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It's almost as if you can opt into it if you want to. Amazing.

Someone1234 6y ago
That's not an argument for using Brave. If you don't opt into it, why use Brave at all? You're essentially using a glorified Chrome with uBlock.
- shadowgovt 6y ago
  > If you don't opt into it, why use Brave at all? Sounds like you compiled a statement like "give me the factors of 26, but you can't use 1, 2, or 13." If you don't opt into it, you definitely aren't using it. As for why someone would opt into it: some people don't mind being tracked but they care about who's doing the tracking and how their data gets integrated. If Brave shuts down everyone else's tracking but then Brave is building a profile on a user, that's fine for some.
  - ashtonkem 6y ago
    > Sounds like you compiled a statement like "give me the factors of 26, but you can't use 1, 2, or 13." If you don't opt into it, you definitely aren't using it. Parent comment said that the business model of Brave is opt in, implying that they’re recommending you use brave but not opt in to the crypto/ad business model. I think it’s perfectly fair to ask what is the value prop of Brave if you don’t use their crypto/ad system.
    - catalogia 6y ago
      As far as I'm aware, Brave is the only browser that blocks ads by default. Personally I just use uBO/uMatrix on Firefox, but I can certainly understand why some people might prefer a more streamlined default experience. The fact that so many people get bent out of shape about Brave blocking ads by default is probably also seen as a positive signal by many people who hate ads. If Brave pisses off people who run ad-supported websites, that's a fantastic endorsement.
      - ashtonkem 6y ago
        I guess if you can’t figure out how to install uBO, then Brave makes sense. I suspect that the pool of people who care about blocking ads, can’t figure out uBO, but are willing to install an extra browser is pretty small, but I have no skin in this game. I’ve never seen anyone angry about Brave blocking ads; what I’ve seen are people angry at Brave blocking ads and adding their own, which is a drastically different complaint.
        catalogia 6y ago
        Last I checked, the number of people using Adblock Plus dwarfs the number of people using uBO, so there's clearly a pretty large number of people who find uBO difficult, or perhaps simply don't know about it. Either way, I don't use it and wouldn't invest in that company either; I wouldn't bet on them succeeding in the long run. But I think can certainly understand, if not agree with, the people who decide to use it. > I’ve never seen anyone angry about Brave blocking ads; what I’ve seen are people angry at Brave blocking ads and adding their own, which is a drastically different complaint. I think for many people who hate ads, this distinction isn't really relevant. They like that Brave pisses off people who run websites with ads. Perhaps disliking website operators enough to cut off their nose to spite their face.
        ashtonkem 6y ago
        The difference between Adblock plus and uBO doesn’t affect my point. Most people are fully capable of installing an ad blocker, and tons do. I guess I get people wanting to piss off those who run ads, but that applies to ad blockers as a whole. That’s not an argument for Brave specifically.
        catalogia 6y ago
        Well I can't defend it further than I have. It's not my intention to provide arguments for using Brave, merely to explain why I think many people have chosen to. You and I agree that Brave isn't the browser to use, but evidently plenty of people do want to use it and I think the reasons I've described explain a lot of that. I doubt it'd be causing so much consternation if that weren't the case. For website and ad network operators, it could be worse. Automated 'clickfraud' extensions could have gained traction. Maybe Brave will do that in the future too.
  - thanatropism 6y ago
    Brave is also a bit faster on older Windows computers.
  - mthoms 6y ago
    FWIW, if you opt in, any profile that Brave builds (for ad matching purposes) never leaves your machine. You can inspect or delete it any time. That's one part of the appeal — that this stuff stays local.
- bzb3 6y ago
  Chrome now has a gimped ad block API, brave is more flexible. It also comes with some anti fingerprinting measures and additional options.
  - snazz 6y ago
    uBlock Origin still works fine in Chromium today. Even if Google were to disallow it and other powerful adblockers, the alternative (similar to content blockers on MobileSafari) is not a serious problem, at least for me. I have Ka-Block! on my iPhone, which blocks ads just fine, despite having a much less powerful interface than uBO.
