Clearly, Google is serious about trying to oust ad blockers from its browser, or at least those extensions with fuller (V2) levels of functionality. One of the crucial twists with V3 is that it prevents the use of remotely hosted code – as a security measure – but this also means ad blockers can’t update their filter lists without going through Google’s review process. What does that mean? Way slower updates for said filters, which hampers the ability of the ad-blocking extension to keep up with the necessary changes to stay effective.
(This isn’t just about browsers, either, as the war on advert dodgers extends to YouTube, too, as we’ve seen in recent months).
At any rate, Google is playing with fire here somewhat – or Firefox, perhaps we should say – as this may be the shove some folks need to get them considering another of the best web browsers out there aside from Chrome. Mozilla, the maker of Firefox, has vowed to maintain support for V2 extensions, while introducing support for V3 alongside to give folks a choice (now there’s a radical idea).
Man fuck google
If only banks and government websites moved their asses and stopped mentioning Internet Explorer for one more time…
When new fearures added to V3, will Mozilla port it to V2 too?
IIRC, they’ve said they’ll implement V3 to maintain compatibility, but they’ll also continue to maintain V2. You, the extension developer, will not be forced to use V3 if you don’t want to.
educated guess: since firefox is implementing v3 support alongside their v2 extensions, there shouldn’t be any issues running v2 and v3 extensions side by side in the foreseeable future
I think they are wondering if one extension can use both v2 and v3 APIs at once? As in whether v3 APIs will be “backported” to allow v2 extensions to use them
Comeon 0.0001%! Let’s get those last 5 people who know what an extension is but were holding out for…???
Yeah… These articles are like reading the tally marks on a prison wall. Let it go.
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I downloaded Librewolf today - the privacy oriented fork of Firefox!
Good to see there are browser variants that aren’t just Chrome.
Until you actually need a chromium based browser. I get so annoyed when this happens.
Chromium isn’t as problematic as Chrome.
constantly, to be honest
In what situation do you need one?
I’ve been using Firefox for over a decade and have literally never once needed to open a different web browser. For anything, ever. This is a very common complaint that tons of people seem to have that I have never seen happen even once out in the wild.
I also use Firefox on my work computer, I need to quickly authorize a login in the browser before the local “app” opens (“app” because it’s just a webpage pretending to be an app) and I just recently got a notification that slack won’t support Firefox anymore so please switch to chrome. The fucking animals.
Sounds like Salesforce acting like Salesforce.
Firefox is getting so small it’s starting to disappear out of the testing matrix. Confluence has issues with it, you can’t always log into Vanguard on Firefox, many news website layouts have overlapping elements on Firefox, quite a few shopping websites too (H&M in Europe has a long-standing but with putting stuff in the shopping basket until they revamped their website a couple of months ago). Etc etc. I see it ALL the time.
I use Librewolf on desktop and Mull on mobile. I have a few extensions on both, which could definitely contribute to issues. When I have issues (usually government sites or financial stuff, sometimes DRM-related stuff for media) it’s easier to just use a Chromium-based browser with no extensions than try to troubleshoot specifically what’s causing the issues. I keep Falkon (desktop) and Vanadium (mobile) installed for this purpose.
I get the feeling a lot of issues people are having in Firefox might be due to extensions or settings, which gets “fixed” by using another browser (which happens to be Chromium-based because most browsers are) and they blame the issue on Firefox itself.
Several government websites for the state of Pennsylvania complain and refuse to work if they detect that you aren’t using chrome/edge/safari.
Do the sites work if you use an extension that lies to them about what browser you are using?
You can spoof your useragent to appear as chrome. And you should as it makes your browser less “unique”
While you can do this, it’s not clear to me that you should. There are a number of additional laws having to do with perjury and misusing goverment sites and while I would undoubtedly agree with you, were you to assert the application of those laws to the utilization of a user agent switcher is a ridiculous overreach, I am just as certain I have no desire to be in the hot-seat on the day we all find out.
Oh wow I didn’t know that. I’ll have to double check for the states that are relevant for me.
I imagine many people naively install a privacy extension and unknowingly have altered useragents
Imagine the government coming after someone, demanding they give Google their fair share
Flashing ESPhome devices. I just had to re-flash one via serial the other day and it requires chrome AFAIK.
As if installing and using something else means you can’t have Chrome lying around for that one stupid website.
And I do. Sometimes I’ll just fire up Edge if Chrome isn’t installed since it’s chromium based.
Almost 20 years and I’ve never needed a Chromium browser for anything. I’m sorry you were forced to use such garbage ass software.
I have chromium installed for the sole reason to cast some streams to my remote TVs. Otherwise it stays closed. I tried some work around with FF, but I couldn’t get it to work. It’s only once or twice a week for live sporting events, so I can stomach it.
I understand where you’re coming from. It’s never happened to me, but if a website didn’t work with Firefox, I would just assume it’s a shit site ran by rookies who know nothing, and move on to a different site. I understand most people don’t have that kind of principle though.
