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> And also by not having a company behind it, a partnership with uBlock Origin for "acceptable ads" isn't possible. I'm really glad you brought that up, becaus
by danShumway 7y ago
> And also by not having a company behind it, a partnership with uBlock Origin for "acceptable ads" isn't possible.
I'm really glad you brought that up, because it's an interesting dynamic. Industries generally know how to deal with companies and senators. People like Gorhill though are hard to control using conventional strategies, because they're not getting any money out of it, they don't have supply chains or a duty to investors that you can exploit. They're just people doing stuff.
This can obviously be both a positive and a negative. But when people talk about competitive and regulatory forces, it's important to remember that some forces also come from outside of the system.
Adblocking is legal, but another good (less legal) example is Sci-hub. Sci-hub is just as large of an actor in the debate about academic publishing as any other official institution, but it refuses to be subject to the same rules as those institutions. If you're a traditional publisher, you can't reason with Sci-hub. None of the conventional strategies you would use on a competitor work for Sci-hub.
In general, if you're a business, you would prefer to only deal with other businesses and (to an extent) the government. Purely ideological actors, or people who don't pay attention to the conventional rules of engagement are much more annoying. You have to find some kind of leverage over those people so they can't cause as much trouble.
I don't doubt that part of the reason Google is locking down extensions is for security. I'm also sure that there are executives at Google who look at locked-down extension APIs and the inability to side-load extensions as a way of locking out people like Gorhill, and making sure the debate over acceptable ads is primarily restricted to industry players. For them, the fact that these policies improve some aspects of security is just a bonus.
- vatueil 7y agoThere isn't anything stopping individuals from publishing Safari content blockers, though? No more than with the previous extension model. Nor were individuals the only players to take advantage of the powers available to old extensions. There are also legitimate security reasons why browsers such as Firefox have restricted side-loading add-ons on consumer operating systems such as Windows. There's a debate to be had about whether security for most users is worth the trade-off in flexibility for power users. But regardless of any other reasons we might speculate, the arguments that have been presented in favor of such changes are already compelling enough on their own and need to be seriously addressed.
- bad_user 7y agoAs I said, Safari's content blockers are restricted in what they can do and easy to circumvent. That they work for now is only temporary. There's also the elephant in the room: 1. Those content blockers don't work in webviews and most apps on iOS open urls in web views with no way to choose Safari 2. Apps have no ad blockers either Gmail on iOS is especially annoying because we often have to open links that require sign-in (e.g. Github) and there's no way to make it open Safari, but it does have an option for opening "Chrome" (also a shell around an iOS webview). But I love seeing people sticking it to the man :-)
- xodice 7y agoThen you aren't the target for these browsers. I suggest you use one that does what you need. Safari does enough for the majority, tho I understand if "power users" need more "control". Are you a Safari user? I'm trying to understand why you are so obsessive over this minor (to the majority of Safari users) "issue". Regardless, we all deserve privacy and I suggest everyone use either an extension OR a content blocker. I don't care. Just stick it to those scum bags mining your data to send you "targeted" ads. That we can agree on! edit: Cannot reply to bad_user for whatever reason. Regardless, I think we're both on the same page arguing about the same thing in different ways. Let's agree to disagree? <3 my man. Take it easy.
- bad_user 7y agoNo, this isn't about control. Safari's content blockers simply suck at what they do. And yes, I'm an iPhone user.
- acdha 7y agoI use the Firefox Focus blocker on iOS and while it’s not perfect, a few minutes with it disabled is sufficient to say that “simply suck” is grossly inaccurate. It’s a good compromise for something which normal users have a hard time evaluating — 90% of the benefits with zero risk of a security compromise.
- flingo 7y agoAnyone else remember why it's called ublock origin? Because that exact kind of supply-chain attack thing happened to the original version. (ublock)