads are a way to mitigate that so that people/companies can capture some value that they create.

Nobody wants to pay for anything, but if they have to pay to get what they want, they do.

Re: uBlock Origin is giving up the fight to keep ads off Facebook

#939

Post by DJBunnies » Sat, Aug 15, 2026, 5:02 PM UTC

bastardoperator wrote: post #513

DJBunnies wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some of us plan events / engage socially.

What's your favorite type of event to plan on Facebook?

Birthdays, bachelor parties, random poker nights.

It's far easier and has further reach than doing it manually.

Re: uBlock Origin is giving up the fight to keep ads off Facebook

#940

Post by askvictor » Sat, Aug 15, 2026, 10:37 PM UTC

ssernikk wrote: post #526

askvictor wrote: post #506

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This exists for facebook.

Can you give us a link or something?

I've been using fluff busting purity, though it hasn't been updated in a few months so starts to crack at the seams.