It’s not that the site doesn’t work in FF, it’s that casting the stream from that site to a remote TV in the house is only possible in chromium, at least with my current device setup. If I just watch on my computer, I watch in FF.
Ah, you did say that. I’m sorry for my misunderstanding. I’ve never tried that, and you’re the first I’ve seen to mention it. I concede to your argument.
I’m in the slow process of replacing devices with HTPCs then I won’t need to cast anything. Unfortunately computers and time don’t grow on trees.
There’s still Vivali which is Chromium based and still supporting V2 extension (like uBlock) until June 2025. Its not a full fix, but its a stay of execution. That said, I’m a FF primary user.
I see Vivaldi, I upvote.
I have no idea why people are downvoting it.
I’m already mad about having to potentially abandon my highly customized Vivaldi should ublock lite not work up to my standards
Vivaldi isn’t entirely open source, if that matters to you.
Brave would be my recommendation, I just disable the crypto stuff.
Brave’s CEO is so anti-gay, he dished out 4-figure checks to fight gayness.
I’m not a fan of that, and Brave has issues with being Chromium-based, like Vivaldi.
this reads like a yo mama joke
I’m sorry, but that is an instance of separating the art from the artist, I really don’t care.
Roughly 92% of the browser’s code is open source coming from Chromium, 3% is open source coming from us, which leaves only 5% for our UI closed-source code.
https://vivaldi.com/blog/technology/why-isnt-vivaldi-browser-open-source/
Only the UI part is not open source.
If people used other browsers, then the market share would change and this would become less and less of a problem.
I already use Firefox full time and recommend others do as well.
I’ve been using librewolf for a several months. Be careful because streaming doesn’t always work on it due to DRM features, and YouTube has been spotty AF. With YouTube it might start the video a couple seconds into it, buffer for no discernable reason, or just skip a few random seconds.
Oh? I noticed that issue last couple of days using invidious on librewolf, and thought it was YT doing invidious shenanigans again.
I use firefox but I have to change my useragent string to chrome with an extension to get YouTube working.
Might be worth having a look to see if it fixes your issues
yep firefox with arkenfox for me, same deal as librewolf. And Mull on mobile.
Switched about 2-3 months ago thinking it might be difficult or impact me negatively or something but its been easy and great.
You know the problem I have with Librewolf? – Fuckall nobody knows how to spell it.
The beauty of Firefox is that even the densest idiot knows how to spell those two words. And with attention spans the equivalent of a gnat, people need to have things simplified for them as much as humanly possible.
Fortunately enough, Firefox is about the only one with a renderer that isn’t controlled by Google, but - even now they’re shifting to a pro-advertising stance and backing off of the privacy orientation that they took just a year or two ago.
Yes, and we will drop Mozilla when it drops uBlock as well. We will all get behind whatever open-source browser stops ads, and it will very quickly become the most widely used browser. Why? Because everybody despises fucking ads and you can’t curb-stomp them into liking ads, that’s why.
Google can spend all the money it likes trying to piss on users and tell them it’s raining but at the end of the day, a new king will be crowned and if it isn’t Chrome and it isn’t Firefox, then it will be something else.
And no, FOSS doesn’t need money behind it. FOSS needs a dedicated community behind it. Assertions to the contrary are FUD constantly being seeded by Google, Microsoft and their ilk to destroy competition. This is an existential necessity for Google, you can bet they are doing everything in their power to maintain the status quo.
And no, FOSS doesn’t need money behind it. FOSS needs a dedicated community behind it
how do you imagine a Linux-sized community getting built around firefox in a few days? and even that is a bad example, because a lot of linux devs are paid by their employer from a company anywhere on the world
Just stop destroying the www by supporting this toxic monopoly. How in the hell are all of those coping tweaks easier than just switching the freaking browser?! It’s like Windows users claiming superiority when they have to have like 10 tools to tweak their operating system, with each year another new one being needed. At what point do you people realize how much you’re getting duped and how you are part of the problem that makes this possible in the first place?
I relate to your Windows comment. There was a point where I was that person with a bunch of different tools to modify my OS exactly how I like it, and then I realize I’m just doing more work. If I’m willing to do that work anyway, I might as well have an OS that is more malleable.
Yes, same here. After turning off a bunch of services I noticed update stopped working, but I forgot how I turned off the firewall in the first place to make it work again… Never booted windows again except for that one time to change the polling rate of my mouse (windows only app)
How dare anyone suggest that there’s a way to accomplish something!
It’s better to just use another browser that’s not looking to exploit you
Yeah from one of those companies that pour tons of money into developing and maintaining a web browser without any way to recoup that expense.
They recoup it through shipping a default search engine that’s Google in 90% of the world
So they’re just subcontracting the exploitation?
I’ve seen countless of those tweaks throughout the years. You can harangue the people using them all you want, but at the end of the day they’re hooked on a powerful drug. And they’ll do anything to keep their supply.
For those who may not want to click the link, this appears to show a workaround that enterprises might use to bypass the change.
