Google Chrome will limit ad blockers starting June 2024::The “Manifest V3” rollout is back after letting tensions cool for a year.

    • @[email protected]
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      11 year ago

      I use Chrome, but Firefox on my android phone. I have had ublock origin installed since the beginning. I only really use it because I manage my YouTube and Google accounts through it, and its handy for sending tabs between my macbook and PC, as well as the various other workflow features I’ve come to rely on over the last decade or so.

      Though I recently heard this was a feature on Firefox now. I used to use Firefox prior to chrome, about 15 or so years ago. I’ve been intending to switch back recently but haven’t got round to it yet.

    • @[email protected]
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      11 year ago

      I use it for a couple things, although my primary browser is Firefox. I use Google Workspace for my business so I have a Chrome profile set up for that. Another business I’m involved with uses M365. It’s easy to set up another Chrome profile for that. I like to keep work separate from my personal stuff and this setup works well for me.

    • @[email protected]
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      1 year ago

      Does Vivaldi count? In that case, daily. I did install Firefox recently to try it out again, though.

    • @[email protected]
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      51 year ago

      I use it for some tasks at work that don’t function correctly on Firefox (for whatever reason our local intranet doesn’t play nice with FF) but other than that, I am almost exclusively using Firefox.

      Now if someone can come up with a better search engine than Google…

      • @[email protected]
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        11 year ago

        That’s the only reason why I have a Chrome install, sometimes some pages (it’s always store pages) don’t work correctly on Firefox, but that’s becoming more rare.

    • @[email protected]
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      11 year ago

      I have Chrome configured as my default browser, armed to the teeth against any possible misbehaviour such as no Javascript. Anything that tries to open a website automatically goes there, and if it wants to work properly has to get onto my whitelist or gets its URL copypasted into Firefox.

      I use Firefox as my main browser. It doesn’t seem to like not being my default browser and complains regularly about it, but there’s no way to explain my setup to it so I have to keep saying “no” to the prompt (to be fair it’s only at update time when this happens, and even then it’s occasional so no big deal). JS is on by default but I still have uBO, Enhancer for YT, I don’t care about cookies, and a few other extensions.

  • @[email protected]
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    361 year ago

    Never thought this would be the thing that drove me to degoogled myself, but here we are. I put myself back in an apple silo purely out of spite. Converted all my gmails to other services, like hey.com and tutanota, I PAY a search engine now Kagi.com.

    They really burned my soul. Fuck Google.

      • @[email protected]
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        141 year ago

        I see so many of these comments I can’t help but wonder if it’s an ad campaign by Kagi.

        • @[email protected]
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          91 year ago

          Pretty sure it is, I ended up trying the free trial because of all the yapping. Don’t bother. 99% of the results are the same as ddg.

          • Laurel Raven
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            71 year ago

            +1 for ddg, it does everything needed from a search engine without the extra crap, and even if you don’t turn off ads, they’re reasonable and unobtrusive (and they let you turn them off very easily)

        • Draconic NEO
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          11 year ago

          It very likely is an Astroturfing campaign to try and get more users.

            • Draconic NEO
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              11 year ago

              Lemmy is a poor choice for astroturfing, not because of small user count but because no one here is going to hesitate from removing their content or banning them from the site. On regular social media you can act like a shill and get downvoted and hated on, but here the punishments are actually handed out, and even if their home instance doesn’t ban them others likely will, effectively crippling said campaign.

              These campaigns work on social media services that will protect them due to corporate interest, something that basically doesn’t happen here.

      • @[email protected]
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        11 year ago

        I’ve done Linux desktops, and I fight with them too much. Macos is fine by me. Mad respect for Linux users though.

        Non android Linux phones just don’t feel ready.

        Comfy leashes I guess.

  • ColorcodedResistor
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    501 year ago

    title as it should be: ‘google did not die a hero, it instead lived long enough to become the villain.’

      • @[email protected]
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        101 year ago

        Eh, when Chrome first came out, Firefox was incredibly clunky and slow in comparison.

        At least it was for me, which was why I switched back then.

        Google’s YouTube shenanigans earlier this year got me back to Firefox though, and the more Google does crap like this the more I’m thinking my next phone may take me back to the Appleverse.

        • @[email protected]
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          21 year ago

          Trust me, if you care about what’s happening to Google and YouTube right now, you won’t love what has been happening to Apple and it’s products for the last decade or so.

        • Corhen
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          11 year ago

          Yea, i swapped to chrome when it was on the rise, and it was subsantially faster than firefox.

          These days i find firefox as fast, or faster.

          • @[email protected]
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            21 year ago

            Yeah I honestly expected some growing pains with the switch but it was a lot smoother than I expected.

