• @30p87@feddit.de
    10•7 months ago

    I have seen so many inbuilt ad blockers of browsers fail, especially at YouTube, even before the recent changes, that I was surprised to see them still being used and promoted by eg. Louis Rossmann.
    IMO basically nothing can beat addons, at least if seen for all browsers or just firefox.
    Browser devs can’t focus on ad blocking functionality. And their team developing ad blockers will certainly be smaller than the team of devs for adblock addons; the browser just needs somewhat functional stuff while the addon depends on delivering a very good to perfect to be used and to receive donations.
    On chromium, with Manifest V3 at our doors, built in ad blockers will win over addons by far, just because they have more power.

    This creates an interesting situation, at least in my mind fed by my bubble:
    Tech nerds will use firefox, probably with adblock addon
    Tech illiterates will use whatever comes preinstalled - Edge, without any adblock
    Users that know the concept of browsers will probably use Chrome, or other browsers they heard before - possibly a Chromium browser with built in blocker

    Now, what happens if the built in blockers fail - again and again and again? Will the somewhat knowledgeable user care and switch to another browser, maybe the one pushed the most for adblocking: FF with uBlock?

    • 𝘋𝘪𝘳𝘬
      3•7 months ago

      Tech nerds will use firefox, probably with adblock addon

      Adblock isn’t a real issue because every browser has it. The real issue is all the other cool extensions available from Chromium-based browsers.

      • @30p87@feddit.de
        7•7 months ago

        I use 27 addons on my desktop, in firefox. There are no extensions I would need but don’t exist for firefox. The only extension I had to replace with a Tampermonkey script was Vencord, because the devs removed the firefox version of it.

        And on my phone I use 12 addons. On chrome, or any other browser not based on FF, I could use exactly none.

          • LinkOpensChest.wav
            5•7 months ago

            I know what you’re saying, because having that many addons makes them unique, but doesn’t resist fingerprinting still help somewhat?

          • @30p87@feddit.de
            3•7 months ago

            In my understanding, a website should only be able to detect addons if they directly change the website in any way, eg. the css or html. So let’s just go through the list and check:

            • Augmented Steam: Only affects steam, where I’m logged in anyway.
            • Auto replay for YouTube: I’m logged in anyway, and mostly use some piped instance.
            • Buster: Captcha Solver: I guess it just uses JavaScript to click whatever it needs to. And if changes would be detected, the captcha would probably not let me through anyway.
            • Clean twitter: I don’t use twitter. Yeet.
            • Dark reader: This is probably one of the only extensions actually changing the website significantly. So I’m one of a million users, if we assume my user agent is real.
            • DeArrow: Again, only YouTube.
            • Defund Wikipedia: I’m honestly not concerned about Wikipedia fingerprinting me.
            • Disable Youtube seek my numbers: You know the drill.
            • DDG privacy essentials: 1.6 million users, and I would be surprised if an extension designed to protect from fingerprinting is easily fingerprintable itself.
            • I don’t care about cookies: (Because I block them anyway) Also just simulates clicking.
            • Kagi search: Just adds a new menu and changes the default search engine.
            • Karrinator: Only changes the name of a German politician. And I basically never see her name anyway, and if so either only on Lemmy, (reputable) Newspapers or the official website of the German Government. They have my fingerprint anyway, and it’s the only definition they know.
            • KeePassXC: Again, only inserts and clicks.
            • NoScript: Is ironically probably the best way to fingerprint, if it’s configured incorrectly and a fingerprinting script is still allowed.
            • Return Youtube Dislike: You know.
            • Shortkeys: Browser only.
            • Simple Tab Groups: Browser only.
            • Simple modify headers: Should not change anything that would be possible for the website to check, and is only activated for discord anyway.
            • SponsorBlock: Youtube again.
            • Tampermonkey: Only has one script for discord.
            • uBlock: Should block fingerprinting, or the main use of it, but even if not its behavior is probably very similar to other AdBlockers and there are more than 7 million users (just on FF).
            • UnloadTabs: Browser only.
            • User-Agent Switcher and Manager: Should not be transparent to websites.
            • Vencord Web: Now absolete as it was dicontinued for FF natively. Yeet. It’s a Tampermonkey script now, and only active on discord.
            • Video DownloadHelper: Should only read contents, and only if I want it to. yt-dlp is often better anyway.
      • @tenacious_mucus@sh.itjust.works
        4•7 months ago

        Yeah…that’s why I switched from FF to Chrome a few years ago. I was tired of whatever extension it was that i needed or wanted at the time being only on Chrome. Of course, i’m back on FF now and it seems to be much better for what i need, so that’s good.

        • candyman337
          8•7 months ago

          If you’re ever aching for a chrome extension try out waterfox, it’s based on Firefox but also allows the use of some chrome extensions, the list of useable extensions used to be bigger, but it’s growing again thanks to the original dev getting the browser independent again and re-opening it’s development