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in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

True but at the same time entire businesses are built on advertising and wouldn't exist without it. All your favorite YouTubers, virtually all internet published media, etc.
in reply to Ulrich

Well too bad for the advertisers cause I don’t see any of what they’re spending money on
in reply to Ulrich

Don’t forget; sports events. Even the Olympics don’t exist without ads. Adds rule the world (unfortunately). It gets problematic when your privacy gets compromised.
in reply to devilsedvocate

Sporting events existed for thousands of years before advertisingβ€”don’t mistake current conditions for necessary ones.
in reply to AbouBenAdhem

Yeah.. The classical "it has always been like that" when "always" means "in the past 10y". What is 10y compared to the thousands of years we existed as a society?
in reply to devilsedvocate

I watched the Superbowl on a Sky Sports stream from the UK. No ads, they just cut to talking to people on the field.
in reply to devilsedvocate

Sports would be better without ads. Less money in the industry, less corruption, less over paid players, less private jets. More passion.
in reply to teegus

My husband was watching old basketball games a few weeks back, even as late as 2004, and the differences in advertising is wild, as in, its not present in the older games we grew up with.

Hell, I tuned into the Rocket Leauge tournament recently, and shut if off as soon as I saw progressive insurance on the ball. You can't escape it.

in reply to devilsedvocate

And yet the (modern) Olympics existed for decades without ads. You’ve been tricked into thinking they’re necessary. They are not. Life would exist just fine without them.
in reply to Ulrich

Your business model is not my problem.

Especially when plenty of profitable services add this shit anyway.

in reply to mindbleach

Your problem is, as I stated, that they no longer exist.
in reply to Ulrich

I'm old enough to remember when network television didn't cut important scenes from shows in order to show me commercials.

If these businesses are getting so much efficiency from laying off their employees, why do they need increasingly more advertising?

I doubt there are enough of us who block (when it is even possible) to seriously affect revenue.

Also, if they can break their contract with me to pay for a service with no commercials and force me to watch them anyway, I have no compunctions with denying them the extra profit.

in reply to MasterBlaster

That's all entirely dependent on what business you're referring to.
in reply to Ulrich

If they can’t exist without ads then it’s time to die
in reply to ieatpwns

Great, wave goodbye to all your favorite publications.
in reply to Ulrich

Bad take. There's also subscription models for example. Or grants or donation / donor based.
in reply to dubyakay

Bad take. Those are simply not sustainable in most cases on their own. They just subsidize other revenue models.
This entry was edited (2 days ago)
in reply to Ulrich

Such a small share of ad-revenue goes to creators it's not worth it. You lose in wasting time, getting your brain turned to mush and getting manipulated by the ads. It costs less to support the creators directly.

I just wish there were easier ways to do so. Something decentralised with all the creators where I could fix an amount per month to spend on content creation and getting it split between what I appreciated.

in reply to alastel

Such a small share of ad-revenue goes to creators it's not worth it.


Uhhhh I mean there are lots and lots of people doing it every day, so it very clearly absolutely is worth it for them.

It costs less to support the creators directly.


That's great but it's not sustainable.

in reply to lime!

idk about other languages, but in Portuguese it's literally the same word
in reply to Eager Eagle

I'm surprised the corpos haven't pushed for a new word with less baggage. That's exactly the sort of thing they do when you don't reign them in
in reply to chunes

We don't have any advertisements on our platform but there are some occasional commercial breaks
in reply to Eager Eagle

Neither "anuncios" (adverts) nor "marketing" (yeah, we use the English word) are the same as "propaganda" (its spelled the same as in English but said slightly differently)

Is what you describe a Brasilian Portuguese thing?

This entry was edited (1 day ago)
in reply to Aceticon

Probably is a Brazilian thing, but we have words for publicity(publicidade), advertising(anΓΊncios), marketing(same english words because we are a bunch of removed). Propaganda is all this things, I don't know if is just colloquialism but people uses more the term propaganda than the specifics.
in reply to ZeroHora

Ah right.

In Portugal in general use "propaganda" is definitelly just the political stuff whilst "publicidade" is definitelly just the commercial stuff.

Mind you, maybe before those two concepts were more merged: I know that in legal terms the political stuff is explicitly called "Propaganda PolΓ­tica" since I've done paphlet distribution for a political party here during election campaigns and the rules for putting "political propaganda" in people's mailboxes are different than for "publicidade".

in reply to Aceticon

Maybe there's a technical difference, but at least in Brazil, publicidade and propaganda are widely used as synonyms

It is uncommon to call propaganda (in the political sense) publicidade, so maybe in popular conversations this makes publicidade a kind of propaganda, and not the other way around.

This entry was edited (1 day ago)
in reply to ZeroHora

It's funny how you can tell when a concept is extremely modern because in languages other than English they tend to just use the English term or a localized variation of the English term
in reply to lime!

advertising is forcing you to pay with your time and attention. I started hating all kinds of ads when I first flew with Ryanair. There aren’t headphones big enough to withstand two and a half hours of uninterrupted bullshit
This entry was edited (2 days ago)
in reply to lime!

The cause is to separate you from your money and time. To reinforce and promote capital as the ultimate gatekeepers.
in reply to Ugandan Airways

yeah but it's not made by the people the propaganda works for. they're just cogs. normal propaganda is made by the people championing the cause in question.
This entry was edited (2 days ago)
in reply to lime!

If you work for an advertising agency, you know that your job is to separate people from their money. They celebrate this. They have awards for this. It’s the whole purpose of their job.
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

I moved to Linux, use Freetube, LineageOS on the phone, listen all day to internet radios from the command line, browser with uBlock add on and it's been years since I saw or listened an ad.
in reply to corvus

Same, glad to hear there are others who found the path free from these parasites :)
in reply to Tanis Nikana

The eternal pestilence of physical advertising. Our world will not truly be clean until Linux purges the sins of marketing from this Earth.

