6 ms·

We need to collectively switch to Firefox and Brave.

by pmurt7 5y ago

gigatexal 5y ago
Been on FF for a few years now. FF89 is really nice.
dvfjsdhgfv 5y ago
I finally made the total switch to FF last year and it's fine; the stuff got imported from Chrome correctly. Containers are a good bonus. I keep a copy of Chrome at hand but I used it maybe once a month or two to test some random website, that's all. There is no single reason to remain on Chrome for me, I just regret it took me so long. No crashes, no noticeable performance differences, no quirks. I'm very grateful Firefox exists.
- sixothree 5y ago
  Edge is a good alternative when you _need_ a chrome browser.
ahmedalsudani 5y ago
Correction: they never injected ads, but they do remove ads and replace them with "attention tokens", which is an opt-out system for publishers. See also https://tech.hindustantimes.com/tech/news/this-popular-browser-caught-injecting-affiliate-codes-in-crypto-urls-71591610043600.html https://tech.hindustantimes.com/tech/news/this-popular-brows.... In short, please look into the questionable aspects of Brave. Brave is perhaps the most ethically challenged browser out there. Hopefully they have stopped doing this, but they were injecting their own ads instead of what the publisher put on their website.
- 3np 5y ago
  They never injected ads. If you enable Brave Rewards, you do get notification/pop over ads and rewarded a small amount of BAT, which can get redistributed to content creators or sites. If you don’t , all this is disabled.
- alias_neo 5y ago
  Is it Brave that uses BAT? You're being downvoted but weren't they collecting BAT for sites whose owners had never signed up, and presumably keeping it if the owner didn't claim it?
  - ahmedalsudani 5y ago
    Right, that's what I was thinking of. They created an opt-out system for publishers. The reader can guess how Brave expects to make money with a free browser that is handing out BAT :-)
    - dcow 5y ago
      This makes sense to me. If you make the system opt in, publishers aren't going to give a fuck because like 0.01% of their users browse on Brave. And that means users aren't protected because sites that were already okay selling their users out are still going to do it. So you have to make it opt out so that users are protected by default. Idk just seems like the incentives are nicely aligned here: the user-centric option also happens to be the one that benefits the browser vendor. Isn't that what we want?
      - alias_neo 5y ago
        I think some have issue with them collecting monies on behalf of an organisation who has made no indication they are interested in participating. If my site gets 1000 BAT in payments which sit there because I decided I don't want to take part, what happens if I say to Brave I never intend to take part? Do they give those BAT back? Site visitors may have had the impression they were paying for my content while Brave is pocketing it. Personally I reserve judgement, but I see why some look at it this way.
        dcow 5y ago
        I can see that. Perhaps there's social a fix somewhere around messaging or something. Ultimately it's not Brave that's doing this to site owners, it's the users who install Brave for Brave's feature set. I think the elephant here is that it's not really up to site owners to say whether users can use ad blockers or not or which browser they should use. If I install an ad blocker as a user, that's my choice. So installing Brave, essentially an add-blocker-as-a-browser doesn't seem like the thing that site owners should be able to opt out of at all. Allowing publishers to opt-out feels like a tactical compromise. Of course sites can block requests based on Brave's user-agent string if their business depends deeply on ad revenue and they consider users with ad blockers to be abusing their service. That's their prerogative if this really irks them and it's worth losing the users. On the flip side if this becomes popular enough then site owners see real money on the table and they'll opt in to picking it up. That seems like an easy fix for them. If I was a site contemplating either blocking content to users with ad blockers or allowing cooperative users to opt into a more private client-side ad experience which still gives me the opportunity to collect revenue for their traffic, I'm pretty sure I'd choose the cooperative approach.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- pmurt7 5y ago
