We’ve been anticipating it for years, and it’s finally happening. Google is finally killing uBlock Origin – with a note on their web store stating that the extension will soon no longer be available because it “doesn’t follow the best practices for Chrome extensions”.
Now that it is finally happening, many seem to be oddly resigned to the idea that Google is taking away the best and most powerful ad content blocker available on any web browser today, with one article recommending people set up a DNS based content blocker on their network 😒 – instead of more obvious solutions.
I may not have blogged about this but I recently read an article from 1999 about why Gopher lost out to the Web, where Christopher Lee discusses the importance of the then-novel term “mind share” and how it played an important part in dictating why the web won out. In my last post, I touched on the importance of good information to democracies – the same applies to markets (including the browser market) – and it seems to me that we aren’t getting good information about this topic.
This post is me trying to give you that information, to help increase the mind share of an actual alternative. Enjoy!
Can I just add a different perspective on this?
My dad is really old (like early baby-boomers), and I am basically the in-family tech support when the home computer starts acting strange.
Well, right after google rolled out this update, my dad clicked on what he thought was an online shopping link. It was actually an ad for a toolbar add-on. Queue like 6+ hours trying to uninstall that add-on and the bundled software.
I never had to worry about that in the past with him because I had u-block origin installed. Now I need to find something else that can run quietly in the background. And probably a better antivirus.
Is there any organization out there that could actually promote an “Acceptable ad standard”? Like, maybe even something within web specs?
A long time ago, ads were slightly irritating, rarely useful, and considered a necessary evil for gently monetizing the web. We’ve had this slow evolution to draconian tracking nightmares that are genuinely dangerous and often written by malicious untraceable actors. I almost feel like we could pressure back towards decent ads if there was some standard by which they only received basic info about the user, showed basic info about a product, didn’t pollute the experience or ruin accessibility, and were registered to businesses by physical address with legal accountability for things like false advertising.
That is…perhaps a vain hope though. It’s just hard to picture futures where all websites run off of donations or subscriptions, because advertising is fucking hell now.
You mean like https://acceptableads.com/ which is only supported so far by Adblock Plus (and its parent company)?
The problem is until there is some kind of penalty for being too annoying or too resource consuming, it will always be a race to the bottom with more, worse ads. As people add ad blockers to their browsers, the user pool that isn’t running them begins to dry up and more ads are needed to keep the same revenue. This results in even more people blocking them.
Two of the things I had hope for on the privacy side was Mozilla’s Privacy-Preserving Attribution for ad attribution and Google’s Privacy Sandbox collection of features for targeting like the Topics API. Both would have been better for privacy than the current system of granular, individual user tracking across sites.
If those two get wide enough adoption, regulation could be put in place to limit the old methods as there would be a better replacement available without killing the whole current ad supported economy of most sites. I get that strictly speaking from a privacy perspective ‘more anonymous/private tracking’ < ‘no tracking’ but I really don’t want perfect to be the enemy of better.
Acceptable Ads is bullshit on many levels:
uBlock Origin, or at least uBlock Origin Lite on Chromium-like browsers, are must-haves.
The best browser you can set up for a family member, IMO, is Firefox. Disable Telemetry (which should rid them of Mozilla’s own ad scheme too), install uBlock Origin, remind them to never call or trust any other tech support people who reach out to them, and maybe walk them through some scam baiting videos.
I’m still evaluating which Chrome-likes are best at actual ad blocking, and the landscape is grim.
Google would never push this because it would cost them money in the short term, eg, next quarter.
They can’t have that.
Nooooo, but MV3 is all about security!
This is how I know this is bullshit. I was reading the article and thinking "So, let me get this straight. The ads aren’t the security risk. It’s the ad blockers!"
Sure. Pull the other one.
so what you’re saying is; this will bring old-school computer repair shops back? i’m sort of in favor of that 😂
Buy a Raspberry PI, install PiHole or AdGuard, change router DNS, and you are good to go. Yes, not perfect, but doesn’t rely on a browser extension that can go extinct next time the browser decides it is time for a change.
… or use Firefox and migrate their bookmarks.
That’s what I ended up doing. It was a weird conversation though, telling him that if it seemed like some website wasn’t working, try it on chrome and it just might work
You’re awesome!
I recently switched back to Firefox, and almost immediately ran into an issue where I couldn’t log into Dropbox. It took me far longer than I’d like to admit, to realize that
Firefox was the problemit wasn’t working because Dropbox doesn’t properly support Firefox. I popped into edge and logged in immediately no problem.I’m still gonna stick with Firefox, but it’s annoying that it doesn’t work all the time.
Edit: what’s with the down votes? I like Firefox, I’m using Firefox, but I won’t deny that I ran into issues with it 🤷♂️
Edit 2: I realize now that the tone of my message sounds like I’m blaming Firefox. That was not my intention. It’s a complicated issue and they are getting a rough deal. Not their fault. I’ve struck out the offending line.
This is part of Googles strategy. Ever since the Chromium engine took off enough and everyone else fell behind they began introducing more and more changes that merely benefits them, with less public debate or proper communication (or even adherence to common standards). Last thing I remember, aside of manifest v3, was them killing off JPEG XL as it was a competitor to webp and webm (which they control). JPEG XL was actively worked on and would’ve probably turned out better before they killed it without any previous notice.
Given Googles dominant market position, their influence and everyone wanting to cut corners wherever possible sometimes Firefox support is just ignored.
tl;dr It’s not Firefox’ fault. It’s Google’s sabotage.
Ah I see, it sounds like I’m saying it’s Firefox fault. No I definitely agree, chromium is the largest market share, and gets the most support, and doesn’t always follow standards, so some websites will have compatibility issues if they don’t specifically focus on Firefox support.
It’s just a sucky situation.
Or just do what I do. Use Firefox and only keep Chromium around for those few sites that work better in Chromium.
You could leverage Kitbogas software in relation to scam/sketchy download protection.
https://www.seraphsecure.com/
Paid and closed source with a proprietary license.