I bet this move is also to kill the workings of extensions like DecentralEyes and others that try to protect users from being tracked. The whole changing of the API into a "sure we'll block that URL for ya, sometimes maybe" model reeks of increasing user tracking. They'll work out the kinks to let AdBlockers function again. But they'll have their tracking back.
(Disclosure: I work at Google, not on Chrome, and don't have any inside information on this)
Meanwhile a bunch of unrelated extensions will be killed, the ones that rely on modifying requests and which have nothing to do with ad blocking. Innovation around extensions that involves modifying requests will be halted, and everyone will suffer as a result, except Google.
Crooks will have continued and easy access to user data, since Manifest v3 is not focused on protecting user privacy.
I can bet on that.
I will make a public prediction that after one year of Manifest V3 actually shipping to users in mainline Chrome:
- Assuming that Manifest V3's declarative API is not significantly changed from its current implementation.
- If you visit each of the top 10 publishers in the US (including open publishing platforms like Twitter/Facebook/Youtube)
- If you compare Chrome and Firefox, each with the most-recommended ad-blocking/tracker-blocking extensions on their equivalent web stores installed (currently Ublock Origin, but we'll leave it open. "Most recommended" means that among technical users, this extension is the most commonly recommended. There's a little ambiguity here, but not sure how to narrow it.).
- Firefox will block more web trackers (65% likelyhood).
- Firefox will block more visible ads and popups (55% likelyhood).
There are a couple of reasons why I feel comfortable making those two predictions:
- Twitter and Facebook both try really hard to get around adblockers, and Firefox will be more likely to be able to combat their strategies in the future.
- Extensions like Privacy Badger will already have a more difficult time working in Manifest V3, so there's potential for new adblocking strategies to develop in Firefox that can't be ported.
- Safari made similar changes, and it's already less effective than Firefox at adblocking, so it seems reasonable to guess that Chrome will follow the same path.
- Properly configured, Firefox is already better than Chrome at blocking web-trackers, and I think Firefox will roll those changes out by default to ordinary users before Chrome does.
There are a few reasons why I'm hedging my bets:
- The advertising market is volatile, and might change significantly in the next year (privacy laws, etc...) This is unlikely, but not so unlikely that I can completely discount it.
- Chrome has research teams working on some interesting privacy strategies. I think it's mostly just talk and they won't do much of significance in a year, but I can't completely discount it.
- A mass exodus to Firefox could force Chrome to adapt Manifest V3 to be more open. This is also unlikely, but again, I can't completely discount it.
- And just general uncertainty, because the longer out you predict the more uncertainty you should introduce.
55% and 65% seem like very low numbers, but I think they're a relatively bold prediction. If Firefox and Chrome are blocking basically identical numbers of trackers/ads, that doesn't count as a successful prediction. I'm not going to be pedantic about, "Chrome randomly saw one more ad on exactly one website." Right now, I consider Chrome and Firefox to be equal in terms of adblocking capabilities. So even a 50% guess would be saying, "there's a one-in-two chance that something changes and Firefox will just be an objectively better browser for adblocking."
If you asked me to make a bet on whether Firefox would be meaningfully better than Chrome on, like, SSL support, I would give that a pretty low probability -- maybe 10% off the top of my head. Because I expect that a year from now nothing drastic is going to happen that would magically make either browser be different from each other on that front.
It's not 50% "one of the two things will happen, flip a coin", it's 50% "we will see a meaningful change from the status quo."
once they're in total control of how the blockers can operate: I doubt they'll be responsive to what the developers of the blocking extensions want...
The replacement API is incompatible with what it is replacing. The supposed gain in performance is not without loss in ability to block ads.
> ad blocking extensions won't disappear. May be some will, and new extensions emerge.
Some kinds of ad-blocking is simply impossible in the new API, without replacement or workaround. No extension can implement those methods.
This is how a company implements measures that could be a legal problem: By formally making a technical decision and having the actual goal as a by-product of that decision.
It's funny because for years MS kept officially supported, feature complete, portable format for use in interchange, while DOC being shared was kinda unintended consequence that just wasn't fought against.
The very requirements of the original DOC spec required it to be a memory dump.
So they say. I see literally no reason to believe that claim, though.
Clearly an unpopular opinion here, but anyway: I'm happy to let a few ads slip through (which I will happily ignore anyhow) in exchange for the possibility of a future where I dont have to drive a car to get places.
Ads are funding the Internet only because it's the easiest legal business model to pull off, so everyone gravitated to it. But it's not like there wouldn't be money for self-driving cars without adtech, and in reality, them being tied with advertising companies only ensures that the future will be shitty.
I'm convinced that in a world where collecting anonymous micropayments was as easy as serving ads, the web would look at lot different.
People look at this as a choice between paying $5 a month for every website they visit, or getting it "free" with ads. But in a world with good micropayments, most websites wouldn't cost $5. Outside of the biggest players, most sites aren't currently making $5 a month per user via ads.
But should that mean letting the fox guard the henhouse though? The problem here is that the largest ad provider also controls the largest ad display platform (i.e., Chrome), and is using the latter to benefit the former.