  Soon publishers will be allowed to run Brave ads on their website (and earn money), but users will be able to disable these ads anytime. So Brave is building a web experience where users can choose to enable ads or not (and if they do they will earn crypto).
alias_neo 5y ago
I switched to FF years ago. I used to root my Android phones but I'm getting too old (read; jaded) to care now, Firefox means that with uBlock I _still_ never see ads on my phone. I pay for apps I want to use, and I don't use apps which don't have an alternative to ad-supported, with one exception being Twitter and "Promoted" tweets, which I can spot and skip in a blink.
- eingaeKaiy8ujie 5y ago
  For Android I can also recommend Bromite. It's Chromium-based with a built-in ad blocker and focus on anti-fingerprinting. https://www.bromite.org/ https://www.bromite.org/
  - alias_neo 5y ago
    Thanks for the suggestion. I currently see no reason to switch from FF which I use everywhere and benefit from Sync. Hopefully someone else will find it of interest.
  - moneywoes 5y ago
    Anyhing like this for ios that is chromium based
- pluc 5y ago
  If you want to have fun with Twitter ads, block the advertiser whenever you see them. After two weeks or so you start to get really.. different stuff.
  - dredmorbius 5y ago
    Howso? (Not on Twitter, can't run the experiment myself.)
  - esnard 5y ago
    Can you elaborate? I'm not sure if this is something I would prefer to current ads, or something I would want to avoid.
needle0 5y ago
To Firefox only. Switching to Brave does not improve the Chromium engine hegemony.
- zelon88 5y ago
  How does switching to FF improve "Chromium engine hegemony?" FF is not Chromium based.
  - jethro_tell 5y ago
    Seems they ment improve as in lessen the hegemony.
  - ohgodplsno 5y ago
    That's the point. Using a Chromium based browser just further cements Google's grasp on the web.
- cheschire 5y ago
  Why does it matter if the underlying engine is shared amongst multiple browsers?
  - Dah00n 5y ago
    Because as it is now Chrome (read: Google) can dictate how the web works and they do. If you use a Chromium based browser everything just works and happy people doesnt often complain or see the problems. So using something Chromium based makes you part of the problem. Apple isn't much better though so there aren't many options left...
    - cheschire 5y ago
      What prevents forks of chromium from sharing amongst each other? I don't think google can gatekeep to the extent you seem to be implying. I'm pretty sure Brave and Opera and MS Edge can share changes they've made amongst each other without going through the original repository first.
pdimitar 5y ago
I've been on Firefox for a few years now and it irritates me how super slow it is. Version 89 seems to be a bit better though. I know it might be the extensions (I have 20+) but I seriously don't care. Chrome manages to be fast with the same set of extensions. I don't like Google but Firefox's slowness is a real strain on my productivity and brain well-being. Hope they improve even more soon. I am on an iMac Pro btw. Stuff like this should not ever happen on a workstation.
- eingaeKaiy8ujie 5y ago
  Not sure if this would help in your case but try to enable `gfx.webrender.all` or `layers.acceleration.force-enabled` in `about:config` if it's not already enabled.
  - pdimitar 5y ago
    Only the second one was disabled, enabled it. Thanks for the tip!
    - eingaeKaiy8ujie 5y ago
      In that case it won't make a difference I think, `gfx.webrender.all` should override `layers.acceleration.force-enabled`.
- drunner 5y ago
  Well, that's part of the issue. On macOS, all browsers are just skins over Safari. Google obviously has more resources to make this work better but I agree, overall I always found Chrome better than Firefox on macOS. You can't really compare that to a native linux/windows experience.
  - pdimitar 5y ago
    Wait what?! I thought this only applied to iOS / iPadOS. You're telling me Firefox under macOS is using Safari's engine? If so, wow. Extremely disappointing.
williamtwild 5y ago
Is Safari in the running?
- pmurt7 5y ago
  Safari team is seriously understaffed, because Apple want people to use the App Store instead.
ericholscher 5y ago
I'm biased, but a lot of users should also be using products that respect user privacy. We're building a dev-focused ad network called EthicalAds that does this: https://www.ethicalads.io/ https://www.ethicalads.io/ -- but there's lots of other privacy-focused products out there we should be building and supporting.

