Google’s campaign against ad blockers across its services just got more aggressive. According to a report by PC World, the company has made some alterations to its extension support on Google Chrome.
Google Chrome recently changed its extension support from the Manifest V2 framework to the new Manifest V3 framework. The browser policy changes will impact one of the most popular adblockers (arguably), uBlock Origin.
The transition to the Manifest V3 framework means extensions like uBlock Origin can’t use remotely hosted code. According to Google, it “presents security risks by allowing unreviewed code to be executed in extensions.” The new policy changes will only allow an extension to execute JavaScript as part of its package.
Over 30 million Google Chrome users use uBlock Origin, but the tool will be automatically disabled soon via an update. Google will let users enable the feature via the settings for a limited period before it’s completely scrapped. From this point, users will be forced to switch to another browser or choose another ad blocker.
They made Firefox a good number of new customers.
Firefox isn’t exactly “the good guys” either
Between two evils, Firefox is the comparative good guy. There’s not a chance in hell I’m using anything based on Chromium, I’ve been using FF for close to two decades now and I’ve experienced very few dealbreaker issues.
You expect good guys?
No
I prefer flawed but trying guys to guys with zero morals that farm every ounce of data they can.
Firefox has telemetry too
And it can be turned off.
100% of it? Nope.
What are you stating cannot be turned off?
This sounds baseless without any evidence.
You cannot make Firefox have zero connections to the Internet.
Of course not. It’s an internet browser. What point are you trying to make?
I agree but isn’t the choice between “the terrible guys” and “the okayish guys”?
If you don’t know the good guys, then yes that’s your choice
So who are the good guys, mind you telling? As far as I’m aware, currently it’s a choice between Chromium based browsers and Firefox and its forks. So really just 2 options in the grand scheme of things.
Tell me you’re poor without telling me you’re poor
All 10 of us
I‘m really anxious for firefox as google is the main financier afaik.
look up ladybird. we may soon have a 3rd browser!
Now, that’s a name I haven’t heard in a long time…
In 2026
That’s supoosed to be the preview release date on Linux and MacOS…
If they can stay funded I believe them
Looks promising. Lets see where it goes. https://github.com/LadybirdBrowser/ladybird
It’s hard to take a project seriously for championing our privacy if the only communication options are Discord & Microsoft Github
Feel free to offer hosting something else for them. Be the change you want to see.
There are free (both kinds) options to these problems if they can’t afford it—and that still isn’t an excuse to require all coms go thru US-based proprietary services with big privacy implications.
Although I‘m not a fan of the options either, the implications regarding the project are minimal and I wasnt talking about the money. Hosting communications platforms isnt easy. It requires the team to change their habits besides their already challenging tasks of producing usable software.
Being the change you want to see does not implicate money, it implicates you contacting them, talking about their reasons, convincing them the comfort loss of non big tech platforms is worth it and only them it becomes a question of money.
Contact how? When you cut yourself off from the FOSS com options to build FOSS projects, you are unwelcoming to those actually using the tools whose philosophy match your project—just not your communications for some reason. There isn’t a listed email address or a gateway or bridged room.
The few teeny, tiny projects I have, I welcome emails & XMPP chat for anyone that wishes to collaborate which doesn’t require anyone to create an account on any particular service.
For those still not getting it, it is as wild as saying you need to have a Facebook account to communicate to a project as these services are all on the same level of propriety & lacking in privacy.
I am hopeful they will get some more corporate backing. We can donate all day but that is a drop in the bucket compared to a few million from some large companies
2026 isn’t soon.
It is a worry. I think we might end up needing to pay for Firefox ourselves.
Not sure firefox will be on our side after the recent ad tracking debacle. If they implement one more anti consumer feature I‘m jumping ship.
Jump ship to what? Not like there’s s lot of choices out there. You could always try LibreWolf.
Plenty of Firefox forks out there.
Netscape Navigator and Opera raise their hand
Wait, Navigator still exists?
