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I think the privacy crowd drawn to Brave couldn't care less what the (current) digital advertising industry wants. Anyone who's been involved in the current ad

I think the privacy crowd drawn to Brave couldn't care less what the (current) digital advertising industry wants. Anyone who's been involved in the current ad-tech industry knows it's a total tire fire of fraud, technical incompetence and deep hostility to end-users. Brave's model is very interesting and also a threat to the current ad-tech cesspool, so there should be no surprise to see attempts to misinform people about the model. Brave doesn't replace ads with other ads. Brave is a browser first, with an economic layer that will support all sorts of opt-in economic activity in a privacy-respecting way. The tokens have a market price of more than zero. Advertisers already include brands like Vimeo and Vice, and many within the ad industry appreciate the model Brave is attempting. Using on-device machine learning to deliver relevant ads, while at the same time protecting privacy by not sending that data over the wire is a rather brilliant idea. It certainly remains to be seen what advertisers are convinced to trial this approach, but predictions based on a very wonky understanding of the Brave model aren't particularly interesting.

hnaccy 7y ago
>I think the privacy crowd drawn to Brave couldn't care less what the (current) digital advertising industry wants. Why would I use Brave over a modified Firefox install?
- justsee 7y ago
  It's faster, more secure, and uses less battery among other things. You can read a lot more detail within the research section of their site [1]. My previous browser setup was Firefox Dev Edition with uBlock origin, but Brave is just a better browser all-round now so I've completely switched. I particularly like where the sync-chain stuff is going [2]. [1] https://brave.com/research https://brave.com/research [2] https://github.com/brave/sync https://github.com/brave/sync
  - RandomBacon 7y ago
    Be aware that they are testing uBlock which still displays ads, not uBlock Origin.
- ajmurmann 7y ago
  Does that work on mobile (only place I'm using Brave)?
  - yjftsjthsd-h 7y ago
    I'm posting this from Firefox mobile with both ublock origin and umatrix active. It's wonderful. I hear people say that the scroll mechanics are weird, but I've never noticed that. I've also heard a claim that it's slower, which I couldn't comment on.
- rjf72 7y ago
  It's much faster is one big reason. For instance I tend to have quite a lot of tabs/windows open at any given time and generally do not shut down my computer or close my windows. And Firefox starts to crawl in this scenario both in terms of very poor performance as well as its countless memory leaks. Brave works fine without needing regular restarts. But really I think one of the coolest features is one click per-site configuration of scripts/cookies/fingerprinting. For instance most paywalls that have pop-in paywalls to try to 'tease' the user rely on scripts. This paywall is now removed by clicking the lion icon (in the top right) and then clicking on scripts blocked. And this is automatically then saved per site. Another neat little feature is similar one-click functionality for single-instance Tor windows. Imagine a site is geoblocked, blocked by your government, or you'd simply like to see what a site would return from another country or with no information at all on you. You can right click on a link and select 'Open link in private window with Tor', and you can then similarly change identities with a single click. Awesome stuff. All this said, I think the GP comment is correct. I'm attracted to Brave because of these sorts of features and I will never once enable ads, even if I'm paid to do so. In my, perhaps eccentric, opinion I think ads are psychologically harmful at scale. Everybody thinks they are not affected by ads, yet look at consumer behavior at large and we've become incredibly irrational market actors. And companies continue to pump out trillions of dollars on ad spending. One of these groups is right, and I think it's clear which one. As such, I'm not arrogant enough to believe myself immune to such effect, so yeah - no thanks.
manigandham 7y ago
If you want advertisers, you need to care about what the industry wants. Obviously that's for Brave to deal with, not the users, but showing ads for money is an ad network. Microtransactions have been tried many times. I spent half a million testing it. Didn't work because of user behavior. And unless users are buying with their own money, it's just converting the BAT they earn from ads into BAT they pay the publisher. This is an ad network. Even the block-and-replace-ads model has been tried before. Everything from iframes to browser toolbars. Again, this is an ad network. If you have to use language like "economic layer" to describe your business model, you're either hiding something or you don't have one. Or we can just use the standard definition: brave is a browser-based ad network.
- PudgePacket 7y ago
  Brave doesn't need advertisers though, it needs users. Once it has users then advertisers need Brave. I don't see how Brave has to win over advertisers at all, they'll come around when Brave can offer some non-insignificant amount of money to them.
  - LowLevelHacker 7y ago
    I'd like to incentivise unique users to visit/revisit the site, is that part of the idea that of BAT?
    - manigandham 7y ago
      It is supposed to be possible for publishers to spend their BAT on paying users to visit or promote their content.
  - manigandham 7y ago
    Advertisers have several supply paths to inventory and what gets chosen is a complicated series of decisions. Brave is just not very enticing. Having a large user base isn't useful if there isn't effective delivery and performance. It's always possible to get the low-end performance marketers because they'll buy anything if it works but it won't be good quality. Also the current trade of content for ads makes sense. When it's opt-in, I fail to see why users would enable ads if they can get the content for free anyway. And if the ads are all low-end spam then I definitely don't see why they would choose them. It's a very tough 3-way marketplace to bootstrap where the user has all of the control and none of the incentive.
tssva 7y ago
Blocking someone's means of income and then telling them they can get some of it back if they change their business model so revenues now flow through you isn't opt-in economic activity. It is extorted economic activity.
- atomical 7y ago
  A lot of that income is from tracking users, storing that data, and then selling it. I don't feel one ounce of sympathy for them.
  - katzgrau 7y ago
    You're lumping all publishers together. Brave blocks static banner ads whether they track you or not - whether they're served by an ad network or not. Whether it's delivered by a for-profit or non-profit. Brave's stated model is disingenuous at best.
    - dcbadacd 7y ago
      Which non-ad-network ads Brave blocks though? Are there any non-profit ad-networks??
    - atomical 7y ago
      There needs to be major reform in the advertising industry. I'm sure some people will be hurt by the change but that is the cost of progress.
  - tssva 7y ago
    Your argument is basically two wrongs make a right.
Simulacra 7y ago
I love using Brave, it’s been a tad better at ad blocking the other add-ons
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]

hnaccy 7y ago

>I think the privacy crowd drawn to Brave couldn't care less what the (current) digital advertising industry wants. Why would I use Brave over a modified Firefox install?