Incidentally, you might be interested in Cidade Limpa

This entry was edited (2 days ago)
in reply to corvus

I would like to know more about this Internet radio command line thingy
in reply to agingelderly

It's a script that I made some years ago. Give it executable permission and you can search (e.g. streema-cli jazz) play and save radio stations. I uses mpv. It loads saved stations when run with no arguments.
This entry was edited (2 days ago)
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

If you want to actively shit on them, there is AdNauseam, which is a fork of uBlock Origin but in addition to blocking the ads, it clicks on absolutely everything, sending fake signals. Polluting their database is costing them money and they have to deal with all the noise.

Not for everyone, but definitely an active hostility towards these fucks.

This entry was edited (2 days ago)
in reply to voidsignal

That seems like it opens the door to a lot of security issues. Part of the reason to use uBlock is that ads are a known threat vector.
in reply to just2look

All clicks are performed in an isolated sandbox separate from the user area (basically imagine the click register signal going out, but nothing more).
in reply to Truscape

What if you have a multi layered ad blocking setup where you’re using ublock origin and pi.hole and a VPN with blocking?
in reply to tyler

The multiple layers of redundancy would likely clash with Adnauseum, yeah. Although that probably is just wasted compute - you may only need one or two of those solutions to have effective adblocking (uBlock for supported browsers, pi.hole for devices unable to have uBlock installed) rather than all 3 at once.
in reply to Truscape

Well I’m not gonna bother turning off any of the layers when I’m out and about. Like, my laptop still needs ublock when I’m not at home. And the vpn is just for certain use cases.
in reply to tyler

If you set up tailscale, you can connect your laptop to your home network and have the pi-hole everywhere.
in reply to resting_parrot

I have tailscale set up. I’m not gonna have my wife be using tailscale. And I’m also not going to be using tailscale all the time. I even have an exit node on my server.
in reply to voidsignal

It's a cute idea, but they would just incorporate some amount of false clicks into their metrics.
in reply to null

Yeah they can probably just ignore your entire profile because it's gives no useful insight, and that's the point.
in reply to null

Exactly, its data poisioning.

If someone is trying to build an ad profile on you (even if you personally dont see the ads) then it feeds them junk data instead of real date.

in reply to Bahnd Rollard

If you think clicking all the ads makes a meaningful difference, then all the power to you.
in reply to null

Its purely out of spite, plus, im not clicking anything.

I run the full ad blocking suite anyway and see more ads watching a sportsball game with the family than I do on my home network over the course of months.

  1. I dont see the ads
  2. The data they generate is wrong and random, if that is used to train AI it runs the risk of poisioning the model.
  3. The site Im on gets paid by the ad vendor, even though the interaction is fraudulent.

I call it a win-win

This entry was edited (1 day ago)
in reply to Bahnd Rollard

Blocking ads definitely doesn't help the site get paid, that's what I was talking about above.

For the same reason, it's probably not doing any meaningful "poisoning" either.

This entry was edited (1 day ago)
in reply to null

Then go read what the AdNaseum plugin does and we will talk then.

github.com/dhowe/AdNauseam/

This entry was edited (1 day ago)
in reply to Bahnd Rollard

Whatever table you imagine clicks to be stored in, add a column called "Using adblocker".

Filter out any rows where that column = true.

in reply to voidsignal

Except it still rewards the site for hosting ads in the first place
in reply to Chronographs

As someone who works in marketing - they will tote these clicks as a great success and continue to do what they are doing, maybe even more so, but will be distraught by the lack of follow through when it comes to sales. I guess if it happened long enough, And on a big enough scale, they might eventually give up but it would take years
in reply to agingelderly

Didn't Louis Rossmann say that the conversion rate when they briefly ran repair shop ads was less than 2% or something similar? I think he referred to it when talking about using adblock and donating/buying merch for your favorite creators instead.
This entry was edited (1 day ago)
in reply to agingelderly

Or, more likely, they would not include the fake clicks in their metrics at all, and marketing would never see the inflated metrics.
in reply to Chronographs

Site gets paid and I get the content I want. Only one losing is the advertiser, which is a good thing in my book
in reply to voidsignal

Do you know if AdNauseum actively merges in new uBlock Origin changes, or is it fully forked?
in reply to Taldan

github.com/dhowe/AdNauseam/
It's a direct fork that seems pretty up to date, only lagging 26 commits behind upstream
This entry was edited (2 days ago)
in reply to voidsignal

I prefer using Pi-Hole (DNS based block) the ads don't even waste my bandwith.
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

I grew up with every internet ad being likely hostile, you didn’t click any of them. It kinda stuck with me.

But also they went way overboard. If it’s a site funded by advertising and there was just a simple banner at the top or something then fine, I’d just ignore it still but whatever. But everything is so obnoxious now, so fuck β€˜em.

in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

All ads are non consensual and designed to get your attention. So we put them in places like on giant boards along highways. Very cool, very safe.
in reply to nondescripthandle

Yet another reason we need to move away from cars. Since the distraction is likely not going away, we need to minimize the safety/distraction issue.

(Goddamn we need so much high speed rail, and yesterday)

in reply to PunnyName

If you don't think you can do away with billboards I don't see how you'd think you could get people to stop using cars. Especially with how many things get delievered door to door these days. You could put every commuter on trains and the roads would still have traffic. I don't see changing that being any easier than getting rid of billboards and other highly intrusive ads.
in reply to nondescripthandle

I understand that cars serve a purpose. But trains and buses move orders of magnitude more people than cars could ever dream. With a properly functioning transit system (including the aforementioned high speed rails) traffic would clear up (because traffic didn't happen to you, you are traffic), and fewer distracted operators would be on the road.

And in removing those people from operating vehicles, the distraction of a billboard, and the subsequent potential accidents, are mitigated.

And yes we also need to get rid of billboards.