Nah, it’s Firefox now
Well, Opera is also based on Chromium.
Do they still pass everything through a spy proxy to “speed up” browsing?
LadyBird is very promising.
They plan a release for 2028. It’s going to be a while before it can be used for everyday browsing.
That’s true, but it’s worth waiting. Until then Librewolf is probably the best choice.
Librewolf is just a reskinned Firefox.
Purged of unwanted and intrusive features, UBO pre installed, and is pre configured for increased privacy.
Tried librewolf recently and although worked well (linux mint) had all sorts of scaling issues and wouldn’t keep my settings. Just using as a backup to FF until I can figure it out. FF only just started failing to play YT unhindered.
Could very well be a mint issue. It’s a bit wonky at times with regular system windows.
Things are getting strange if you activate too much privacy settings. For example, all websites appear in light mode (because most people use light and thus is less value to track you) and for some reason, webUI with integrated terminals were not able to draw the ASCII text, it was just rainbows 😂 (proxmox and hombridge)
Oh really, are they building their own engine?
That would be my first address, assuming the librewolf folks will never accept anti community code, hopefully.
If everything fails i‘m fine to join a small project and help with it. I have some skills and can contribute financially.
I will happily donate.
If, of course, money won’t go to the CEO.
A CEO is a needed possition, I know in the past the Brendan Eich was controversial in his political views, but Laura Chambers seems ok so far
Ha! Good one…
oh wait. You’re serious…
How is a ceo needed? They do no work. Their entire job is to rake in cash from workers.
All a ceo needs is a guillotine.
Right.
And a football team doesn’t need a quarterback.
🤦🏼♂️
Yes, many of them are assholes, doesn’t change the need for the leadership.
ceos are not equivalent to quarterbacks.
the ceo is equivalent of the team owner. he makes the money and not much else.
CEO =/= business owner
Ok, granted that the CEO concept is not the only way to lead a company.
But you do need a leader, someone who can make decisions for the company, someone to make everyday decisions that are not fun, but needed to make the company work.
We can absolutely argue about their compensation, but thst is another argument alltogether.
Here’s a short animated Ted Talk about co-ops without CEO’s. Decisions can be decided by the workers, I think there’s some disconnect on what you’re imagining a CEO is. If you’re needing to make decisions everyday for the company to work… well you’re looking at something like Twitter which isn’t a stable company in a lot of ways. The video goes on to explain how co-ops operate and perform successfully through the centuries and a good starting point if you haven’t been introduced to the business model before.
Managers or “presidents” do exist, but the big difference is their role is to implement the decisions made by the group and does away with the usual power structure that influences and hurts the workers (usually through wage theft like the record bonuses CEO’s collect while making decisions for the share holders, not the consumers or employees).
At least Brendan Eich was a developer, good on him for being Christian.
it is lol, have you seen how much the ceo is paying herself?
its kind of a reddit situaton, where money wouldnt be that much of an issue if it werent for the ceo.
IIRC, only like 2% of Mozilla spending goes towards FF (I may be misinterpreting something, but I remember 2% being thrown around), so funding FF without rest of Mozilla bullshit shouldn’t be that hard. Of course, since Mozilla did spend so little on FF, it’s a question how much they actually care about FF and what would happen if they lost access to their golden goose. They shouldn’t have problem funding FF, but they probably have other bullshit they don’t want to let go and that has more priority for them.
A list of Mozilla’s “other bullshit”:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Mozilla_products
You are right, it was unfairly harsh wording, I apologize for that. Most of those products are super cool and important, I’ve kind of extrapolated it from what I’ve read in other posts about them spending too much on stuff like events and other, non-developemnt, related stuff that I actually never checked, while also not realizing that they also have a ton of other projects, which mixed with the dissapointment with the recent development about the Meta partnership led to me choosing that wording unfairly.
For now. They could default to yahoo and make money. Maybe not as much, but they could sustain browser development.
Firefox is still far superior to chromium.
I agree. That could work. We‘ll see.