We need to collectively switch to Firefox and Brave.

by pmurt7 5y ago

We need to collectively switch to Firefox and Brave.

gigatexal 5y ago

Been on FF for a few years now. FF89 is really nice.

dvfjsdhgfv 5y ago

I finally made the total switch to FF last year and it's fine; the stuff got imported from Chrome correctly. Containers are a good bonus. I keep a copy of Chrome at hand but I used it maybe once a month or two to test some random website, that's all. There is no single reason to remain on Chrome for me, I just regret it took me so long. No crashes, no noticeable performance differences, no quirks. I'm very grateful Firefox exists.

sixothree 5y ago
Edge is a good alternative when you _need_ a chrome browser.

ahmedalsudani 5y ago

Correction: they never injected ads, but they do remove ads and replace them with "attention tokens", which is an opt-out system for publishers. See also https://tech.hindustantimes.com/tech/news/this-popular-browser-caught-injecting-affiliate-codes-in-crypto-urls-71591610043600.html https://tech.hindustantimes.com/tech/news/this-popular-brows.... In short, please look into the questionable aspects of Brave. Brave is perhaps the most ethically challenged browser out there. Hopefully they have stopped doing this, but they were injecting their own ads instead of what the publisher put on their website.

3np 5y ago
They never injected ads. If you enable Brave Rewards, you do get notification/pop over ads and rewarded a small amount of BAT, which can get redistributed to content creators or sites. If you don’t , all this is disabled.
alias_neo 5y ago
Is it Brave that uses BAT? You're being downvoted but weren't they collecting BAT for sites whose owners had never signed up, and presumably keeping it if the owner didn't claim it?
- ahmedalsudani 5y ago
  Right, that's what I was thinking of. They created an opt-out system for publishers. The reader can guess how Brave expects to make money with a free browser that is handing out BAT :-)
  - dcow 5y ago
    This makes sense to me. If you make the system opt in, publishers aren't going to give a fuck because like 0.01% of their users browse on Brave. And that means users aren't protected because sites that were already okay selling their users out are still going to do it. So you have to make it opt out so that users are protected by default. Idk just seems like the incentives are nicely aligned here: the user-centric option also happens to be the one that benefits the browser vendor. Isn't that what we want?
    - alias_neo 5y ago
      I think some have issue with them collecting monies on behalf of an organisation who has made no indication they are interested in participating. If my site gets 1000 BAT in payments which sit there because I decided I don't want to take part, what happens if I say to Brave I never intend to take part? Do they give those BAT back? Site visitors may have had the impression they were paying for my content while Brave is pocketing it. Personally I reserve judgement, but I see why some look at it this way.
      - dcow 5y ago
        I can see that. Perhaps there's social a fix somewhere around messaging or something. Ultimately it's not Brave that's doing this to site owners, it's the users who install Brave for Brave's feature set. I think the elephant here is that it's not really up to site owners to say whether users can use ad blockers or not or which browser they should use. If I install an ad blocker as a user, that's my choice. So installing Brave, essentially an add-blocker-as-a-browser doesn't seem like the thing that site owners should be able to opt out of at all. Allowing publishers to opt-out feels like a tactical compromise. Of course sites can block requests based on Brave's user-agent string if their business depends deeply on ad revenue and they consider users with ad blockers to be abusing their service. That's their prerogative if this really irks them and it's worth losing the users. On the flip side if this becomes popular enough then site owners see real money on the table and they'll opt in to picking it up. That seems like an easy fix for them. If I was a site contemplating either blocking content to users with ad blockers or allowing cooperative users to opt into a more private client-side ad experience which still gives me the opportunity to collect revenue for their traffic, I'm pretty sure I'd choose the cooperative approach.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
pmurt7 5y ago
Soon publishers will be allowed to run Brave ads on their website (and earn money), but users will be able to disable these ads anytime. So Brave is building a web experience where users can choose to enable ads or not (and if they do they will earn crypto).