    - bzb3 6y ago
      >uBlock Origin still works fine in Chromium today. They intended to gimp the API. Not sure if the changes are in effect already though. >Even if Google were to disallow it and other powerful adblockers, the alternative (similar to content blockers on MobileSafari) is not a serious problem, at least for me. I have Ka-Block! on my iPhone, which blocks ads just fine, despite having a much less powerful interface than uBO. Good for you. It's not enough for me. I even write my own rules for the sites I visit often.
      - scarface74 6y ago
        You can write your own rules for most Safari content blockers. But if I don’t trust websites not to invade my privacy, why would I trust a third party ad blocker that has access to my entire browsing history as opposed to the Apple method where the content blockers just give Safari a list of rules?
        bzb3 6y ago
        That's a very good point, but I have to say ublock origin has done nothing yet to breach my trust.
        mthoms 6y ago
        Don't all ad-blockers work with (regex-like) rule lists these days?
- thanatropism 6y ago
  Brave for iOS is an ad-blocked browser. Maybe there are others, I know none. It also auto-closes tabs I might have browsed in anonymous mode. Safari doesn't, and it's quite a nightmare to fatfinger into anonymous mode and see whatever you had opened anon mode for.
  - snazz 6y ago
    MobileSafari natively supports content blockers as well. You can turn them off temporarily or for a specific site. There's a variety of apps in the App Store that include block lists; just flip a switch in Settings similarly to how you'd add a new keyboard or autofill provider. The adblocker app doesn't get your browsing history, it just provides the list of blocked elements to Safari.
- basch 6y ago
  Because its considerably faster, they claim. https://brave.com/improved-ad-blocker-performance/ https://brave.com/improved-ad-blocker-performance/ https://github.com/brave/adblock-rust https://github.com/brave/adblock-rust They rewrote ublock origin in rust, and its native to the product, not tacked on. Shady business model aside, they are making technical contributions to the world.
- mikro2nd 6y ago
  There are a (fairly small) number of use-cases where Chromium-like behaviour is needed (my 90% of the time browser is FF) but I don't want a browser that's reporting my every move back to Google. AFAIK Brave fits that need. And no, I've not opted in to their ad system since I hate ads anywhere and everywhere and want them all to die.

That's not an argument for using Brave. If you don't opt into it, why use Brave at all? You're essentially using a glorified Chrome with uBlock.

shadowgovt 6y ago
> If you don't opt into it, why use Brave at all? Sounds like you compiled a statement like "give me the factors of 26, but you can't use 1, 2, or 13." If you don't opt into it, you definitely aren't using it. As for why someone would opt into it: some people don't mind being tracked but they care about who's doing the tracking and how their data gets integrated. If Brave shuts down everyone else's tracking but then Brave is building a profile on a user, that's fine for some.
- ashtonkem 6y ago
  > Sounds like you compiled a statement like "give me the factors of 26, but you can't use 1, 2, or 13." If you don't opt into it, you definitely aren't using it. Parent comment said that the business model of Brave is opt in, implying that they’re recommending you use brave but not opt in to the crypto/ad business model. I think it’s perfectly fair to ask what is the value prop of Brave if you don’t use their crypto/ad system.
  - catalogia 6y ago
    As far as I'm aware, Brave is the only browser that blocks ads by default. Personally I just use uBO/uMatrix on Firefox, but I can certainly understand why some people might prefer a more streamlined default experience. The fact that so many people get bent out of shape about Brave blocking ads by default is probably also seen as a positive signal by many people who hate ads. If Brave pisses off people who run ad-supported websites, that's a fantastic endorsement.
    - ashtonkem 6y ago
      I guess if you can’t figure out how to install uBO, then Brave makes sense. I suspect that the pool of people who care about blocking ads, can’t figure out uBO, but are willing to install an extra browser is pretty small, but I have no skin in this game. I’ve never seen anyone angry about Brave blocking ads; what I’ve seen are people angry at Brave blocking ads and adding their own, which is a drastically different complaint.
