We can do better. It isn't the 10% ruining it it is the 10% who see that we don't need to live like lab rats
this post was submitted on 13 Jul 2024
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I mean… what's wrong with stuff like the Fediverse just gradually strangling the commercially-driven internet? I pay a couple bucks a month to a number of different Fediverse providers and if everyone does that, they'll likely be able to stay self-sufficient and community-oriented. I honestly don't mind paying websites directly in that fashion as long as my data is portable and not for sale, whereas I know that if I let most commercial websites have my data, they will sell it to whomever and however many times they are capable of, all while enshitifying the user experience on their website as much as possible without making everyone leave completely.
It's the most frustrating business model possible and why I refuse to give them any more traction than they already have.
The problem with donation driven Internet is that it lives on the whims of a few and weaker willed developers and content creators start trying to pander to whoever is paying them.
I was there, during the first advertising push of the mid/late 90s, where visiting the wrong website - or even the right one on the wrong day - spawned “uncloseable” pop-ups and pop-unders… uncloseable because as soon as you tried to dismiss the window, that action triggered a half-dozen more to spawn.
Eventually, the weight of all the browser windows would cause not only the browser to grind to a halt, but even the computer as a whole (single-thread CPUs & minimal RAM, nat), such that your only possible recovery path was to conduct a hard restart of the entire system, your unsaved work be damned.
I feel for those businesses whose only possible funding strategy is via ads, but that well was lethally poisoned for me decades ago. I jumped onto the world’s first adblocker the moment it became available for Phoenix (now Firefox), and I have never looked back. The only way I will ever stop using adblocking is to stop using the Internet entirely.
I don't think anyone is asking you to stop blocking ads. Block away!
I think the only request defenders of PPA are making, is please don't actively prevent it from making things better for everyone else.
Many ads are scams or malware too, which ad brokers don't want to address because they get paid. The "we need ad money to support our service" sounds close to the mobs protect racket given the security risks on some ads.
While I also hate ads, what I hate even more is the tracking. I would honestly be okay with ads that respected my privacy, like they largely did back in the early days of the web. I remember visiting sites and having ads that had nothing to do with my interests, probably because they were either randomly or staticly (based on page content) assigned.
We have the technology, however, to move beyond ads. We can do microtransactions and just pay a nominal fee per page view. I wouldn't mind if I paid the fraction of a penny a page would've g otten by showing me an ad, provided that payment was anonymous (e.g. through something like GNU Taler or Monero). But for some reason, websites either expect a ton of money and a login, or ads, with no in-between. I hoped Brave would provide that, but that didn't happen at all.
Please, give us three options:
- privacy-respecting ads - ads should be relevant to the page content and maybe local browsing history (never sent anywhere, just analyzed locally)
- anonymized microtransactions per page view to avoid ads
- subscription to avoid MTX and ads for sites I use regularly
But if the current options are privacy invasive ads or subscriptions, I'm going to install an ad-blocker. If you prevent me from seeing it, I'm going to look at your competitors instead.
"Why don't you want to compromise with the leopards? They don't want to kill you, just let them lick your nose a bit. That would be cute, right!?"
Well, using your leopard analogy. It's why wouldn't you go to a safari park in a car rather than on foot.
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