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Google pulls the plug on uBlock Origin, leaving over 30 million Chrome users susceptible to intrusive ads
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this post was submitted on 15 Aug 2024
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The count is supposedly closer to 3 billion, but the article clarifies only 30 million use ublock origin. Which seems devastatingly low to me. Why risk such a move if it only affects 1% of your userbase?
Because it only affects one percent of the userbase. There's no short term loss. Your clients (ad companies, Big Corp) see that you're Doing Something. And, more importantly, Big Tech is removing the copper wiring out of the walls. They want to monetize ad space as much as humanly possible. YouTube is already showing 4-5 ads to normies as we speak.
My 13 yo cousin won't install or let me install an adblocker on his phone and it's killing me because he keeps complaining to his mom that he needs YouTube plus or whatever it's called, but then I say "sponsorblock is free" and he says "oh I'm used to the ads" aaaaaaaaaaaaa why is he like this?
In bad country, the children have resigned themselves in being the target of relentless predatory advertising through an implanted sense of worship to highly marketable treats.
Honestly, it won't be long before you can't use a blocker for those ads anyway. Most services now inject the ads right into the data stream for the video you're watching dynamically. To try and block those ads is to try and block the same video of the content you want to watch.
The day that happens is the day I go back to the same full-scale, all-media piracy I was pulling in my teens. Pretty sure the old schooner's still seaworthy.
If that happens and it's truly impossible to work around it will finally be the day I get off my ass and read Das Kapital in its entirity.
I don't think this will be as big an issue as people fear. Sponsorblock already is a crowd-sourced method of blocking the same video of the content you want to watch, and it works borderline perfectly. Just do the same but by still or video-clip instead of timestamp, job done.
TPM
Sorry, I realized I had a lot to say so I made it a main comment lol
Aw hell yeah baby just look at that rant
well he was raised by youtube. he's been seeing the ads his whole life, sponsor and otherwise. it's like with older people who don't mind seeing ads on their netflix plan - its just tv for them.
I was raised by YouTube as well, it's just a matter of being radicalized to stop giving a shit and prioritizing yourself. I'd still be watching ads on yt if I never became a leftist.
I do think there are a lot of users that run adblockers that are not ublock so the number might be higher in terms of adblocking users.