This entry was edited (1 day ago)
in reply to nondescripthandle

You could put every commuter on trains and the roads would still have traffic.


True, just one more lane, right?

This entry was edited (2 days ago)
in reply to jmankman

The thing with adding lanes is induced demand. By nature of there being more space for cars on that road more drivers will choose take that road over other roads. Cars don't magically come into existence, people drive them, and people drive them for a reason, most commonly to go to/from somewhere

Trains (and bikes and buses) take cars off the road. Every person riding on a transit solution that isn't a car is a individual vehicle trip saved. When every vehicle contains an average of 1.2 people in it, you've got very close to 1:1 vehicle reduction for every trip that's not taken by car

So to your point, are some number of non-drivers choosing not to drive because of traffic? Probably a small number of them. But a complete transit system that has the real world effect of fewer cars on the road will mean few people owning cars. Why would a family own 2 cars when one is parked most of the time? Why spend $20k on a new (to you) car if you're barely using the one you have/had? Fewer cars means less cars on the road which means less traffic. This is the dream.

in reply to PunnyName

in reply to Trainguyrom

Have you considered a conversation with someone like Lina Khan? Even if it's just to get you talking to the right people in government. I love this!
This entry was edited (1 day ago)
in reply to nondescripthandle

Nice point if view. Ironically we live in times when minding others boundaries is almost common sense. Abusive behavior gets public contempt. But everyone is just accepting manipulative, malicious and intrusive ads.
in reply to nondescripthandle

There's a giant, glowing, animated LED billboard along a main road near my house that had a PSA about distracted driving on it the other day. It made me angry.
This entry was edited (2 days ago)
in reply to underisk

Yeahhhh that kind of on the face irony would absolutely bug me too
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

It blows my mind that some people on my team were excited to watch the commercials during the Super Bowl.

I live my life in a way that minimizes the advertising I'm exposed to, and some people are just mainlining that garbage.

in reply to Zombiepirate

I mean, it blows my mind that people were excited to watch the Super Bowl at all. The advertisements are often the best part, given that the game itself is so mired in interruptions - often to deliberately increase the amount of air time for ads.
in reply to Zombiepirate

Yah but the ads during the Super Bowl are usually interesting and fun and I don't mind them.

Which begs the question, why aren't all ads fun and interesting? I've seen some YT channels make them this way and it makes them far more palletable.

in reply to artyom

you felt that the big brother ad for the ring cameras was interesting and fun?
in reply to artyom

Fun and Interesting ads are actually the worst ones, because they get you to associate pleasant feelings with their product/service/brand, which dilutes your ability to make rational, objective choices about them. That's one of the ways that they are manipulating you.
in reply to Zombiepirate

I think there is an American ritual aspect to it. I hate football and never watch it other than the super bowl. I've always just watched it for the funny ads, halftime show, and social gathering aspect. There is nostalgia for the 90s-00s where funny Superbowl ads became cultural touchstones, and early "memes" that people would quote and talk about the rest of the year if not more. Though honestly, it feels like the mojo is gone. The ads rarely seem as funny as they used to be. Or maybe we are just so inundated with internet ads and the lightspeed meme cycle that they simply can't draw the same level of cultural relevance they once did.
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

That’s right, refuse this pollution for the senses to rob your time.

Die advertising, just die.

in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

I rarely see any ad because I don't consume "regular" media.

But I don't mind funny or plain informative ads. The latter are non-existant though, the former rare.

But what I truly despise is this cheap stupid shit that tries to manipulate me in the most trivial ways, so that I actually feel insulted by them. Why do they take me for a dumb fuck?
Whenever I see such an ad, I boycott the company/product. Just go fuck yourself.

in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

Yeah I'm done with these companies man, if you want us to buy your wares don't fucking shit on the planet and hijack the PEOPLE'S government. If they wanna think of us as numbers, make the numbers scary.
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

i have an actively hostile relationship with ads but i don't see a reason to try and justify it. Ads are bad. -pretty simple.
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

Not just personal mind poison, but societal poison too. Most of our media companies are just ad businesses with whatever they portray as their main products as window dressing. Meta, Google, NYT, all TV networks, even NPR is increasingly funded by ads. I was hopeful in the shift to paid streaming services this might change, and it did sort of, for a while, but increasingly they too are turning to ads.
in reply to aeischeid

Not just personal mind poison, but societal poison too.


i came to realize this when when my home built router died a few months ago.

it was based on pfsense and i had setup publicly shared advertisement blocking; so i hadn't see any ad at all for years.

i became annoyed when i started seeing them after the router died and then i actively became angry when i was bombarded by them while watching tv as i was visiting family, yet they didn't think anything was wrong with watching the same mcdonalds advertisement 500x in a single hour.

that shit has an impact on your psyche whether you know right away or not.

in reply to eldavi

Yup. For me it was when I went on vacation with my family. Tried to enjoy a movie in the evening after a day out and my god. Ads every literal 7 minutes of movie. How the fuck anyone can deal with that is beyond me.
in reply to Bosht

same here, i couldn't finish watch the movie because i was so angry about it. lol
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

Almost drove off with the gas cap and door open on my car cause I was doing my best to ignore the pump blasting some shit advertisement about some shit product I don't want and wouldn't buy. Wife caught it before I could drive off, but still, I will never voluntarily watch any form of ad. I loathe this world.
in reply to Γ†nima

Mute button is on the right of the screen, second from the top.

