5 ms·

There is a famous, in Poland, quote from Stefan Kisielewski about communism: "Socialism bravely fights problems unknown to any other system." And this reads exa

by blfr 8y ago

There is a famous, in Poland, quote from Stefan Kisielewski about communism: "Socialism bravely fights problems unknown to any other system." And this reads exactly like that. Just block ads.

garfij 8y ago
Ah yes, such a simple solution, just get everyone, everywhere to install adblocking software in their browser of choice. Problem Solved!
- stirfrykitty 8y ago
  Actually, as a sysadmin/coder (devops, but I hate the term), I have a moral imperative to protect people on my network. I use the firewall at work to block ads via a subscription list. My next project is to run Pi-hole on a VM with proper specs to get almost everything. Does wonders for bandwidth and a clean corporate network.
- blfr 8y ago
  Considering this blog comes from the makers of Firefox, they could bundle adblocking software by default.
  - dao- 8y ago
    Firefox is going to enable tracking protection by default, which is already risky and would currently make many websites with anti-adblocking measures block Firefox by default. Blocking _all_ ads would surely make content providers revolt against Firefox to the point where its viability as a mainstream Web browser would be at risk.
    - stirfrykitty 8y ago
      Which is where something like the Pi-hole comes in handy. Defense in depth is the only way to go with this stuff. Like most IT people, I use multiple browsers. I want everything blocked with every browser, not just Firefox (my default). Let's say the advertisers and websites do start giving grief to end users who are proactively protective. I have an idea that I believe can be done, but I'm at a loss with my current skill level to achieve it. Quick anecdote: when Flash was a thing, I used to symlink .adobe and .macromedia to /dev/null to let the Flash cookies "think" they were being written to the HDD, while allowing me to view Flash content without worrying about the LSOs tracking me. I wonder if there is a way, if ads/websites figure out how to block adblockers, that would allow the "loading" of ads, but shunt them into /dev/null (or similar bit bucket) making the website think they have been loaded, but not. A man in the middle, as it were. If I could figure out how to begin this, I would undertake it as a project. Hosting this online and allowing others to pass their traffic through it would be ideal. MitM/proxy. Methinks it will eventually come to this if enough people continue to add blocking tools to their tool set. Any ideas?
      - cpeterso 8y ago
        "AdNauseam" is a Firefox add-on that blocks ads but also virtually clicks each blocked ad in the background, polluting trackers' profile of your browsing habits. I haven't used this add-on but some reviews say that its ad blocking doesn't work as expected. https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/adnauseam/ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/adnauseam/
        stirfrykitty 8y ago
        Thank you. Didn't know this existed. I like the idea behind it. Polluting the ad peddlers' database is actually hilarious. It must get expensive to be serving up ads no one is seeing.
dao- 8y ago
> Just block ads. The point of the ad archive is to protect society as a whole from bogus election ads. Sure, block ads and tell all your friends to do the same. But unless you get all members of society to block ads, the above problem still exists.
- treis 8y ago
  But mozilla/firefox is actually in a position to block all ads. They just need to make a browser better than Chrome.
  - dao- 8y ago
    Mozilla could block all ads for Firefox users, except that this would be somewhat insane, see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19563427 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19563427 Mozilla can't block ads for non-Firefox users, nor does it aim for establishing a Web browser monopoly, so the original problem still exists.
    - deleted 8y ago
      [deleted]
    - treis 8y ago
      >Mozilla could block all ads for Firefox users, except that this would be somewhat insane, see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19563427 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19563427 If Firefox had the 65% market share that Chrome does now no sane website would block them. >Mozilla can't block ads for non-Firefox users, nor does it aim for establishing a Web browser monopoly, so the original problem still exists. Firefox should be aiming to be the dominant web browser. If they did that instead of spending their effort dicking around on unrelated projects and poking Google they could actually solve the problems they complain about.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]

by blfr 8y ago

There is a famous, in Poland, quote from Stefan Kisielewski about communism: "Socialism bravely fights problems unknown to any other system." And this reads exactly like that. Just block ads.

garfij 8y ago

Ah yes, such a simple solution, just get everyone, everywhere to install adblocking software in their browser of choice. Problem Solved!

stirfrykitty 8y ago
Actually, as a sysadmin/coder (devops, but I hate the term), I have a moral imperative to protect people on my network. I use the firewall at work to block ads via a subscription list. My next project is to run Pi-hole on a VM with proper specs to get almost everything. Does wonders for bandwidth and a clean corporate network.
blfr 8y ago
Considering this blog comes from the makers of Firefox, they could bundle adblocking software by default.
- dao- 8y ago
  Firefox is going to enable tracking protection by default, which is already risky and would currently make many websites with anti-adblocking measures block Firefox by default. Blocking _all_ ads would surely make content providers revolt against Firefox to the point where its viability as a mainstream Web browser would be at risk.
  - stirfrykitty 8y ago
    Which is where something like the Pi-hole comes in handy. Defense in depth is the only way to go with this stuff. Like most IT people, I use multiple browsers. I want everything blocked with every browser, not just Firefox (my default). Let's say the advertisers and websites do start giving grief to end users who are proactively protective. I have an idea that I believe can be done, but I'm at a loss with my current skill level to achieve it. Quick anecdote: when Flash was a thing, I used to symlink .adobe and .macromedia to /dev/null to let the Flash cookies "think" they were being written to the HDD, while allowing me to view Flash content without worrying about the LSOs tracking me. I wonder if there is a way, if ads/websites figure out how to block adblockers, that would allow the "loading" of ads, but shunt them into /dev/null (or similar bit bucket) making the website think they have been loaded, but not. A man in the middle, as it were. If I could figure out how to begin this, I would undertake it as a project. Hosting this online and allowing others to pass their traffic through it would be ideal. MitM/proxy. Methinks it will eventually come to this if enough people continue to add blocking tools to their tool set. Any ideas?
    - cpeterso 8y ago
      "AdNauseam" is a Firefox add-on that blocks ads but also virtually clicks each blocked ad in the background, polluting trackers' profile of your browsing habits. I haven't used this add-on but some reviews say that its ad blocking doesn't work as expected. https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/adnauseam/ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/adnauseam/
      - stirfrykitty 8y ago
        Thank you. Didn't know this existed. I like the idea behind it. Polluting the ad peddlers' database is actually hilarious. It must get expensive to be serving up ads no one is seeing.

dao- 8y ago

> Just block ads. The point of the ad archive is to protect society as a whole from bogus election ads. Sure, block ads and tell all your friends to do the same. But unless you get all members of society to block ads, the above problem still exists.

treis 8y ago
But mozilla/firefox is actually in a position to block all ads. They just need to make a browser better than Chrome.
- dao- 8y ago
  Mozilla could block all ads for Firefox users, except that this would be somewhat insane, see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19563427 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19563427 Mozilla can't block ads for non-Firefox users, nor does it aim for establishing a Web browser monopoly, so the original problem still exists.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  - treis 8y ago
    >Mozilla could block all ads for Firefox users, except that this would be somewhat insane, see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19563427 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19563427 If Firefox had the 65% market share that Chrome does now no sane website would block them. >Mozilla can't block ads for non-Firefox users, nor does it aim for establishing a Web browser monopoly, so the original problem still exists. Firefox should be aiming to be the dominant web browser. If they did that instead of spending their effort dicking around on unrelated projects and poking Google they could actually solve the problems they complain about.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]