I'm really impressed to see this, Mozilla should've led here on implementing something like this years ago. This is a pretty big nudge for me to consider Brave as a future browser.
I have always suspected that the current Brave CEO Brendan Eich was a victim of a malicious campaign intended to get him removed from Mozilla (which he co-founded, and later become a CEO of), because he would have been more vocal against Google in Mozilla, and wouldn't have been happy to let the Firefox codebase stagnate while everyone in Mozilla was content with the millions of dollars they were getting from Google. (His religious beliefs / political ideology was just an excuse and just made him an easy target).
Edit: I am not endorsing Brave browser either, as there are some questionable privacy issues with it.
I'm not a fan of them adding this and switching it on, but it's easily disabled...
> Click on the hamburger menu and then select Settings
> Click on Privacy and Security in the sidebar and scroll to Address Bar — Firefox Suggest
> Select or deselect the checkbox for contextual suggestions to turn the feature on or off
> Select or deselect the checkbox for “occasional sponsored suggestions”
Excuse me sir but you definitely sound like a fan.
The really real joke is claiming that proclaiming that Mozilla is a joke is some sort of a joke.
Out-of-the-box I would definitely classify Firefox as ad-ware/spy-ware.
No it's not. That's about as buried as it gets without hiding it in about:config.
"Easily disabled" would be a button right next to the ad that said "never show me this dogshit again."
1. Advertisements appear in places they shouldn’t be. (Yes in Firefox - ads in new tab and address bar).
2. Your web browser’s homepage has mysteriously changed without your permission. (Yes in Firefox - default custom home page)
3. New toolbars, extensions, or plugins suddenly populate your browser. (Yes in Firefox - bundles unwanted, uninstallable extensions)
4. Your computer starts automatically installing unwanted software applications. (Yes in Firefox - studies can install extensions without your knowledge).
5. Collect personal data without your knowledge (Yes in Firefox - ad partners and studies).
Again, technically you are right that there are options to disable some of these things, (most of which are all enabled by default that the majority of users won't be aware of) ... But when a software imitates and behaves like an adware / spyware, Mozilla would do best to listen to their users criticism than call us ignorant.
Even more privacy-respecting options like Vivaldi make their money from search deals, and as much as they try to build their model to be privacy respecting, Brave is still an ad agency.
Next to no one is actually building browsers for a subscription or some other model in that vein. It'd be really hard to get an appreciable userbase that way.
The loss of trust and respect also needs to be considered - when you start doing data collection and introduce intrusive ads, how do I trust you to know the data collection stops?
Features that should come out on Mozilla will instead come out of Brave...
There are still things about brave that confuse me... like the browser feature that allows giving crypto to content providers...
but as someone who loathes AMP... I support this feature.
Brave sells ads. They get $X normal money from it. The ads are delivered from a local catalog downloaded in bulk (the same way safe browsing blocklists are, for example) and matched on device.
If you opt in to see Brave's ad popups, you get a cut from the revenue those popups generate.
Brave gives this cut as BAT - they buy the coins from the open market.
Brave has a built-in tipping service where you can tip people with BAT. If you do, Brave transfers BAT from your wallet to the tippee (and Brave takes a cut from the transaction).
Tippee has BAT that they can sell because there's at least one buyer of BAT on the market: Brave.
It seems like a sensible system overall, but my specifics may be wrong.
Google removed ClearURLs from the chrome add-ons store because (I wish I were making it up) the extension's description was too detailed: https://www.ghacks.net/2021/03/25/the-curious-case-of-clearu...
Brave implementing this, while nice, is basically a nothingburger.
Extensions can certainly deliver this type of functionality in large part, but you have to [run an extension]. You need to ran an extension process (with its additional overhead). You need to make sure Google doesn't swoop-in with breaking changes between manifest versions. Then you have to make sure the extension is permitted in the Web Store, and not removed over something as silly as a detailed description.
By delivering this functionality natively, Brave offers a more reliable and efficient solution to the problem of AMP.
But yes, you will need to use a browser to browse the Web
Regards to the "holding site operators and ad revenue hostage," I'm not sure to what you're referring. Perhaps the UI/UX of Brave Rewards ("Payments" at the time) in late 2018? If so, see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31086397 what, I hope, will be a helpful answer.
> By delivering this functionality natively, Brave offers a more reliable and efficient solution to the problem of AMP.
Just because it avoids a separate process doesn't mean it is more reliable or efficient. Further, you offer a subset of the functionality of the URL-cleaning extension I do use, so it's moot.
I don't care if your browser ever becomes a superior product for me. I can't stand the community, who are easily the most aggressive and zealot-y bunch of any open source project I can think of. The comments section of any HN article about Brave becomes a shit-show as Brave users with the emotional maturity of teenagers dogpiling on shouting about how Brandon was the victim of a conspiracy by 'The SJWs', Firefox is "spyware", we're all stupid sheeple for not using Brave, etc.
And then at least one person from Brave shows up and starts condescendingly responding to every comment that isn't supportive of Brave.
There's the history of crypto-bro-y nonsense. The donation-scamming where creators had to "opt out" of Brave pretending to collect donations "for them." And so on.
I also don't want to support a company run by a person who has spent vast amounts of his money supporting some of the most bigoted politicians in our nation's modern history and to causes working to strip people of human rights. I don't want to support him, and I don't want to support people for whom his political activities are not an issue.