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Comment by wereHamster | Hacker News Reader

> We won’t turn on Do Not Track by default because then it would be Mozilla making the choice, not the individual.

I don't buy that. They are making a choice either way, whether they enable or disable it by default. Just like they are making a choice about the hundreds of other options Firefox has. A few examples of how Mozilla thinks:

> JavaScript enabled by default. Why? Developers and designers can do some really awesome websites with it and we want users to have that experience.

> SSL enabled by default. Why? It improves your security.

> Do Not Track disabled by default. Why? Because we don't want to fuck with the people who are paying us (i.e. Google).

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Or, by turning it on by default, advertisers will completely ignore the setting, exactly as they are with Internet Explorer.

Why should they be honoring the header now? For them, implementing support for that standard are only expenses. There are no incentives to do so, and no punishment or repercussions if they don't.

> Why should they be honoring the header now?

The idea was that, given a significant enough amount of people turning it on, advertisers would take notice of it and react accordingly. If it's on by default it is meaningless.

It's a tool that enable users to send a message to advertisers that they are not okay with their practices. It was designed this way. It says you are okay with ads but not with the tracking.

> There are no incentives to do so, and no punishment or repercussions if they don't.

Except for adblock. If the only option to avoid tracking is to block ads, then that is what will be used.

> Except for adblock. If the only option to avoid tracking is to block ads, then that is what will be used.

Therefore, browsers should come, by default, with an adblock feature (or simply, just bundle the adblock plugin). This DNT business is purely just lip service.

I think this could potentially be a worthwhile outcome. Advertisers ignore it, eventually someone manages to explain successfully to enough people with clout that this is a bad thing, and hopefully something is done to require advertisers to respect the setting.

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