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Comment by bsharitt | Hacker News Reader

Everybody imagine going back 15 years and tell yourself that you're using a web browser made by the parent company of DoubleClick. Your 15 year ago self would think you're a moron (assuming that 15 years ago you were old enough to know what DoubleClick was).

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I always believed that tech-savvy people using Google Chrome are morons. It's the perfect blend of Google being evil trying to force it to everyone, the browser being dumbed down to masses so much it's missing the most basic features, and I guess privacy concerns too when using browser from advertising company.

That's a really great way of conceptualizing it, if you assume Google is basically DoubleClick at it's core (which I think makes sense).

Doubleclick ads were, originally, what prompted me to seek an adblock extension.

I think it was around 2006 that I got the extension for Firefox; Google bought them about a year later.

Well, it depends. Do I get a funny animation following my cursor if I do it?

Kind of true. The whole internet was much more of a toy back then. Tracking was not viewed so maliciously as now. Heck I might have even been convinced by a hard sell "this will help your favorite sites maximize their revenue".

I can only speak for myself, but myself from 15 years ago would not have cared so strongly about the choice of browser. I believe I was using the newly-ad-less Opera at the time, and new/cared little about the company making it.

My 15 year ago self would have taken a double helping of DoubleClick if my only choices were that or Internet Explorer 6.

Firefox and Opera existed at the time.

Do you remember what browsers were like when Chrome came out? I switched from Firefox the day it came out, and was very happy with performance and UI.

I don’t use Chrome. Never have, never will. Why do you?

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