Fucking hate those gas pump ads.

in reply to ToTheGraveMyLove

Oh dang. That's fucking bullshit. Around here they all have buttons. Wow. I hate capitalism
in reply to harsh3466

Yup, it fucking blows. I can't even find the speakers on the ones by me, I think they're behind the screen.
in reply to Γ†nima

Almost drove off with the gas cap and door open on my car


I made it a habit to always glance in my side mirrors to confirm there's nothing unexpected around me (including open doors or connected gas nozzles) before shifting out of park every time. Granted best practice is to walk around the car once as an inspection before even starting it every time, but that's more than I often can be bothered to do

in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

If you have to react to advertising you're already doing it wrong. If it's able to reach you on your hardware in any form, you've already failed.
in reply to chunes

This entry was edited (2 days ago)
in reply to IratePirate

Well said all around. I've had almost the exact same thoughts. Good TED talk.
This entry was edited (2 days ago)
in reply to Formfiller

You can try invidious instances like yewtu.be

Invidious is an alternative front end for youtube that allows you to watch videos without ads or other tracking. And it's self hostable. But the public instances work just fine - I actually have issues with YouTube stalling constantly, I assume because of my ad/script blockers. But going to yewtu.be/watch?v=(youtube video code) allows me to watch in HD with zero ads or interruptions.

Youtube does try to fight it, so it occasionally will break, but just like Ublock, Invidious has talented people on the team fighting back.

There's also a firefox extension for auto redirect: addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firef…

This entry was edited (2 days ago)
in reply to cheesybuddha

For some reason invidious never works for me, i just get errors and it doesn't load, but FreeTube works great.
in reply to ToTheGraveMyLove

There have (especially lately) been a lot of times when it goes down.

My understanding is that Youtube has been changing the way they present or stream videos. I'm not familiar with the technical aspects, really, but Invidious is actively working on the issues.

For me, when I try to use it, it's down maybe 10-20% if the time, but occasionally for longer stretches at once. Not a perfect solution, but another tool you can use to avoid Youtube directly

in reply to Formfiller

I use Firefox with Ublock Origin on Android, and if I watch youtube in the browser, it filters pretty much all ads. Sometimes I get one at the start of a video, but closing the tab and starting again has got rid of them so far πŸ‘
in reply to Tippon

One day I need to share a screenshot of how youtube looks on Firefox after a few tweeks. I've used Ublock Origin to block everything I didn't like. It's literally just the player, description, the comments and a link to the settings and my subscriptions.

It's actually shocking when I see unfiltered youtube on someone's stream.

This entry was edited (2 days ago)
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

I also make a mental note to not buy products that have intrusive ads. There are always alternative brands.

Also, I go out of my way to get all my gas from the one station near me that doesn't show loud ass video ads everytime I get gas.

in reply to cheesybuddha

Mind you that, if you have to make a mental note, they have won.
in reply to cristian64

They can have the moral victory. I'm concerned about not giving them my money.
in reply to herseycokguzelolacak

Yep I actively avoid companies that inundate me. I've switched insurance companies because of it (local agent got me much better rates too).
in reply to BanMe

So you're telling me gaico doesn't save as much on car insurance?
in reply to slacktoid

Usually they "save you money" by giving you a shittier policy and relying on the buyer not understanding what coverage they need and why
in reply to BanMe

Seriously going through an insurance broker is awesome. Best dang way to deal with insurance because I can just call up the broker and have them do it all for me, plus they get paid on commission by the insurance companies (which are mostly smaller B2B companies that don't spend millions on advertising) so it's not even like you pay more for your insurnace
in reply to herseycokguzelolacak

The worse the product is, the more desperate they get to shove it in your face. Good products don't need to pay others to pretend it's good, you just find out via word-of-mouth or free trials
in reply to GaumBeist

I was thinking about this just the other day. There's a popular market in my home state, one I've been going to since childhood. It's a single store, not a chain, and it's almost always packed. I've never seen nor heard a single ad for it in my life. Naturally, that makes me like the place even more.
in reply to herseycokguzelolacak

People say this but, if advertising didn't work, companies would have stopped paying for ads long time ago. It works for them, we view ads and then we are willing to pay more for a product that is worth less; it's this simple.

The only solution for us is to avoid ads at all cost.

in reply to cristian64

I can't obviously speak for everyone, I can only speak for myself. And I hate products that advertise.
in reply to cristian64

Yeah - ads do work. The whole point of the surveillance ad system is to track how effective ads are. Companies can measure how many sales they get from their ads and calculate if they are still making a profit. And all those influencers peddling scam products with their special discount codes? People are buying those products.
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

Soon advertisers will be able to force you to watch their lies, don't worry about that.

Soon your computer won't be yours ever again

Soon enough, I'm sure, we'll even have ads in space so we can't escape any of this shit anymore

That is, unless we start getting.more hostile against advertising and marketing. We need politicians to become hostile against ads

in reply to anguo

Yep. One must move beyond an "I hate you and I hope you die" relationship with ads, to a "I don't think about you at all" relationship with ads. Regardless of how many fits Google throws about ublock, one can always do VPN/DNS type filtering. I've honestly almost forgotten ads exist.
This entry was edited (2 days ago)
in reply to MoffKalast

There's some tech blog/news site (can't recall the name right now) that tries to shame me into turning off my ad blocker and viewing their ads with an extra pop up

"Hey! We noticed your browser isn't displaying ads. Can you..."

HAHA NO

This entry was edited (2 days ago)
in reply to MoffKalast

What do you mean fits about ublock?

I had to download it off the internet and not the play store on both my phone and computer, but it worked, still works great, I see about zero ads and it blocks a lot of pages entirely.

in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

Ad-blocking is a property right. I have every right to control what my device does or does not display, by definition of ownership. Conversely, advertisers or other parties attempting to colonize my device by forcing it to display something against my (the owner's) will is a hostile act that violates my rights.
in reply to grue

Except we are beginning to not own what we own. The computer is yours, the software is just licensed, and they are trying to take everything away from us, from ovens to washing machines, they want to make it all subscription, spying on us, and serving us ads. We don't have the right to repair the products when we break, and it's a federal felony to "break" any sort of digital lock on a device, and I think to change it's programming too.