            • @[email protected]
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              31 year ago

              To put it simply, a “custom ROM” in this context means a modified version of Android. Many of these versions are based on AOSP (Android Open-Source Project), which is still maintained by Google, but is in fact open-source and doesn’t include Google services. Therefore, there is a possibility to use Android phones (given you have one with unlockable bootloader) without any Google apps or account.

              • @[email protected]
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                11 year ago

                I guess I am just past the time where I enjoy…or even am willing to…delve into the way my devices work, run non standard stuff on them, or have some unique setup on them.

                I don’t feel like my needs or desires are too awfully picky or niche at this point, I just don’t want my shit to be actively fighting me in day to day function.

                When I got my first smart phone, I went Android for the increased options to customize and more hardware and app options.

                As time went on, I got to a point where the hardware all sucked compared to iPhone, couldn’t find a phone I liked that did all the things as well as an iPhone, so I switched, trading customize-ability for function.

                While that was a trade that worked, I still missed Android as I found the iPhone trying to constantly force me to do things a certain way. And when I went looking for ways to change that, most of the apple community basically said, “If you don’t want to do things the apple way, you’re the one that’s wrong and needs to change”

                So after that one, I came right back to Android.

                My last phone was pretty good but this one has so many quirks and hardware issues that just the experience of using the phone frustrates me and I’ve only had it a few months.

                Not seeing anything else I like on the market, my options seem to be annoyance with hardware, annoyance with software, or annoyance with hardware and fuss with installing non typical software.

                • @[email protected]
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                  11 year ago

                  I get it, I have a similar situation, except since I came back to Android I have been nothing but happy.

                  I used to be into running custom stuff on Android before my switch to an iPhone. And I, too, have found it frustrating to be forced to respect Apple’s rules.

                  Now, however, I have a Pixel 7 and it’s been a perfect experience so far. Running the stock OS non-rooted, it finally feels like my phone.

    • @[email protected]
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      271 year ago

      How long until Google starts paying sites to require chrome? The already tried rolling that concept out a few months ago. They only stopped because of the backlash that was publicly associated with it. They already pay major phone manufacturers to have google as their default or only search option.

      So who’s going to stop them when we start finding that major popular sites suddenly don’t work on firefox?

            • @[email protected]
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              41 year ago

              With something like that, it’s usually just rebranded and pushed out after backlash calms down.

            • @[email protected]
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              121 year ago

              As it is customary, companies drop bomb shells to gauge their user base reaction. They pull back if the reaction is too strong and slowly reintroduce it piece by piece when the things have cooled down a bit.

              The moment they announced their intention to DRM the web meant that they will try to push however they can.

        • Cethin
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          21 year ago

          I think there are more reliable ways to identify your browser. The user-agent is self reported, so not reliable. It’s just the simplest option that’s usually good enough unless you’re doing something malicious.

      • @[email protected]
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        31 year ago

        Sounds like they will create a non-corporate version of the internet by accident. Sound good to me, but I feel like it won’t fly in EU to well.

      • r3df0x ✡️✝☪️
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        121 year ago

        People could start configuring their sites to ban Google Chrome. Give a scary message that says something like “Google Chrome is not allowed on this site for your protection. Google Chrome has severe vulnerabilities that allow for easy infection. An autistic teenager was falsely convicted of selling CP after being infected and now must register for life.”

        People would switch away from Google Chrome incredibly fast if website owners started posting that.

        • @[email protected]
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          91 year ago

          I like the way you think, but that sounds like a lawsuit with one of the richest companies on the planet behind the prosecution. Could work for sites based outside of US jurisdiction.

          • r3df0x ✡️✝☪️
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            61 year ago

            They can’t sue millions of people.

            It could also be made very hard for them to win. All someone has to do is make a site making that claim and their ability to win will be gone. Any defendant can claim they read that site.

            • @[email protected]
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              61 year ago

              They don’t sue millions of people. They sue one person and make an example out of them and the chilling effect does the rest. That’s how this kind of thing goes.

              • r3df0x ✡️✝☪️
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                31 year ago

                That’s only if everyone else complies.

                Plenty of organizations would likely jump in. Someone could make a site alleging the bad thing that happened as the result of Google Chrome and that pretty much tanks the entire case. It would be very hard to prove reckless disregard for the truth when there’s a website that alleges the claim. Furthermore, someone could simply write the code and distribute it, and every site displaying it would have grounds for displaying it.

                All someone really has to do is find one thing that could potentially be a vulnerability in Google Chrome and they have grounds for making a scary notice about it.

      • Uriel238 [all pronouns]
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        41 year ago

        Then we’ll develop add-ons that make the sites pretend Firefox is Chrome. It may not be perfect for a while, but it’ll still block ads.

