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Feels anti-competitive to have defaults to block mining while not having default enabled advert blocking. I'm much happier for a site to mine on their tab whil

Feels anti-competitive to have defaults to block mining while not having default enabled advert blocking. I'm much happier for a site to mine on their tab while I'm watching a video than to show me 2 minutes of advertisements every 10 minutes. On mobile in particular, where video ads end up eating a large chunk of my data costs.

jakubp 8y ago
You are happier to have your resources stolen and not be aware of it (it's invisible, you can't see what's happening and react - right?) than to be shown an annoying thing which is very much in your awareness? I don't know, I'd rather know someone is harming me silently and have the means to stop it by default. The things that are shown in front of me, I can handle them...
- jlrubin 8y ago
  Firefox already has tools to throttle tabs which are abusive CPU-load wise, which seems sufficient in this case. And it's unclear such resources are being 'stolen' if it's stated in the site ToS. Cryptocurrency mining is a lot less deleterious than ads. Mining doesn't need to track your behavior, it doesn't generate misleading native content, and it doesn't distract you from what you're trying to do. Sign me up! disclaimer: I was one of the founders of Tidbit, https://www.eff.org/cases/rubin-v-new-jersey-tidbit https://www.eff.org/cases/rubin-v-new-jersey-tidbit, the first(?) crypto mining ad replacer.
  - thekyle 8y ago
    > “we do not believe Tidbit was created for the purpose of invading privacy.” I don't see how a cryptocurrency miner was ever going to invade anyones privacy so this seems like a weird choice of words.
  - kevingrahl 8y ago
    > And it’s unclear such resources are being ‘stolen’ if it’s stated in the sites ToS. Unless I, as a user, explicitly consented to crypto mining, no such thing should be allowed to take place. Same thing goes for auto playing videos.
  - zaarn 8y ago
    Just because you put it in the ToS doesn't make it legally or ethically acceptable. In addition, very few people will read the ToS of random websites they visit that begin cryptomining, resulting in non-consentual mining.
- Smithalicious 8y ago
  My computer is at maybe 20% resource utilization while I'm browsing the internet. Resource utilization only becomes a problem once you run out of resources; there is zero difference to me between 20% and 40% resource utilization other than very minor factors like a negligible increase in power draw and my fans spinning a little harder. Of course people could (and do) build malicious mining scripts that try to use way too many resources, just like people could (and do) make malicious ads that spam you with INCREASE YOUR DICK SIZE BY 20 INCHES IN 5 MINUTES popups, but that's not an inherent problem with the model itself.
  - Rychard 8y ago
    For devices that are directly connected to the grid, I can somewhat see your point. However, a large portion of devices on the internet run on batteries, and don't have huge quantities of reserve power. Back to things such as desktop computers, though: am I supposed to close my browser before doing anything CPU intensive? Someday, will I need to close StackOverflow to avoid negatively impacting the time it takes to compile my code? That's a trade-off I'm not willing to make.
    - Smithalicious 8y ago
      I think that these scripts should A) not run endlessly in the background while you're not using the website and B) be mindful of how many resources you actually have available. I think the battery concern is valid enough and it's something that I didn't really consider since it doesn't affect me personally much[0]. I still think the tradeoff of not having ads is worth it though. Perhaps let users choose whether they want ads or mining? [0] My portable devices are a ThinkPad with a slice battery that lasts me 9 hours of continuous normal use and a phone with a 20kmAh battery bank so I often forget battery life is a problem for some people

jakubp 8y ago

You are happier to have your resources stolen and not be aware of it (it's invisible, you can't see what's happening and react - right?) than to be shown an annoying thing which is very much in your awareness? I don't know, I'd rather know someone is harming me silently and have the means to stop it by default. The things that are shown in front of me, I can handle them...

jlrubin 8y ago
Firefox already has tools to throttle tabs which are abusive CPU-load wise, which seems sufficient in this case. And it's unclear such resources are being 'stolen' if it's stated in the site ToS. Cryptocurrency mining is a lot less deleterious than ads. Mining doesn't need to track your behavior, it doesn't generate misleading native content, and it doesn't distract you from what you're trying to do. Sign me up! disclaimer: I was one of the founders of Tidbit, https://www.eff.org/cases/rubin-v-new-jersey-tidbit https://www.eff.org/cases/rubin-v-new-jersey-tidbit, the first(?) crypto mining ad replacer.
- thekyle 8y ago
  > “we do not believe Tidbit was created for the purpose of invading privacy.” I don't see how a cryptocurrency miner was ever going to invade anyones privacy so this seems like a weird choice of words.
- kevingrahl 8y ago
  > And it’s unclear such resources are being ‘stolen’ if it’s stated in the sites ToS. Unless I, as a user, explicitly consented to crypto mining, no such thing should be allowed to take place. Same thing goes for auto playing videos.
- zaarn 8y ago
  Just because you put it in the ToS doesn't make it legally or ethically acceptable. In addition, very few people will read the ToS of random websites they visit that begin cryptomining, resulting in non-consentual mining.
Smithalicious 8y ago
My computer is at maybe 20% resource utilization while I'm browsing the internet. Resource utilization only becomes a problem once you run out of resources; there is zero difference to me between 20% and 40% resource utilization other than very minor factors like a negligible increase in power draw and my fans spinning a little harder. Of course people could (and do) build malicious mining scripts that try to use way too many resources, just like people could (and do) make malicious ads that spam you with INCREASE YOUR DICK SIZE BY 20 INCHES IN 5 MINUTES popups, but that's not an inherent problem with the model itself.
- Rychard 8y ago
  For devices that are directly connected to the grid, I can somewhat see your point. However, a large portion of devices on the internet run on batteries, and don't have huge quantities of reserve power. Back to things such as desktop computers, though: am I supposed to close my browser before doing anything CPU intensive? Someday, will I need to close StackOverflow to avoid negatively impacting the time it takes to compile my code? That's a trade-off I'm not willing to make.
  - Smithalicious 8y ago
    I think that these scripts should A) not run endlessly in the background while you're not using the website and B) be mindful of how many resources you actually have available. I think the battery concern is valid enough and it's something that I didn't really consider since it doesn't affect me personally much[0]. I still think the tradeoff of not having ads is worth it though. Perhaps let users choose whether they want ads or mining? [0] My portable devices are a ThinkPad with a slice battery that lasts me 9 hours of continuous normal use and a phone with a 20kmAh battery bank so I often forget battery life is a problem for some people