5 ms·

You disable competitors ads to show your own. Something is wrong with it.

by Dolores12 7y ago

RandomBacon 7y ago
10 (5?) years ago, that used to be called malware.
- nostrademons 7y ago
  You don't have a right to show ads to users. (The CFAA actually works in consumers' favor here: circumventing a user's adblocker is just as much of a crime as hacking into a server.) You do have a right to refuse service to users with adblockers, but to my knowledge Brave doesn't interfere with sites that do this - I still can't get past the paywalls on WSJ/NYTimes/Bloomberg.
- Spivak 7y ago
  It's not malware if it's done at the users request. And the user is free to display the web pages it downloads in any way they want.
  - RandomBacon 7y ago
    Users willingly installed toolbars too.
    - mrob 7y ago
      And if it was truly willing, and the toolbar only did what it claimed it would do, then it wasn't malware.
- Dolores12 7y ago
  It is nice analogy. Sophisticated malware disabled competitor's malware to be the one and only, acting like antivirus software.
- dunham 7y ago
  About fifteen years ago, this was called Gator: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claria_Corporation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claria_Corporation
brettnak 7y ago
I think this largely ignores "how" ads are distributed. The website you are looking at did not select _any_ of the ads you see. They chose a network who is delegating that placement to someone else. Depending on which ad network, this could delegated by several different ad networks until an advertiser is finally selected by the final intermediary. In principle this may not be a very important distinction. However, I often think that I would stop blocking ads _IF_ the website I was looking at had actually vetted the ad I was seeing. I do not want to see so much garbage just for visiting a website. For example: I block all ads from theverge.com, not because their content is bad, but because I find the outbrain ads at the bottom of the page so asinine and tasteless that I'd rather not see any ads. To continue on with theverge example, If they actually had selected the individual ads they were placing, I'd be totally fine with that. But I am not fine with them delegating that responsibility to another company that clearly is not up to handling the task.
- bad_user 7y ago
  > The website you are looking at did not select _any_ of the ads you see. That's irrelevant. In general the content creator gets to choose how their content gets monetized. They own the copyright after all. That ads blocking isn't considered yet a copyright violation in the court of law probably has to do with the upsides, like protecting against malware and privacy. But blocking ads for commercial reasons, like Brave is doing, only to replace those ads with their own, that's just racketeering and I hope to see them lose in a court of law. --- > I do not want to see so much garbage just for visiting a website Then stop vising that website and go to alternative websites that treat you better. Voting with your wallet works. Also a lot of websites these days offer subscriptions. I bet for example that 99.9% of HN visitors don't pay for subscriptions to their favorite publications. Which would just go to show how self entitled we feel to getting other people's work for free. --- Note that I am using browser extensions, like uBlock Origin or Privacy Badger, but I'm only doing so for privacy reasons. And I'll never trust Brave with my privacy, sorry.
  - __MatrixMan__ 7y ago
    > Voting with your wallet works. But it doesn't, not in this case. Very few people want to manage a separate payment stream, and a separate login, for each content provider on the off chance that they might stumble across that provider's content. And those that do don't want to pay a flat rate for access to content that they might never stumble across in a given payment period. My uncle used to give me a lot of grief for getting my music via bittorrent--but it was never about avoiding having to pay for content, it was about objecting to a monetization model (DRM) that was less convenient than its free alternatives. I started paying for music just as soon as Spotify made it easier to pay than it was to pirate. Ads are the same way. I don't mind paying for my content, but blocking ads and circumventing paywalls is currently less work than the hassle of managing a fleet of flat rate subscriptions. Brave offers an alternative where you only have to move dollars once (buying BAT and funding your browser's wallet), and the money is thereafter distributed according to which content you spend more time viewing. It solves a problem that no other "voting with your wallet" way currently does. I'll confess that I'm not currently using brave that way, but it's only because they don't currently support a unified wallet across browsers. Once I have to manage just a single BAT balance, though, I intend to keep the shields up and the contributions flowing, and set up recurring transfers into the BAT wallet from my bank account.
bsclifton 7y ago
Showing ads is something users have to opt-in to see (using Brave Rewards). Users can turn off ad-blocking globally if they missed the ads, but blocking them (ads/trackers) is one of the main draws to downloading Brave, IMO

You disable competitors ads to show your own. Something is wrong with it.

