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Tell HN: Now Washington Post is asking to turn off Firefox's tracking protection

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Re: Tell HN: Now Washington Post is asking to turn off Firefox's tracking protection

#211

Post by giancarlostoro »

andai wrote: post #160
johnchristopher wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not how things happened. First they came with the blink tag. Then they added animated GIFs everywhere. They came with the pop-up. Then they put the pop-up under the main window. Ad-blockers' first usage was to make the Web readable. Then years later privacy concerns took over.

At this point, ads are just one of many problems. Newsletter popups, cookie consent (10x worse since GDPR), auto-playing video, in-browser crypto mining..? At this point, basic self-respect demands I simply disable JavaScript. It's incredible how much faster the web is without it, and how much smoother, and how much less cluttered.

And poorly constructed single page applications that 9/10 could have been basic HTML / CSS pages with Bootstrap and maybe minimal jquery.

Re: Tell HN: Now Washington Post is asking to turn off Firefox's tracking protection

#212

Post by StevePerkins »

KozmoNau7 wrote: post #207
sticazzi wrote: post #167

I have AdBlock, AdBlock Plus and DuckDuckGo Privacy Essentials. Anything else to recommend for Firefox?

Ditch Adblock and ABP, and get uBlock Origin instead. Cookie Autodelete, Ublock Origin, Decentraleyes, Don't touch my tabs!, FB Purity, First Party Isolation, google-no-tracking-url, HTTPS Everywhere, Link Cleaner, Privacy Badger, Smart Referer and of course uBlock Origin in advanced mode with all 3rd party scripts and frames blocked by default.

I know that Brave draws a bit of controversy on HN, but the fact that you just named a DOZEN plugins is the reason why I switched. That's just too much to keep up with, I need more sane defaults and built-in behavior.

Re: Tell HN: Now Washington Post is asking to turn off Firefox's tracking protection

#213

Post by Rjevski »

x0x0 wrote: post #24
mirimir wrote: post #13

I see the same behavior (v52.8.0). Damn. Also, from a German IPv4: > The new European data protection law requires us to inform you of the following before you use our website: > We use cookies and other technologies to customize your experience, perform analytics and deliver personalized advertising on our sites, apps and newsletters and across the Internet based on your interests. By clicking “I agree” below, you c…

There is also this https://www.washingtonpost.com/gdpr-consent/ ? where the Post offers a free sub, a basic sub (requiring consent to the use of cookies and tracking by us), and a Premium EU ad-free sub (No on-site advertising or third-party ad tracking).

> (No on-site advertising or third-party ad tracking)

The premium subscription still asks you to agree to their privacy policy and use of analytics, ads & tracking.

Re: Tell HN: Now Washington Post is asking to turn off Firefox's tracking protection

#214

Post by KozmoNau7 »

StevePerkins wrote: post #212
KozmoNau7 wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ditch Adblock and ABP, and get uBlock Origin instead. Cookie Autodelete, Ublock Origin, Decentraleyes, Don't touch my tabs!, FB Purity, First Party Isolation, google-no-tracking-url, HTTPS Everywhere, Link Cleaner, Privacy Badger, Smart Referer and of course uBlock Origin in advanced mode with all 3rd party scripts and frames blocked by default.

I know that Brave draws a bit of controversy on HN, but the fact that you just named a DOZEN plugins is the reason why I switched. That's just too much to keep up with, I need more sane defaults and built-in behavior.

There's nothing to keep up with, really. You could very servicably get by with only uBlock Origin's default blocklists and the advanced mode with 3rd party scripts/frames on default-deny.

The rest are there because I'm slightly paranoid.

Re: Tell HN: Now Washington Post is asking to turn off Firefox's tracking protection

#215

Post by Shacklz »

blub wrote: post #88
kbenson wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, if WaPo makes a distinction between subscribers and non-subscribers for this behavior (I'm not sure if they do or don't), they they are very clearly giving you a choice for how to pay for your content, with your money or with whatever information that can get out of you, and to that end they don't want you to block that because they actually want to get something of value out of the transaction. > I think it's…

I don't know how WaPo does this, but all newspapers I've tried including NYT and The Guardian and The Economist have a lot of tracking in their apps even for subscribers. So it's a crap deal.

As much as I like the NYT for its journalism, they cannot even stop from advertising their subscription service even though I'm already a subscriber...

Re: Tell HN: Now Washington Post is asking to turn off Firefox's tracking protection

#216

Post by bdcravens »

fgheorghe wrote: post #205

And how exactly are these organisations to make money, if not through ads?

Advertising in and of itself isn't bad. Degrading performance (via crazy Javascript that ad networks use) and degrading privacy (via tracking) is the problem.

Re: Tell HN: Now Washington Post is asking to turn off Firefox's tracking protection

#217

Post by bdcravens »

int_19h wrote: post #127
ilovecaching wrote: post #61

For those of you advocating for a payment model over the ad model, I want you to consider two perspectives. First, consider the people who will be denied access to information on the basis of class. People who consider it a luxury to be online at all, let alone logging on to find a paywall for basic news. Now consider the editors at the Washington Post, who now have to cater the demographic who can pay their fees. In…

Why can't it be both? Amazon seems to be doing pretty well with their "special offers" / "no special offers" arrangement.

All the more interesting considering Jeff Bezos owns Washington Post.

Re: Tell HN: Now Washington Post is asking to turn off Firefox's tracking protection

#218

Post by Shacklz »

newsbinator wrote: post #39
larkeith wrote: post #8

Any time a site asks me to disable tracking protection, it has the curious effect of reinforcing my desire to leave it enabled - that site has made it clear that they are intentionally and unapologetically violating my privacy for a quick buck.

It's like a grocery store employee sidling up while you wait in line at the checkout, and politely asking you to put away your phone so you can examine the impulse-buy items on the racks around the checkout. They remind you that having a good grocery store in your neighborhood is important, and don't you want to support that?

> It's like a grocery store employee sidling up while you wait in line at the checkout, and politely asking you to put away your phone so you can examine the impulse-buy items on the racks around the checkout.

That is a thing somewhere? Genuinely curious because I can't imagine that ever happening around where I live...

Re: Tell HN: Now Washington Post is asking to turn off Firefox's tracking protection

#220

Post by alkonaut »

makomk wrote: post #206
mirimir wrote: post #13

I see the same behavior (v52.8.0). Damn. Also, from a German IPv4: > The new European data protection law requires us to inform you of the following before you use our website: > We use cookies and other technologies to customize your experience, perform analytics and deliver personalized advertising on our sites, apps and newsletters and across the Internet based on your interests. By clicking “I agree” below, you c…

There's been no GDPR enforcement so far and it seems to have basically failed. All it's done has kill off a bunch of smaller websites, games, etc that aren't making enough money to justify the risk of being found noncompliant, whilst the big companies whose business models rely on tracking people have carried on regardless.

I think it's too soon to say it failed. A few high profile cases need to be fought before that is settled. This is a typical example of an extremely high profile company that is very blatanly in violation. So it should be the perfect fit for a legal battle.
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