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Adblocking: How about Nah?

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Re: Adblocking: How about Nah?

#201
post #119
post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agree. I’d go as far as forbidding embedded JS altogether which removes the attack vector for malware within advertising networks. The networks have proved time and time again they are not able to prevent distribution of malware, and this is the primary reason I use an adblocker. Maybe a new tag which points to a resource which can only serve an image, video or text. Absolutely no scripting. Pass along only the adver…

> Maybe a new tag which points to a resource which can only serve an image, video or text. Absolutely no scripting. Pass along only the advertiser ID and the bare minimum. How would fraud detection work in this model? How do advertisers know the requests are coming from real users and not bots? Without assurance there, advertisers would pay much less, and publishers would earn much less. (Disclosure: I work on ads at…

Consumer: im blocking all ads for reason x

Advertiser: dont block my ads because the business depends on it

Consumer: here's a solution that works for me

Advertiser: but then that solution doesn't work for me

Consumer: i don't care, im still blocking all ads until I feel like i don't have to

Re: Adblocking: How about Nah?

#202
post #67

I don't actually want to block ads. If you want to put a small text or image blurb anywhere on the page... Good for you. I'll gladly accept those on a webpage so that the content creator can make a bit of cash. But these companies are intentionally blurring the lines between advertisement and digital surveillance. You don't need to collect everything about my operating system, browser, monitors, GPU, every click I ma…

Yeah not to mention malware is often fed through ad services. I want context based ads. Context being the web page I am on not my life story. All it takes is one of these tech giants pulling a Equifax and who knows how much data spills over.

Domain-specific auctions was nice when it was done by Project Wonderful, but there is too much convenience in being able to push advertisements for the entire internet.

Designing secure APIs that can’t be misused by a Cambridge Analytica or similar is a hard problem. Google Plus was “breached”.

Re: Adblocking: How about Nah?

#204
post #196

There are more countries besides United States. I don't know why people here always refer to it as if it were the only ruler of the internet. It's not. In fact it does a piss poor job at playing its part.

Of the major browsers which are non-US based? Hint: not the majority. The point the op was making had nothing to do with your response claiming the US is the "only ruler of the internet".

Does the US do a poor job of regulation of monopolies in tech? You don't have to look hard to find supporters of that statement. But we're at a point in time where things are finally starting to bubble up and garner traction. Will it be perfect in the short term? Definitely not. But I'm hopeful the US can and will bring their portion of the blame back into check which is advantageous to a sum that's greater than simply the US.

Re: Adblocking: How about Nah?

#205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't see a world where Javascript vanishes and privacy gets any better. If JavaScript vanished, it would accomplish one huge win for privacy: it would split the "reading content and submitting forms" part of the Web out from the "powerful applications" part. It is cool that you can use JavaScript to build a collaborative 3D modeling program. It might even be better for privacy than a native app. But it is less c…

Absolutely. What is Javascript? It's andom pages all over the world telling your computer to download code from other random pages all over the world and execute it. Executable data is one of the first no-no-s of security. A native app collaborative 3D program could be worse for privacy if it were closed source. If it were open source, then no way. For one thing, unlike a Javascripted one, it wouldn't update behind y…

I think GP is making a reasonable argument about capabilities, and that's something that we should be pushing harder for both on the web and on native. I also think that's something we are actively looking at on the web, we're just looking at it from a feature/platform perspective instead of at a language level.

On the other hand, I don't think the Open Source argument holds at all. This is pushing for something that just isn't going to happen. Now we need to not only get rid of Javascript, we also need to convince Facebook to Open Source its native app?

I run mostly Open Source native apps, but the only way I can do that is because web-apps take the place of many native apps I would otherwise need to install on my phone or computer.

> For one thing, unlike a Javascripted one, it wouldn't update behind your back.

Most people's phone apps are set to auto-update, and most PC apps have the ability to download and execute additional code on the fly. I like to think I run a pretty tight Linux system, but all of my programs have write permissions to their own personal install directories.

It sounds to me like your problem isn't so much Javascript as it is 3rd-party requests/assets and mutable web-pages. These are also interesting problems to talk about, but they're largely unrelated to Javascript. It would maybe be helpful to see the web move more towards a DAT/IPFS model where webpages could be versioned.

On the Javascript side of things, all of this boils down to the security idea the users should only run code that they trust. Users have broadly rejected that idea -- both on the web and on native platforms like phones. They want the ability to safely run untrusted and semi-trusted code.

We can argue over whether that's a reasonable thing for them to ask, but that's the position we're in. The web is trying to figure out how to let you run untrusted code.

Re: Adblocking: How about Nah?

#206
post #196

There are more countries besides United States. I don't know why people here always refer to it as if it were the only ruler of the internet. It's not. In fact it does a piss poor job at playing its part.

You mean, aside from the fact that we invented the internet?

You are welcome.

Re: Adblocking: How about Nah?

#207
post #196

There are more countries besides United States. I don't know why people here always refer to it as if it were the only ruler of the internet. It's not. In fact it does a piss poor job at playing its part.

If another sets the standard for the internet it's google.

What ever they do, running the most viewed sites is quickly taken up by everyone else

Re: Adblocking: How about Nah?

#208
post #196

There are more countries besides United States. I don't know why people here always refer to it as if it were the only ruler of the internet. It's not. In fact it does a piss poor job at playing its part.

I think the US is relevant here because it's where most of the big ad serving companies are based.

Re: Adblocking: How about Nah?

#209
post #96

For many many years I resisted installing an ad-blocker. As someone who worked at a website that made the bulk of it's revenue from ads, it felt hypocritical, and also, I wanted to make sure that the experience of our website was bearable without ad blocking, by forcing myself to experience it every day. I gave up about two years ago. The web just go so bad I had to install ad-block. My computer would spin like a jet…

If this keeps being an issue, maybe browser vendors will eventually limit website CPU usage by default.

For web apps that need it, it could be an explicit permission, like webcam or location access.

Re: Adblocking: How about Nah?

#210
post #67

I don't actually want to block ads. If you want to put a small text or image blurb anywhere on the page... Good for you. I'll gladly accept those on a webpage so that the content creator can make a bit of cash. But these companies are intentionally blurring the lines between advertisement and digital surveillance. You don't need to collect everything about my operating system, browser, monitors, GPU, every click I ma…

I actually want to block ads. If you want to put a small text or image blurb anywhere on the page... I don't want to see it. I'd rather people stop whoring me out and start standing up for what they believe in.

And now I have the tools to do so.

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