That said, it's a moot point as of yet, because while websites forced me to whitelist their sites to use them when I had adblock, I was told about ublockorigin, and I see no ads, and the sites can't tell I am using it.

in reply to hector

the software is just licensed


That is a GODDAMN LIE perpetrated by copyright cartel shysters to swindle all of us. The entire legal theory that assertion rests on is absolute nonsense: they want to pretend that you "need" to accept an "EULA" to use the software because otherwise copying it from the installation media onto your hard drive and/or into RAM would be a violation, but that is wrong because 17 U.S. Code Β§ 117 (a) (1) carves out an explicit exception that allows it. EULAs are bunk and do not constitute a valid contact, as they not only lack 'acceptance' because they attempt to work on adhesion (trying to impose new terms after-the-fact when the transaction to obtain the copy has already occurred and concluded), but fail to provide any meaningful 'consideration' to begin with!

They can pry my hardware and software that I own from my cold, dead hands.

in reply to hector

Sadly, and I am not a lawyer so this is not even close to legal advice(!!), "beginning" is potentially the wrong word when talking about licenses due to copyright. Because even a single flipped bit in RAM on your computer could be constructed as a copyright infringement if pushed in a legal battle and decided in a court. (This all sounds squishy because, again, I am not a lawyer and as far as I know nothing of this sort has had clear ground setting or breaking rulings yet...)

Why am I of this opinion despite also usually loving to take the "my device my rules stance"? Because I got to proof read some final exams for legal professionals-to-be for their technical accuracy and let me tell you: the most likely legal outcome they saw was not good for most of us. (So now I really really hope that some high up court rules on a case like this and sides with "common sense" about what is and is not allowed with our owned hardware!)

This entry was edited (2 days ago)
in reply to pkjqpg1h

Need free food, rent, healthcare, education, and housing first. As long as we still need money to pay for those things then there'll always be too few experts with skills willing to work for free.
in reply to grue

Thats fair if you also hold the stance that they can block you if you aren't paying to use the service. But i doubt you do.
in reply to IndieGoblin

What fucking "service?" Software running locally on my own computer isn't a goddamned "service" to begin with!

Also, fuck off with your bullshit assumption of bad faith.

This entry was edited (2 days ago)
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

They've figured this out, the most advanced way to advertise something to you is without you even thinking about it. Because the commons aren't collectively owned, it's the ones with the most money who advertise to you the most. It's why they don't really care about you using adblock.

They've already paid for the place in your life and the only way to escape them is to disconnect from society at large. Or maybe one day change it.

This entry was edited (2 days ago)
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

I try to keep my TV clear of as many ads as I can and mute the ones I can't. When that happens my arcade machine calls me to it
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

Advertising is one of the most prolific environmental pollutants of economic activity, and needs to become as socially acceptable as smoking.
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

Got a samsung smart TV that had ads in the menu bar. I bought the thing, why ads. Learn pihole and reuse of old galaxy s7. block Samsung. then firestick. then buy server space to download movies and TV shows.

I got so upset at ads native in TV 6 years ago I hoist the flag.

in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

The case with advertisers is that there used to be a covenant between the advertiser and the viewer where the advertiser gave the viewer a jingle or song or funny scenario and the viewer would be entertained to watch the advertisement. This covenant has been broken by the advertiser. They no longer think that they have to offer you anything for your time . A simple pop-up or banner or an obfuscated page is sufficient to divert you from your task in exchange for nothing but inconvenience. Instead of manipulating people with metrics, advertisers might want to get back to that covenant.
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

I used to think anti-consumerism was a lot more popular. It's a significant disconnect from how I thought people are. Apparently I took more media related courses in high school and university than most people do.

One thing that continued to confuse me is how tech cultures are unrepentantly consumer capitalists. The earlier times of the world wide web was very counter-culture. So it's been an unending source of befuddlement how tech nerds have been deep-throating the adtech boot.

in reply to OctopusNemeses

Pacified by $$$ signs.
Counter culture doesn't pay for Bezos next yacht.
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

Some people like to say that nobody's immune to advertising. Maybe so, but there are definitely some of us who aren't as affected by it. When most ads you see are for things you'd never buy anyway, all the crap kind of blends together.

For me, no amount of fast food ads, car ads, vacation ads, etc. are going to have any meaningful effect. I already don't buy fast food, don't purchase new cars (and if I'm shopping used, there are certain criteria that matter far more than a brand or dealership), and am way too poor to take a vacation. Yet, the ads persist.

Even if I weren't muting and skipping them at every chance, you can't get blood from a stone. End stage capitalism, man. Can't spend money I don't have!

in reply to Whats_your_reasoning

The deluge of gambling, crypto currency, GLP, and AI ads only make me hate those things more.
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

my kids have grown up with my adblocked version of the internet, when they connect to other internet thats not a filtered feed they get annoyed by ads in their games and on their videos
in reply to gnuplusmatt

Our smart TV doesn't allow an ad blocker on YouTube, but my kids have developed a way to skip ads anyway. They don't tolerate ads more than I do, and I couldn't be prouder.
This entry was edited (2 days ago)
in reply to mcv

Man you must be a good parent. I can only aspire that my future kids are this smart
in reply to cozzy

Positive comments like yours are like jet fuel for new parents. :)
in reply to mcv

Jailbreak your TV and install a third party launcher and SmartTube. It gave my Sony TV a new lease on life after it was almost smothered to death by ads, even on the home screen.
in reply to gnuplusmatt

in reply to mic_check_one_two

Hah, the ladies never seem to appreciate what we do until its gone and they realize just how much better life is with all the weird tech stuff you setup
in reply to cozzy

Yeah. Had a guyΒΉ try to put me on his setup once. Let so much bullshit through. Turned out he was running it through windows.

ΒΉroommate

in reply to mic_check_one_two

Do you have links to any knowledge base docs or guides? I tried setting this up a few years back and couldn't really nail it down and just kinda gave up because it broke too many websites and my smarttv apps wouldn't work either.
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

I hate ads but I'm now having to consider running ads for a Kickstarter campaign and don't know how to feel.

