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Firefox for iOS now has a native adblocker

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Re: Firefox for iOS now has a native adblocker

#161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"People are taking the piss out of you everyday. They butt into your life, take a cheap shot at you and then disappear. They leer at you from tall buildings and make you feel small. They make flippant comments from buses that imply you’re not sexy enough and that all the fun is happening somewhere else. They are on TV making your girlfriend feel inadequate. They have access to the most sophisticated technology the wo…

I agree that they’re evil and there are legitimate reasons to use ad blockers. But ("But" is such an unwelcomed word here) we need a better business model than ads to support free content creators, if we want to push back against The Advertisers.

The advertising business model destroyed any possible alternative, like Google Maps destroyed virtually all commercial maps, by providing products "for free" with costs well hidden from the public. Yet those costs exist and burden the society even more by removing the competition and enabling monopolies.

Who knows which products and business models would exist without it? The (actually free, non-monopolized) market would show us. I wish it could and am curious, too.

The real solution is to ban advertising and let the free market do its job, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43595269

Re: Firefox for iOS now has a native adblocker

#162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If and when I want a device I can tinker endlessly with, that’s very available to me already. I have some of them. What I don’t have is a desire to actively deny consumers a “just works” option that is extremely safe and reliable. No caveats. That would be of minor benefit to me and a detriment to many millions of people in general. The market spoke, and a huge number of people want those. That’s fine and should rema…

>If and when I want a device I can tinker endlessly with, that’s very available to me already. >What I don’t have is a desire to actively deny consumers a “just works” option that is extremely safe and reliable. No caveats. False dichotomy. Nothing about the latter means the former can't also be possible. Apple products disrespect customers in the name of the latter, telling them the former is dangerous and must be l…

Those two things are mutually exclusive here. You can't have that ecosystem and all the things people buy it for and have unrestricted control of it all. Those can't exist together.

And iPhone buyers aren't an oppressed people. They bought what they wanted in a market with alternatives.

The only anti-consumer position here is that those people should not be allowed to have that, anymore.

Re: Firefox for iOS now has a native adblocker

#163
post #95

Blocking ads wholesale is a terrible idea and unnecessary. What needs to be blocked is ads that execute client-side javascript (consuming your memory and cpu), ads that consume too much network bandwidth and so on. Ads are necessary so that content producers can generate income, without it they won't produce quality content. When you block abusive ads (as opposed to all ads), advertisers are encouraged to make their…

No. All ads, and I mean all ads, must be blocked. Our children must be raised to hate the product and brand that is shoved in their faces by an advertisement. I already keep mental notes of what ads I see alot and never, ever expend money on those brands or products. The fastest way to get me to never ever buy your brand, product, or service is to show me ads for it, and I want to spread my thought process to others so you have to actually make something decent that can spread word-of-mouth... rather than something to advertise.

Re: Firefox for iOS now has a native adblocker

#164
post #95

Blocking ads wholesale is a terrible idea and unnecessary. What needs to be blocked is ads that execute client-side javascript (consuming your memory and cpu), ads that consume too much network bandwidth and so on. Ads are necessary so that content producers can generate income, without it they won't produce quality content. When you block abusive ads (as opposed to all ads), advertisers are encouraged to make their…

No. We need to think in other ways than the ad economy. I’d gladly pay for good content if there was a decent system set up for it.

I find the best content is free content, made from passion rather than monetary need.

Re: Firefox for iOS now has a native adblocker

#165

In case anyone here missed it, there's a native Ublock Origin for Safari. It works great → https://apps.apple.com/us/app/ublock-origin-lite/id674534269...

Mostly so, it's got all the limitations of Manifest V3 which prevents it from doing a good bit of blocking, https://ublockorigin.com/#manifest-v3-section In particular: * Cannot use all filter lists simultaneously (rule limits apply) * No cosmetic filtering in the default mode * No scriptlet injection by default * Limited dynamic filtering capabilities * Requires broader host permissions upfront But it's definitely s…

Cosmetic filtering and script injection both work fine, they’re just off by default. Everybody works around rule count limits by making the one app register itself as like six different “Safari extensions”, it’s just clutter not a limitation. It requires no permissions up front and later permissions only granularly and rarely, for me only on YouTube, while the Firefox version does require unrestricted access to all domains. I have never seen a “dynamic filtering capability” it lacks or an ad it can’t block, do you have any examples?

Re: Firefox for iOS now has a native adblocker

#166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it's got all the limitations of Manifest V3 which prevents it from doing a good bit of blocking The only mainstream browser left that can still run the full version of uBlock Origin is Firefox. All the others have the same limitations imposed by Manifest V3.

Brave said they will be keeping its functionality.

Brave and Vivaldi built their own blockers, they aren’t addons.

Re: Firefox for iOS now has a native adblocker

#167
post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mostly so, it's got all the limitations of Manifest V3 which prevents it from doing a good bit of blocking, https://ublockorigin.com/#manifest-v3-section In particular: * Cannot use all filter lists simultaneously (rule limits apply) * No cosmetic filtering in the default mode * No scriptlet injection by default * Limited dynamic filtering capabilities * Requires broader host permissions upfront But it's definitely s…

What I like about uBO Lite in Safari is that I can use it without allowing it access to any of my data (it works in a purely declarative mode if you want). Even if it’s unlikely that uBO would be sold to a sketchy company, at least this provides protection against any supply chain attacks.

Yes, that was Google’s justification for killing MV2. It isn’t wrong, of course, but I insist on defining my own security posture and I prioritize adblocking.

Re: Firefox for iOS now has a native adblocker

#168
post #40

If you haven't been using Firefox, what are you even doing with your life?

I've been using it for 20 years and switched 4 yearso ago to something else. My life is fine, thanks. EDIT: so, the downvotes are because what, exactly?

I didn't downvote you, but your post has no useful information and looks like pure Firefox bashing for no reason. You don't tell why you switched, to what, what you gained. Not even mentioning that wherever you switched, your protection against ads and tracking must have become worse, as only Firefox supports Ublock Origin.

Re: Firefox for iOS now has a native adblocker

#169
post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Brave has certainly said a lot of good things while doing quite [0] a lot [1] of bad [2] things [3] that make me think it's mostly just marketing to lower-knowledge users that's carrying it forward. I see so many 'privacy' influencers that recommend it and Chromium, and then Firefox with no mention of FOSS options like LibreWolf, Tor Browser, IronFox, etc [0] https://github.com/brave/brave-browser/issues/15790 [1] ht…

Yep, I don't trust Brave. A web browser holds so much power over your digital life that it cannot be entrusted to a company that consistently and egregiously compromises its ethics for profit. Most of these examples border on scam behaviour... par for the course for the cryptocurrency space! For all their faults, Mozilla has never done anything that holds a candle to the kinds of stunts Brave keeps pulling.

Which is even more noteworthy because Brave is led by an ex-CEO and influential top exec of Mozilla's.

I wonder if he'd have done the same at Mozilla.

Re: Firefox for iOS now has a native adblocker

#170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It goes well beyond requiring an established company. It's so onerous that no company has yet successfully navigated all the gates required - even Google. Apple is maliciously complying with the EU's Digital Rights Act, and many years later, the EU has not concluded its investigations. I am incredibly disappointed.

Apple is the only thing holding back Chromium / Blink from becoming the only browser technology that matters. I hope they keep fighting that fight.

They don't fight it for that reason though. They don't care about an open web either.
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