      • @[email protected]
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        41 year ago

        They won’t pay them it will be smarter than that. Possibly with proprietary APIs that only work on chrome etc. some sites already don’t work on Firefox.

        They’ll also further enshitifiy their own services on non chrome browsers.

  • @[email protected]
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    251 year ago

    People keep saying (and corpos keep believing) that normies will just “get used to the ads or pay a premium”

    But everybody has a breaking point. People who already dislike it have left chrome or are in the rush to leave. Once people reach this point, they will start asking their more tech savvy friends or the Internet for a better way.

    I honestly hope Google will not change its trajectory because sooner or later, people will get fed up with their bullshit.

    • @[email protected]
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      51 year ago

      I paid for YouTube premium for quite a while but cancelled because it wouldn’t stop recommending the same video I’ve “not interested” for too many times, and also for pushing far right propaganda and pseudo science when all I watch is gaming related content and some space and engineering content.

      Browsing the Internet without add blockers literally breaks the pages and makes one vulnerable to malware.

      • Corhen
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        31 year ago

        Would you like to rewatch this video you already watched? i even removed the fact it has been previously played?

        No? How about now? Or now?

        Sometimes youtube’s recommendations are excellent, serving interesting woodworking or tech videos, other time it just shovels me the same drivel over and over.

        • @[email protected]
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          1 year ago

          My current feed is 4 videos that I’ve already watched completely and the red bar is still full, but I get a lot of already watched videos where the bar resets as well. Then it’s a bunch of videos from 14 years ago. These old videos started appearing earlier this year and I get a lot of them since, besides clicking ‘No Interest’

          Then there’s one or two videos that have been there for months in my feed that I’m afraid to dismiss because I like the general topic just don’t have interest in these particular videos.

          And then from time to time it it shines for a day or two and I get interesting stuff that disappears as quick as it came.

          One thing it’s getting better at recently is showing me long videos that are over an hour instead of the under 15 minute ones.

      • @[email protected]
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        21 year ago

        I did have a strange issue with that in the past, but not any more.

        I think it went away after going through the Windows ClearType gubbins again.

        • JackbyDev
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          11 year ago

          Oh god, that menu is the worst shit. I literally downloaded an open source program to tweak it.

      • Cosmic Cleric
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        21 year ago

        It’s been forever since I last looked, but can’t you actually change what fonts are used from within Firefox directly?

      • Corhen
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        101 year ago

        Weird do you have a screen shot you can share? they look fine to me.

        Could it be something withyour windows installation?

        • @[email protected]
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          31 year ago

          Here is a picture that demonstrates the problem. On the left is Firefox and on the right Thorium (Chromium). I’ve had this problem on Windows before but now I’m using Linux and it’s the same unfortunately.

          • Cosmic Cleric
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            11 year ago

            Here is a picture that demonstrates the problem. On the left is Firefox and on the right Thorium (Chromium).

            If I’m understanding that screenshot correctly, it looks like Thorium (Chromium) is ignoring the text values and bolding any of them at the max bolding value, where Firefox respects the text values and bolts off of that just slightly.

            • Cosmic Cleric
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              1 year ago

              Using DuckDuckGo (Android), which is chromium-based, it has the same problem, all text weights are bolded at the maximum values.

              It looks like Firefox is trying to be more respectful of the text weights, when deciding how to bold text.

    • @[email protected]
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      1 year ago

      I just can’t get used to Firefox. Last time I tried it (earlier this year), I tried for 2 months. Can’t remember all the reasons, but using the adresbar as calculator and see the results without pressing enter is so ingrained in my way of working. Just alt+d, 2+2 shows the result. Give me something better than that and I’ll give Firefox an other shot.

      Edit: lol at my downvotes. That’s what I get for asking a genuine question I guess. People really looove their Firefox here. (me too, but I’m missing some features)

  • Black Skinned Jew
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    41 year ago

    Let see what’s happening in a year… for now everything fine when the time comes then people will have to find a solution but anyway who cares what Google say haha…

  • r3df0x ✡️✝☪️
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    441 year ago

    They’re going to burn their own browser. If they stop allowing adblockers, a lot of people are just going to change browsers.

    • @[email protected]
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      61 year ago

      I would love to see this happen but I suspect that the number of users who actually install ad blocker extensions and are willing to switch to a new browser once they stop working is fairly insignificant compared to the total numbers of people browsing in Chrome.

      • @[email protected]
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        31 year ago

        Agree, i have rarely seen people who actually use adblock outside my work. I had to practically tie up my entire family, in-laws included to get ublock installed on all their computers.

  • ThǝLobotoʍi$T
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    81 year ago

    It’s roughly a month that I switched to firefox on pc and android and I’ve never been happier!