Failing that, the game will need to be ad-supported. Even worse.

Even cutting down on everything life is too expensive to make much without caving somewhere.

I just hope I can make them unobtrusive and short and cause as little disturbance as possible.

This entry was edited (2 days ago)
in reply to Psaldorn

Have you tried reaching out to YouTubers who review/play through similar games to yours? Can you buy an ad read from some youtubers as a less intrusive style of ad? Do you have a demo at all that you can point people to right now?
in reply to Trainguyrom

You're on my wavelength!

I'm working on the demo now and was thinking of a few channels that might synergise with it. Just need to get done ready before the cash runs out now.

Once the playable slice is out I was considering putting it straight on steam early access but it would be super early and I don't know if that is wasting the soft release impact. I know steam give you some free promo. Can always just host a download myself though.

Google play early access is extremely difficult to understand. Can't even get ap to appear for testers who have signed up and agreed to test, it's crazy.

in reply to Psaldorn

I've heard advice to initially release a demo on Itch, encourage those who enjoy the demo to join your org's discord, then blast discord to go buy the game on steam on launch day to help boost your day 1 numbers on Steam.

I'd also check various gaming communities on as many social media platforms as possible to see if they allow indie devs to announce releases

in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

I tolerate ads (to a point) if it's a free service. If I have to pay to use, the product should have no ads.
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

The funny thing is that I’m actively making Spotify lose money for me, I use ad blockers on desktop which entirely bypass the ads and I close the iOS app when I hear an ad (they won’t count it as an ad watched until you see the whole thing, which I never)
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

We recently got a new cable service, and it's the best I've ever seen. Besides a bunch of other advantages, I can go back to any TV show from the past 4 days and watch them - and skip all the commercials. I almost never watch a show when it's first on, I'd rather watch it in an hour or so, or tomorrow, and skip the ads.
This entry was edited (2 days ago)
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

God I do have a weird relationship with it. I have adguard set up to block ads at the DNS level, I have adblockers on everything, and yet I spent the other night binge watching "Will it Blend?"
in reply to Kristell

You are a person of culture, and I respectfully tip my hat to you. Of course, the question left unanswered is: Did it blend?
in reply to mastertigurius

It did blend! Many times over the span of several hours (I watched... Most of that channel that day...)
in reply to Kristell

How long did it take to un-break basically every website? I tried doing this and it made pretty much every site that had this problem unusable. I could never find a sweetspot that only blocks ads and let's legitimate traffic through; and it caused issues with my partner's work portals.
in reply to howsetheraven

It weirdly didn't break every website? It said it might, but it ended up not. No idea how, or what I did. The only issue has been my room mate plays mobile games and some of those give ads for a benefit, so they can't watch those.

I'm using HaGeZi's block list (github.com/hagezi/dns-blocklis…). Not saying it'll work for everyone, but it doesn't cause me any issues, even on the strictest one.

in reply to Kristell

Which of HaGeZi's blocklists are you using specifically?
in reply to Trainguyrom

Ultimate, the strictest one. I remember picking one down, but just pulled it up and it is the Ultimate blocklist
in reply to howsetheraven

Moving target. They ho to work every day to fuck up uthe internet.
in reply to howsetheraven

Start with the default block list. That shouldn't break everything, if it does give examples of the problems and the sites and I'm sure we can find a solution.
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

Advertising is a technology of control that sacrifices material reality for authoritarian bullshit.

Advertisers deserve the wall.

in reply to cassandrafatigue

Advertisers deserve the wall.


And/Or: Take a higher ground.

Allow them the autonomy they seek to deprive others.

Like Bill Hicks offered, they realise the error of their ways, and they do it themselves.

...' Saved me anyway. One less advertiser in the world. One more anti-advertising advocate in the world. :) A +2 gain, at no expense of arranging a wall and firing squad. ;)

in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

You guys get ads? 😈

Actually I'm always surprised at how pervasive they are. I keep thinking the way my home infra is set up is normal and people are exaggerating about ads for lulz.

But every now and then when I jump on a unfiltered system I realise "No, no they are not".

This entry was edited (2 days ago)
in reply to HugeNerd

I have no idea what that is, so let me look it up...

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BonziBud…

Huh; must have missed that one back in the day! Though I do recall the Homer Simpson that was like that, and e-sheep

in reply to SuspciousCarrot78

I remember pushing my mom to install one that had a black and white cat wander around the desktop and on top of windows one time when she had to take me to work.

I found a video of a newer version (with bonus Bonzi Buddy), but it doesn't appear to do the walking along the tops of your windows that I remember.

Appropriately for the topic of this thread, it was all an advertisement for Purina Pet Food

This entry was edited (1 day ago)
in reply to SuspciousCarrot78

Its crazy how much people put up with it every time I see someone elses browser I ask them why they dont use an ad blocker and I always gets some nothing reply.
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

Ublock has always just worked for me? I mean, a couple of times YouTube did a thing, but then a day, or an hour later, Ublock fixed it. I'm referring to YouTube only.

Also, I run NoScript and choose whether I'm willing to allow a site to show me an ad, and slurp my data, in exchange for whatever is on the site that I think I want. Often, I get tired of allowing scripts one at a time until the content appears, and just close the site. Rarely, I'll bite the bullet and allow all, then go and wash my hands afterward.

Fewer than ten sites make up more than 90% of my viewing.

in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

Yep. Browse he internet without adblock? Not even once. Sponsorskip you know I ain't never gonna stop. Annoying services I can't adblock, looking at you twitch, you're eight amazon I do need to do something else with my time.

Similarly with streaming subscriptions. Ahoy matey looks like the tried and true method of finding the files themselves is still the best way to enjoy that show or movie.

in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

Even if you adblock and sponsorblock. Advertisement is everywhere. It's on tv series and films as product placements. It's on every bus stop, metro station, in the form of billboards, every casually on TV even muted still showing ads on the corner of your eye, or just company logos, even every single product you buy comes with a damn logo on it.