No, enterprises would use the Google admin console as described here.
The above is for a single machine, applied locally.
It looks like it’s the same flag to me. I mean, it’s entirely possible that administration could use a different path to applying the setting, but it has the same name.
Sure, it’s the same flag, but using the admin console would apply it to a group of computers. The methods in the github link are to apply it to a single computer.
Only until June 2025 apparently, leave chromium behind already guys.
Doesn’t uBlock Origin already have a Manifest V3 version of the extension?
Yeah, but it sucks, because of the heavy constraints of MV3
thr manifest v3 version is basically ublock origin lite, whoch has extremely limited control of what you can and cant do.
Yes, though the devs don’t even like it
Yes, but capabilities are reduced.
That’s uBlock Origin Lite, which the developer already stated is grossly inadequate for ad blocking.
uBO Lite.
Not my jam, lacks the power of the original.
What’s a good YouTube downloader these days?
if youre just looking for a downloader website with zero setup of your own there’s cobalt
yt-dlp continues to be the best option for me.
Screen capture while the video is running, like the VCR days of yore
Nah, man. I point a Betamax camcorder on a tripod at my 4K, 16bpp graphics workstation monitor to make sure I really capture all those pixels.
yt-dlp is what i normally use, tho its only got a command line interface. I think someone’s made a GUI for it, but I’ve never tried it.
There’s like 20 guis
theres seal on android, ive used it on waydroid but thats pretty silly
yt-dlp is the gold standard. Not only for YouTube either. Check out the man page, the amount of shit it can do is insane.
On Android you can use Seal
Hell yeah. Another vote for Seal!
A great privacy focused client for YouTube is FreeTube. Uses a native API or Invidious for playback, and you can download and share videos from it. Doesn’t give any identifying info to Google/YouTube and I’ve never once dealt with an ad. For mobile, Grayjay and NewPipe are similar apps.
The downloading on freetube is so bad as to be functionally broken, and based on what reading I did to try to get it good, it sounds like it’s gonna stay how it is forever.
Basically it should be considered a lie to advertise freetube as having a working download function, even if it can technically do it. I wish it were better because it’s a neat little program for viewing without mucking up recommendations!
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Embrace
Extend
Extinguish <-- you are here
It sorta protected Chrome’s monopoly in the browser world for years. Now that they’ve established that monopoly firmly, it’s time to crack down on things that diminish monetisation.
aka the “extinguish” phase I believe
We need to add a fourth E:
Embrace, Extend, Extinguish, Enshittify.
I’ve been hearing this for at least a year and a half. Ublock still works fine in Chrome…
You’ve been hearing about it because there’s been a lot of pushback at all stages of them doing it. That doesn’t mean it won’t happen, they’ve kept pushing for it and there’s no indication they won’t go through with it.
It’s good that I use Firefox and will continue to be ad free then, eh?
I sure hope so. I’ve been on team Mozilla for a long time, but right at this critical moment they are starting to wobble. Their CEO seems to be steering them in a direction that I don’t agree with.
(I still believe Firefox is the best option right now; but I’m a little concerned for the future.)
I switched to Firefox over the summer and have been mostly happy with my decision.
However, there have been a LOT of issues with video playback on certain sites and I really don’t know how to fix them. Searches have been just about useless in regards to finding a fix. The worst one is Nebula. The video often just freezes while the audio just keeps trucking along like nothing is wrong. This has happened to a more limited extent with some YouTube videos as well. And the TAB crash on some sites is quite infuriating.
The lack of HVEC/h.265 support is kind of a deal breaker in firefox (windows nightly builds don’t count as done). I need it to view h.265 security cameras and the occasional movie streamed via browser.
Cool thing is you can run multiple browsers. So just use Chrome for your cameras and Firefox for everything else.
Why would I use multiple browsers if I can achieve nearly everything in one? I would much rather use Edge or Safari for everything than Firefox plus another browser.
Because Edge has also moved to Manifest V3 and Safari uses WebKit which doesn’t have the same degree of blocking. I mean, you do you, enjoy your ads.
True, but the other argument is just try adblock lite, it works fine… It isn’t as powerful but I would rather have a fully functional daily browser than one with lesser video playback and conferencing functions.
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I guess, but the comment is a direct assertion against Firefox growing from this change. You sort of prove my point by suggestion another sub variant of the chrome ecosystem.
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guessing you want that codec for a reason
It is the default most widely used codec for devices and video 4K and higher resolution. It is just what nearly all new / modern cameras come with. You don’t really get a choice.
I guess when edge stops supporting v2 you’ll just look at ads then
I won’t
Ad block lite does a good enough job without me changing to be honest, again the point being is that there are more problems with me using Firefox as a primary browser than ad blocking benefits.
The Fox has been re-promoted to my daily driver as of this year. Chrome still in play for work stuff & sites don’t have ads.
And we started with “Don’t be evil”
I believe their new slogan is “Fuck em’, what they gonna do!?”.