alias_neo 5y ago

I switched to FF years ago. I used to root my Android phones but I'm getting too old (read; jaded) to care now, Firefox means that with uBlock I _still_ never see ads on my phone. I pay for apps I want to use, and I don't use apps which don't have an alternative to ad-supported, with one exception being Twitter and "Promoted" tweets, which I can spot and skip in a blink.

eingaeKaiy8ujie 5y ago
For Android I can also recommend Bromite. It's Chromium-based with a built-in ad blocker and focus on anti-fingerprinting. https://www.bromite.org/ https://www.bromite.org/
- alias_neo 5y ago
  Thanks for the suggestion. I currently see no reason to switch from FF which I use everywhere and benefit from Sync. Hopefully someone else will find it of interest.
- moneywoes 5y ago
  Anyhing like this for ios that is chromium based
pluc 5y ago
If you want to have fun with Twitter ads, block the advertiser whenever you see them. After two weeks or so you start to get really.. different stuff.
- dredmorbius 5y ago
  Howso? (Not on Twitter, can't run the experiment myself.)
- esnard 5y ago
  Can you elaborate? I'm not sure if this is something I would prefer to current ads, or something I would want to avoid.

needle0 5y ago

To Firefox only. Switching to Brave does not improve the Chromium engine hegemony.

zelon88 5y ago
How does switching to FF improve "Chromium engine hegemony?" FF is not Chromium based.
- jethro_tell 5y ago
  Seems they ment improve as in lessen the hegemony.
- ohgodplsno 5y ago
  That's the point. Using a Chromium based browser just further cements Google's grasp on the web.
cheschire 5y ago
Why does it matter if the underlying engine is shared amongst multiple browsers?
- Dah00n 5y ago
  Because as it is now Chrome (read: Google) can dictate how the web works and they do. If you use a Chromium based browser everything just works and happy people doesnt often complain or see the problems. So using something Chromium based makes you part of the problem. Apple isn't much better though so there aren't many options left...
  - cheschire 5y ago
    What prevents forks of chromium from sharing amongst each other? I don't think google can gatekeep to the extent you seem to be implying. I'm pretty sure Brave and Opera and MS Edge can share changes they've made amongst each other without going through the original repository first.

pdimitar 5y ago

I've been on Firefox for a few years now and it irritates me how super slow it is. Version 89 seems to be a bit better though. I know it might be the extensions (I have 20+) but I seriously don't care. Chrome manages to be fast with the same set of extensions. I don't like Google but Firefox's slowness is a real strain on my productivity and brain well-being. Hope they improve even more soon. I am on an iMac Pro btw. Stuff like this should not ever happen on a workstation.

eingaeKaiy8ujie 5y ago
Not sure if this would help in your case but try to enable `gfx.webrender.all` or `layers.acceleration.force-enabled` in `about:config` if it's not already enabled.
- pdimitar 5y ago
  Only the second one was disabled, enabled it. Thanks for the tip!
  - eingaeKaiy8ujie 5y ago
    In that case it won't make a difference I think, `gfx.webrender.all` should override `layers.acceleration.force-enabled`.
drunner 5y ago
Well, that's part of the issue. On macOS, all browsers are just skins over Safari. Google obviously has more resources to make this work better but I agree, overall I always found Chrome better than Firefox on macOS. You can't really compare that to a native linux/windows experience.
- pdimitar 5y ago
  Wait what?! I thought this only applied to iOS / iPadOS. You're telling me Firefox under macOS is using Safari's engine? If so, wow. Extremely disappointing.

williamtwild 5y ago

Is Safari in the running?

pmurt7 5y ago
Safari team is seriously understaffed, because Apple want people to use the App Store instead.

ericholscher 5y ago

I'm biased, but a lot of users should also be using products that respect user privacy. We're building a dev-focused ad network called EthicalAds that does this: https://www.ethicalads.io/ https://www.ethicalads.io/ -- but there's lots of other privacy-focused products out there we should be building and supporting.