Bought a new pair of shoes, new headphones, new pair of fucking glasses? Which you need to wear everyday and can't see without them? Enjoy being a walking billboard for everyone who looks at you.

This drives me crazy and yes, I do hide most logos I can with a permanent marker, and even then it's not enough.

in reply to Seefra 1

Besides, clothing without logos is more expensive than others.
in reply to pkjqpg1h

Good.

Worth the extra price to not be enslaved as the corporation's advertising bitch.

in reply to Seefra 1

I made it a point to never wear or use anything with obvious logos most of my life. Want me to tell people my shirt is nike. pay me!
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

in reply to mojofrododojo

Somewhat relevant are the Subvertisers for London (as well as similar groups all over the world):
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

It might be an unpopular opinion, but I like the ads! They are very useful because they help me remember the brands not to buy. Edit: /s was not obvious it seems
This entry was edited (1 day ago)
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

Advertisers have made their bed too. I almost fell for some scam/phishing ads myself and that's it for me - no ad is ever showing up on any machine under my control. If you can't maintain your side of a social contract then you lost it.
This entry was edited (2 days ago)
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

Please put me on the haters list.
(For advertising & marketing)
This entry was edited (2 days ago)
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

Same here, here's q tip beside addblocks, if you're still watching yt content, use PipePipe for android based phone, and Smartube TV for android TV. There will be no adds, and the apps skip sponsored segment automatically.
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

I go around installing solutions on my friends and family's phones and TVs (ad-free YouTube clients, stremio, etc) and I fucking hate it when they use the official ones out of habit. Like I didn't just do this for your convenience, this is mainly anti-advertisement activism. I fucking hate ads
in reply to Grazed

β€œbut youtube generates my music playlists because it knows what i like”
in reply to Grazed

It's becoming best practice in IT to install uBlock Origin on browsers to help prevent scareware
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

After setting up my devices and everything i noticed i get really really mad when i encounter (especially intrusive) ads nonetheless. It usually makes me stop whatever i was doing and consider if whatever i want to accomplish is worth more than watching a 10 second ad. - Usually itΒ΄s not.
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

I do exactly the same. Ads were tolerable when they were just a few tv commercials, but nowadays we are flooded with them everywhere, and for me they manage to do the opposite of what they are made for, the more I see a brand advertised the more I despise the brand.
in reply to liking625

in reply to liking625

This 100%. I have so many brands in my black list to never consider after happening to get interrupted by their ad, not even neccessarily a dumb ad. Reoccurring ones do that quite effectively too: Seeing an ad once is maybe no biggie (unless it’s long/dumb), twice starts to annoy, three times and you’re out.
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

I literally dropped my Internet Provider which had a Net+TV+phone packet when their TV box got enshittified with Ads.

Got me a different, Internet Only, provider and made my own TV box from a Mini-PC with Linux and a wireless remote control.

Interestingly, I ended up paying 1/3 the price and getting 5x faster internet relative to the previous provider, so thanks for trying to shove adds on my face Vodaphone!

This entry was edited (2 days ago)
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

Stop doing this nonsense manually !
* Skipping ads ? Use uBlock Origin !
* Skipping sponsorships ? Use SponsorBlock !
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

Another word for "marketing" or "advertisement" is Manipulation. Shady, manipulative, tactics.

Fuck them. I love Lemmy because it seems like the ratio of like-minded people is much larger here. Nothing better than seeing other principled people that would rather give up some comforts than deal with ads and bend the knee to the pieces of shit that try to push them.

Even products in the supermarket (such as bread!!) come with ads in the fucking plastic wrapper. I have changed my bread brand due to this. I will absolutely give up any comfort to avoid your manipulation. I will fucking shower in cold water if it means I don't bend the knee to pieces of shit.

This entry was edited (1 day ago)
in reply to amos

Another word for β€œmarketing” or β€œadvertisement” is Manipulation.


Don't worry they've solved that, it's called 🩷 πΌπ“ƒπ’»π“π“Šπ‘’π“ƒπ’Έπ’Ύπ“ƒπ‘” 😎. That's much less ominous! They just influence!

in reply to amos

Well said. It disgusts me a lot, and it also dismays me to see a lot of people don't care at all about ads. I even rememeber people in my old job talking about ads on tv. Boggles my mind.

If I am forced to see or interact with an ad I will do absolutely everything in my power to excise that ad source from my life.

in reply to amos

This entry was edited (1 day ago)
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

I wonder though if pressing "skip" is a good idea in terms of privacy / not giving them what they want. I don't think this was implemented for our "convienience" and rather as yet another manipulation technique.

Just some ideas what I assume they achieve by this:

  • By pressing it you have to divert your attention towards the ad, even if it is just for a short time.
  • You might unintentionally signal your preferences which could be used for profile enrichment
  • You also provide information, that you are still actively at the device an watching (I assume ad providers have more interest on having more/longer ads on content that is actively watched)
This entry was edited (1 day ago)
in reply to in_the_dark_forest

That’s not the case entirely, at least in my case. When I’m forced to watch ads when using the official YouTube app in one of my smart tvs, I’ve built habit to click mute and grab my phone. There’s usually just right amount of time to fex reply a message. Within the edge of my vision I can still see the timer changing to Next or Skip prompting me to get back to the video. No doubt they will soon make that less obvious…
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

Reading other replies here, I realise, I miss policeman. It was the best web cruft blocker add-on. Really easy non-fiddly high-fidelity controls over what you allow from where. IIRC, last release was 2015, but I think more recently the developer [Edit:Link]asked somewhere if people were interested in it being revived[/E].