RandomBacon 7y ago

10 (5?) years ago, that used to be called malware.

nostrademons 7y ago
You don't have a right to show ads to users. (The CFAA actually works in consumers' favor here: circumventing a user's adblocker is just as much of a crime as hacking into a server.) You do have a right to refuse service to users with adblockers, but to my knowledge Brave doesn't interfere with sites that do this - I still can't get past the paywalls on WSJ/NYTimes/Bloomberg.
Spivak 7y ago
It's not malware if it's done at the users request. And the user is free to display the web pages it downloads in any way they want.
- RandomBacon 7y ago
  Users willingly installed toolbars too.
  - mrob 7y ago
    And if it was truly willing, and the toolbar only did what it claimed it would do, then it wasn't malware.
Dolores12 7y ago
It is nice analogy. Sophisticated malware disabled competitor's malware to be the one and only, acting like antivirus software.
dunham 7y ago
About fifteen years ago, this was called Gator: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claria_Corporation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claria_Corporation

brettnak 7y ago

I think this largely ignores "how" ads are distributed. The website you are looking at did not select _any_ of the ads you see. They chose a network who is delegating that placement to someone else. Depending on which ad network, this could delegated by several different ad networks until an advertiser is finally selected by the final intermediary. In principle this may not be a very important distinction. However, I often think that I would stop blocking ads _IF_ the website I was looking at had actually vetted the ad I was seeing. I do not want to see so much garbage just for visiting a website. For example: I block all ads from theverge.com, not because their content is bad, but because I find the outbrain ads at the bottom of the page so asinine and tasteless that I'd rather not see any ads. To continue on with theverge example, If they actually had selected the individual ads they were placing, I'd be totally fine with that. But I am not fine with them delegating that responsibility to another company that clearly is not up to handling the task.

bad_user 7y ago
> The website you are looking at did not select _any_ of the ads you see. That's irrelevant. In general the content creator gets to choose how their content gets monetized. They own the copyright after all. That ads blocking isn't considered yet a copyright violation in the court of law probably has to do with the upsides, like protecting against malware and privacy. But blocking ads for commercial reasons, like Brave is doing, only to replace those ads with their own, that's just racketeering and I hope to see them lose in a court of law. --- > I do not want to see so much garbage just for visiting a website Then stop vising that website and go to alternative websites that treat you better. Voting with your wallet works. Also a lot of websites these days offer subscriptions. I bet for example that 99.9% of HN visitors don't pay for subscriptions to their favorite publications. Which would just go to show how self entitled we feel to getting other people's work for free. --- Note that I am using browser extensions, like uBlock Origin or Privacy Badger, but I'm only doing so for privacy reasons. And I'll never trust Brave with my privacy, sorry.
- __MatrixMan__ 7y ago
  > Voting with your wallet works. But it doesn't, not in this case. Very few people want to manage a separate payment stream, and a separate login, for each content provider on the off chance that they might stumble across that provider's content. And those that do don't want to pay a flat rate for access to content that they might never stumble across in a given payment period. My uncle used to give me a lot of grief for getting my music via bittorrent--but it was never about avoiding having to pay for content, it was about objecting to a monetization model (DRM) that was less convenient than its free alternatives. I started paying for music just as soon as Spotify made it easier to pay than it was to pirate. Ads are the same way. I don't mind paying for my content, but blocking ads and circumventing paywalls is currently less work than the hassle of managing a fleet of flat rate subscriptions. Brave offers an alternative where you only have to move dollars once (buying BAT and funding your browser's wallet), and the money is thereafter distributed according to which content you spend more time viewing. It solves a problem that no other "voting with your wallet" way currently does. I'll confess that I'm not currently using brave that way, but it's only because they don't currently support a unified wallet across browsers. Once I have to manage just a single BAT balance, though, I intend to keep the shields up and the contributions flowing, and set up recurring transfers into the BAT wallet from my bank account.

bsclifton 7y ago

Showing ads is something users have to opt-in to see (using Brave Rewards). Users can turn off ad-blocking globally if they missed the ads, but blocking them (ads/trackers) is one of the main draws to downloading Brave, IMO