justsee 7y ago
It's faster, more secure, and uses less battery among other things. You can read a lot more detail within the research section of their site [1]. My previous browser setup was Firefox Dev Edition with uBlock origin, but Brave is just a better browser all-round now so I've completely switched. I particularly like where the sync-chain stuff is going [2]. [1] https://brave.com/research https://brave.com/research [2] https://github.com/brave/sync https://github.com/brave/sync
- RandomBacon 7y ago
  Be aware that they are testing uBlock which still displays ads, not uBlock Origin.
ajmurmann 7y ago
Does that work on mobile (only place I'm using Brave)?
- yjftsjthsd-h 7y ago
  I'm posting this from Firefox mobile with both ublock origin and umatrix active. It's wonderful. I hear people say that the scroll mechanics are weird, but I've never noticed that. I've also heard a claim that it's slower, which I couldn't comment on.
rjf72 7y ago
It's much faster is one big reason. For instance I tend to have quite a lot of tabs/windows open at any given time and generally do not shut down my computer or close my windows. And Firefox starts to crawl in this scenario both in terms of very poor performance as well as its countless memory leaks. Brave works fine without needing regular restarts. But really I think one of the coolest features is one click per-site configuration of scripts/cookies/fingerprinting. For instance most paywalls that have pop-in paywalls to try to 'tease' the user rely on scripts. This paywall is now removed by clicking the lion icon (in the top right) and then clicking on scripts blocked. And this is automatically then saved per site. Another neat little feature is similar one-click functionality for single-instance Tor windows. Imagine a site is geoblocked, blocked by your government, or you'd simply like to see what a site would return from another country or with no information at all on you. You can right click on a link and select 'Open link in private window with Tor', and you can then similarly change identities with a single click. Awesome stuff. All this said, I think the GP comment is correct. I'm attracted to Brave because of these sorts of features and I will never once enable ads, even if I'm paid to do so. In my, perhaps eccentric, opinion I think ads are psychologically harmful at scale. Everybody thinks they are not affected by ads, yet look at consumer behavior at large and we've become incredibly irrational market actors. And companies continue to pump out trillions of dollars on ad spending. One of these groups is right, and I think it's clear which one. As such, I'm not arrogant enough to believe myself immune to such effect, so yeah - no thanks.

manigandham 7y ago

If you want advertisers, you need to care about what the industry wants. Obviously that's for Brave to deal with, not the users, but showing ads for money is an ad network. Microtransactions have been tried many times. I spent half a million testing it. Didn't work because of user behavior. And unless users are buying with their own money, it's just converting the BAT they earn from ads into BAT they pay the publisher. This is an ad network. Even the block-and-replace-ads model has been tried before. Everything from iframes to browser toolbars. Again, this is an ad network. If you have to use language like "economic layer" to describe your business model, you're either hiding something or you don't have one. Or we can just use the standard definition: brave is a browser-based ad network.

PudgePacket 7y ago
Brave doesn't need advertisers though, it needs users. Once it has users then advertisers need Brave. I don't see how Brave has to win over advertisers at all, they'll come around when Brave can offer some non-insignificant amount of money to them.
- LowLevelHacker 7y ago
  I'd like to incentivise unique users to visit/revisit the site, is that part of the idea that of BAT?
  - manigandham 7y ago
    It is supposed to be possible for publishers to spend their BAT on paying users to visit or promote their content.
- manigandham 7y ago
  Advertisers have several supply paths to inventory and what gets chosen is a complicated series of decisions. Brave is just not very enticing. Having a large user base isn't useful if there isn't effective delivery and performance. It's always possible to get the low-end performance marketers because they'll buy anything if it works but it won't be good quality. Also the current trade of content for ads makes sense. When it's opt-in, I fail to see why users would enable ads if they can get the content for free anyway. And if the ads are all low-end spam then I definitely don't see why they would choose them. It's a very tough 3-way marketplace to bootstrap where the user has all of the control and none of the incentive.

tssva 7y ago

Blocking someone's means of income and then telling them they can get some of it back if they change their business model so revenues now flow through you isn't opt-in economic activity. It is extorted economic activity.

atomical 7y ago
A lot of that income is from tracking users, storing that data, and then selling it. I don't feel one ounce of sympathy for them.
- katzgrau 7y ago
  You're lumping all publishers together. Brave blocks static banner ads whether they track you or not - whether they're served by an ad network or not. Whether it's delivered by a for-profit or non-profit. Brave's stated model is disingenuous at best.
  - dcbadacd 7y ago
    Which non-ad-network ads Brave blocks though? Are there any non-profit ad-networks??
  - atomical 7y ago
    There needs to be major reform in the advertising industry. I'm sure some people will be hurt by the change but that is the cost of progress.
- tssva 7y ago
  Your argument is basically two wrongs make a right.

Simulacra 7y ago

I love using Brave, it’s been a tad better at ad blocking the other add-ons

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]