[Edit: No, seriously, it was really really good. ghacks.net/2014/10/19/policema… ... I suppose, it's worth vibe-coding a continuation of github.com/futpib/policeman (<- I presume's the right one). ]

This entry was edited (1 day ago)
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

I think social media for profit played a large role in getting a new generation of ad acceptance, since most use the official app with third party apps generally dead.

So they are going to get exposed to ads using it on their phones, and then there's the users themselves seeing social as something to try to use to make money so you got human being like living ads too.

in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

We just had a sporting event in the US where people are more interested in the ads than the actual event itself.
in reply to myfunnyaccountname

The Super Bowl commercial with the Backstreet Boys and MGK was nostalgic and funny. Generally I find most ads annoying and block them or avoid the sites/channels where they show up.
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

Ads? Ah, those annoying stupid things I watch in TV. Online I don't see any of these since more than 10 years.
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

in reply to drath

I mean, it sounds like they're not even running an ad blocker. That's not even an effectively defensive relationship.
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

I try and block everything all the time. the fight is real. PipePipe for youtube , Firefox + Ublock for web . Exploited firestick with Wolf Launcher and SmartTube on TV , Linux on all PCs , DeGoogled phone (wip) and Adguard DNS on the router. Windows PC's at work with copilot, onedrive removed and ooshutup10 . Also use a few modded apps such as Tubi with no ads and my sleep music app with no ads. Probably more ive forgotten but always open to suggestions and the work is never done.
in reply to sunnytimes

Grayjay is better than PipePipe. I use Freetube on my computer. SmartTube is the best. I love that app so much.
in reply to Manmoth

Grayjay


I've heard of it but never tried. I'll give it a go. can I get it on F-droid ?. I don't use Youtube alot on my phone, I listen to the Wan show and do yoga every night haha Thank you!

in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

My entire homelab is constructed with the unofficial goal of never watching any advertisements ever.
in reply to Manmoth

Same here. Glad to hear, that I'm not the only one.
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

This entry was edited (1 day ago)
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

Advertising can feel overwhelming when it stops being informative and starts feeling intrusive. The balance between visibility and respect for attention is important.
in reply to JuliaSuraez

That balance is practically impossible now. If you respect people's attention, you will lose that attention to some other advertiser who does not.
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

Advertising isn’t inherently negative, but people naturally push back when they feel their attention is being taken for granted. Respect for the audience makes all the difference.
in reply to alejandra

No kidding.

Like most of my streamimg is the cheaper ad versions, regular commwrcuals, usually not meaningful, sometimes a bathroom break.

My daughter watches Youtube for music sometimes on the TV though. Good god those are the WORST "ads". So many try to be like 10 minutes long unless you skip. Many feel like some random peraon reading from a card, production quality all around is ass.

I can't change the DNS on the router or TV and keep meaning to set up a new router to block the TV ads through DNS.

This entry was edited (1 day ago)
in reply to alejandra

in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

No kidding, if I happen to hear an ad on a tv or radio I'm passing by I plug my ears and go lalalalala until I or it are gone. I truly can't stand them that much, it's a psychotic invention meant to constantly brainwash you into becoming a mindless consumption robot and I refuse to partake.
in reply to tomiant

So when you're in a store or a restaurant that is playing the radio and an ad comes on you'll walk around the entire commercial break with your fingers in your ears going, "lalalalala?"

Sure. Sure you do, buddy.

in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

There is no device in my house with an adblock of some kind, even my router has one.

The best way to hate is to never acknowledge at all

in reply to Richard

Hi, noob here.

What type of ads do routers with adblock manage to filter that normal browser extensions cannot? Thanks

This entry was edited (1 day ago)
in reply to berrodeguarana

Things that don’t go through the browser like a mobile game or that crappy web wrapper that my parents newspaper uses.
in reply to berrodeguarana

A network "ad block" is just a DNS level block. If a Roku TV tries to reach ads.roku.net or whatever, the router can simply refuse to forward the request.

This is actually really useful beyond ad blocking. You can block known malicious sites as well.

This entry was edited (1 day ago)
in reply to Richard

The problem is the harm to small bloggers and creators that need ads to survive.

I recommend routing your browser around your router ad block by changing its DNS then using uBlock Origin to whitelist the sites you want to support. You can block third party cookies and fingerprinting to mitigate the tracking.

in reply to FG_3479

I would much rather do direct support. Conveniently, I also lose so much respect for people that run ads that I don't want to support them. OTOH, I spend way more on patreon and bandcamp than I would on subscription services.
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

When is been years since you had ZERO relationship with advertising, and it took you a while to get the meme...
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

I find sponsor reads kinda funny. Its like we went back to dawn of tv. And speaking about statisfying, there is nothing more satisfying than a cool paul morrow cigarrete....
in reply to rossman

As much as these ads suck, they were not the problem. The problem was Reddit charging for using their API (which was a big problem for third party readers) in order to force you to view said ads.

Capitalism's most basic promise was that businesses will create value and have positive influence on society because that will be the only way to generate revenue. Reality proves that it's somehow more profitable to enshittify things.

in reply to AeonFelis

That's true I definitely oversimplified things. I had an issue where there were posts from supposed users trying to push a product. Felt deceptive compared to normal ad practices.
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

Pro tip

On youtube, if you get an ad that is related to either gambling or alcohol, you can block the ad and it will skip right to the video tou we're watching

in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

I may be extreme, but on those rare occasions when an ad slips through my adblock wall, I actively wonder it there's a way I can avoid buying that specific product in the future.

That's how much I hate ads.

in reply to Huschke

I love ads. They tell me exactly which sellers would rather spend money on manipulating consumers than making a better product.
in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

I run uBlock on top of a pi-hole, with invidious and de-arrow for youtube stuff.

I don't see ads anymore.

And when I'm on a different device, where I can't stop the ads, I simply don't consume the content.

in reply to 🌈 vanta rainbow black 🌈

Ublock, privacy badger, pi-hole, sponsorblock πŸ’
This entry was edited (1 day ago)
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