4 ms·

That has happened before, but very rarely, and I highly doubt will ever happen to SponsorBlock.

JadeNB 5y ago
> That has happened before, but very rarely, and I highly doubt will ever happen to SponsorBlock. Why do you doubt it? I've read that extension creators are constantly bombarded with offers to package just a little malware in their extension; surely the same is true of ads. If you're just a hobbyist developer—and that's where the best extensions come from—surely it's too much to expect that you'll resist that pressure forever.
- darwinwhy 5y ago
  SponsorBlock is open source. https://github.com/ajayyy/SponsorBlock https://github.com/ajayyy/SponsorBlock
- ajayyy 5y ago
  SponsorBlock is completely tied to my real identity, why would I want to destroy my reputation for relatively little gain.
  - JadeNB 5y ago
    It's definitely nothing against you; indeed, I thank you and everyone like you who makes these tools that make my browsing experience so much better. I assume that everyone who makes useful extensions like this does so out of good will. But I also assume that it is possible for a good person to tire of maintaining a piece of software, and want to pass on control, and to allow themselves to see the upside of an appealing and lucrative offer and believe that the worst won't come. And I can't blame a person who does this—they certainly don't owe me anything.
    - waterhouse 5y ago
      Into this discussion I will drop the following points: 1. The creator of the VLC media player was apparently offered "tens of millions" of euros to insert ads. Thus, if your software is sufficiently widely used, that is the kind of temptation you may eventually face. 2. He said no. So there do exist people who will resist such temptation. Citation: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15372048 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15372048 and the link chain therefrom
      - omershapira 5y ago
        VLC is GPLv2, saying yes would have been a short term annoyance for the community in exchange of him cashing in.
  - patates 5y ago
    It's about neither your extension nor your incentives, and you can be the nicest person on earth (and I have no reason to believe otherwise, great work!), but we are all mortals in the end, and with the automatically updating extensions, it's too hard to say what will happen in the long term (who takes over eventually?). Also a parallel risk which has less to do with the ad industry is the extension getting hijacked. So there is always a significant risk even the author declines all the offers for cashing out. But again, your awesome extension in which you poured so many hours is not the problem, it's just affected by the problem.

> That has happened before, but very rarely, and I highly doubt will ever happen to SponsorBlock. Why do you doubt it? I've read that extension creators are constantly bombarded with offers to package just a little malware in their extension; surely the same is true of ads. If you're just a hobbyist developer—and that's where the best extensions come from—surely it's too much to expect that you'll resist that pressure forever.

darwinwhy 5y ago
SponsorBlock is open source. https://github.com/ajayyy/SponsorBlock https://github.com/ajayyy/SponsorBlock
ajayyy 5y ago
SponsorBlock is completely tied to my real identity, why would I want to destroy my reputation for relatively little gain.
- JadeNB 5y ago
  It's definitely nothing against you; indeed, I thank you and everyone like you who makes these tools that make my browsing experience so much better. I assume that everyone who makes useful extensions like this does so out of good will. But I also assume that it is possible for a good person to tire of maintaining a piece of software, and want to pass on control, and to allow themselves to see the upside of an appealing and lucrative offer and believe that the worst won't come. And I can't blame a person who does this—they certainly don't owe me anything.
  - waterhouse 5y ago
    Into this discussion I will drop the following points: 1. The creator of the VLC media player was apparently offered "tens of millions" of euros to insert ads. Thus, if your software is sufficiently widely used, that is the kind of temptation you may eventually face. 2. He said no. So there do exist people who will resist such temptation. Citation: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15372048 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15372048 and the link chain therefrom
    - omershapira 5y ago
      VLC is GPLv2, saying yes would have been a short term annoyance for the community in exchange of him cashing in.
- patates 5y ago
  It's about neither your extension nor your incentives, and you can be the nicest person on earth (and I have no reason to believe otherwise, great work!), but we are all mortals in the end, and with the automatically updating extensions, it's too hard to say what will happen in the long term (who takes over eventually?). Also a parallel risk which has less to do with the ad industry is the extension getting hijacked. So there is always a significant risk even the author declines all the offers for cashing out. But again, your awesome extension in which you poured so many hours is not the problem, it's just affected by the problem.