      - catalogia 6y ago
        Last I checked, the number of people using Adblock Plus dwarfs the number of people using uBO, so there's clearly a pretty large number of people who find uBO difficult, or perhaps simply don't know about it. Either way, I don't use it and wouldn't invest in that company either; I wouldn't bet on them succeeding in the long run. But I think can certainly understand, if not agree with, the people who decide to use it. > I’ve never seen anyone angry about Brave blocking ads; what I’ve seen are people angry at Brave blocking ads and adding their own, which is a drastically different complaint. I think for many people who hate ads, this distinction isn't really relevant. They like that Brave pisses off people who run websites with ads. Perhaps disliking website operators enough to cut off their nose to spite their face.
        ashtonkem 6y ago
        The difference between Adblock plus and uBO doesn’t affect my point. Most people are fully capable of installing an ad blocker, and tons do. I guess I get people wanting to piss off those who run ads, but that applies to ad blockers as a whole. That’s not an argument for Brave specifically.
        catalogia 6y ago
        Well I can't defend it further than I have. It's not my intention to provide arguments for using Brave, merely to explain why I think many people have chosen to. You and I agree that Brave isn't the browser to use, but evidently plenty of people do want to use it and I think the reasons I've described explain a lot of that. I doubt it'd be causing so much consternation if that weren't the case. For website and ad network operators, it could be worse. Automated 'clickfraud' extensions could have gained traction. Maybe Brave will do that in the future too.
- thanatropism 6y ago
  Brave is also a bit faster on older Windows computers.
- mthoms 6y ago
  FWIW, if you opt in, any profile that Brave builds (for ad matching purposes) never leaves your machine. You can inspect or delete it any time. That's one part of the appeal — that this stuff stays local.
bzb3 6y ago
Chrome now has a gimped ad block API, brave is more flexible. It also comes with some anti fingerprinting measures and additional options.
- snazz 6y ago
  uBlock Origin still works fine in Chromium today. Even if Google were to disallow it and other powerful adblockers, the alternative (similar to content blockers on MobileSafari) is not a serious problem, at least for me. I have Ka-Block! on my iPhone, which blocks ads just fine, despite having a much less powerful interface than uBO.
  - bzb3 6y ago
    >uBlock Origin still works fine in Chromium today. They intended to gimp the API. Not sure if the changes are in effect already though. >Even if Google were to disallow it and other powerful adblockers, the alternative (similar to content blockers on MobileSafari) is not a serious problem, at least for me. I have Ka-Block! on my iPhone, which blocks ads just fine, despite having a much less powerful interface than uBO. Good for you. It's not enough for me. I even write my own rules for the sites I visit often.
    - scarface74 6y ago
      You can write your own rules for most Safari content blockers. But if I don’t trust websites not to invade my privacy, why would I trust a third party ad blocker that has access to my entire browsing history as opposed to the Apple method where the content blockers just give Safari a list of rules?
      - bzb3 6y ago
        That's a very good point, but I have to say ublock origin has done nothing yet to breach my trust.
      - mthoms 6y ago
        Don't all ad-blockers work with (regex-like) rule lists these days?
thanatropism 6y ago
Brave for iOS is an ad-blocked browser. Maybe there are others, I know none. It also auto-closes tabs I might have browsed in anonymous mode. Safari doesn't, and it's quite a nightmare to fatfinger into anonymous mode and see whatever you had opened anon mode for.
- snazz 6y ago
  MobileSafari natively supports content blockers as well. You can turn them off temporarily or for a specific site. There's a variety of apps in the App Store that include block lists; just flip a switch in Settings similarly to how you'd add a new keyboard or autofill provider. The adblocker app doesn't get your browsing history, it just provides the list of blocked elements to Safari.
basch 6y ago
Because its considerably faster, they claim. https://brave.com/improved-ad-blocker-performance/ https://brave.com/improved-ad-blocker-performance/ https://github.com/brave/adblock-rust https://github.com/brave/adblock-rust They rewrote ublock origin in rust, and its native to the product, not tacked on. Shady business model aside, they are making technical contributions to the world.
mikro2nd 6y ago
There are a (fairly small) number of use-cases where Chromium-like behaviour is needed (my 90% of the time browser is FF) but I don't want a browser that's reporting my every move back to Google. AFAIK Brave fits that need. And no, I've not opted in to their ad system since I hate ads anywhere and everywhere and want them all to die.