Google Chrome will limit ad blockers starting June 2024::The “Manifest V3” rollout is back after letting tensions cool for a year.
Firefox users who never left: feeling of smugness intensifies
I try not to express or show it though. Only good vibes to bring everyone over to Firefox.
signature look of superiority
I must admit I ditched Firefox for a while when it was considerably slower than Chrome.
feelsbadman.
Welcome back. <3
deleted
The last time I used Chrome was a fork called Rockmelt 🥴 then moved to Maxthon, then K-Meleon, and settled on Firefox
Rockmelt is a fork of Chromium, not a fork of Chrome. Same with Maxthon. Both Chromium and Chrome are maintained by Google, but Chromium is open-sourced while Chrome is not.
deleted by creator
Agreed. I didn’t mean to imply chromium is a good thing, which is why I said it is maintained by Google. Lots of browsers are forks of Chromium, even Microsoft Edge, but I thought they were implying these browsers were illegal forks hacked from Chrome, so I looked them up and found they’re just more chromium forks.
I think I dropped it for a few years starting somewhere around v3.6. Also feelsbad
I’m ashamed to say I did the same and even converted quite a few non-tech savvy people as well. :(
You’re so smug that you love to smell your own farts!
The trick is to never let your smugness show, then you can be smug about your humility as well. *sniff* Ahhhh…
Same as reddit to lemmy story for me. Moving mobile browser from kiwi(chrome fork) to Firefox nightly. Already a Firefox user in pc.
deleted by creator
Never looked into using firefox but the enshitification has forced me to do so.
awesome browser imo. and i switched back from opera GX
Same
Which is second to the greatest feature, containers!
Google Chrome can suck a dick.
Damn, that sounds like a killer feature.
Yeah, but given the name, I bet Edge does it way better ;)
No, it sucks. Killing is illegal.
Byt what if it wasnt. Hey vsauce michael here. What is killing and how can it be legal?
If only there was an alternative. Some kinda fox. A fox that was set aflame
Or, let’s say, a weasel frozen in ice
There’s a browser called Glacier Ferret? 🤔
Sorry, I had too.
Why would you apologise for that string of masterpieces? It’s marvellous and adorable! Marvorable! Adorallous! Both! 🥰
Those are awesome
OMFG Someone pleaae fork FF and make this one a reality
Or - ohh I don’t know - some kind of frozen bird?
I wish it was for me, but Chrome is necessary for some work I do.
Edit: very weird I get so many downvotes because I need to use a specific browser. Get out more, please.
Such as?
I was doing some work on the social security site and the site i needed wouldn’t even load unless it was chrome or edge. There are sadly too many important website that are somehow allowed to gatekeep browsers. I feel like if their site follows guidelines then there’s no reason they should be restricted from browsers, but here we are.
Platforms I use don’t work reliably with other browsers, online teaching ones to be specific.
Ah, that’s a tough one.
I needed to install Ungoogled Chromium to join lectures, because the remote learning site refused to work in Firefox (wouldn’t be surprised if it was developed against a chrome-specific API)
Pretty much every internal Web application I’ve used in banking, insurance and Govt orgs.
Most of the time the site doesn’t really need chrome, it’s just that’s all they test it with, so they say it’s a requirement.
There’s an addon for Firefox called User-Agent Switcher and Manager that allows you to have Firefox identify itself to websites as chrome (among others), and it often fixes the problem.
I work in IT so I am aware of this. Maybe you’ve not worked in enough places that just build incompatible (cr)apps?
And sure, just go outside our locked down machine policies and install Firefox and unapproved extensions. That will do down well.
Yeah, “most” was probably a bit hyperbolic, especially for internal websites, and I guess it’s no surprise that the sectors you mentioned would be particularly bad for it.
The best place for my little PSA probably wasn’t in response to your post in particular.
Sorry I’m snippy as I have personal stuff going on. You are right in so far as if you have full control of your machine which isn’t the case for the orgs I mentioned.
We can pull FF into our dev environment so I’ve seen these annoying behaviours.
Edit: …
Yeah, I get “Google bad”, and agree, and am 100% on the Firefox train, but downvoting people for not using FF is kinda stinky.
So use Chrome for that work, and Firefox plus an adblocker for everything else.
My adblocker works in Chrome at the moment so will see.
Have you tried to spoof the user agent ?
I don’t know what that is
It’s a neat trick that’s been around for ages. Your browser presents a string of text to the website to identify itself. “Hi! I’m Chrome_ver_whatever.”
You can easily change it, make your browser lie to the website.
Here’s the extension for Chrome and Edge:
https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/user-agent-switcher-for-c/djflhoibgkdhkhhcedjiklpkjnoahfmg
I’m sure Firefox has the same.
Here some for Firefox
I’m not sure that’s going to fix the technical problems I have.
LoLL
Laughing out loud longitudinally?
Limits of Large Language (model not included)
Languishing Overcooked Linguine, Literally?
I’ve tried switching so many times, most recently yesterday. Every time something just doesnt work or is missing. Yesterday it was stremios web client that refused to show the video that I was simultaneously watching in chrome.
And the fact that Firefox doesnt do tab groups. Such a convenient feature for me, and I couldnt find an extension that did the job. Maybe some of you can help?
Absolutely agree on the tab groups. I don’t get how this is not implemented yet, it’s a basic feature with great impact to usability.
Firefox actually had tab groups way back, but Mozilla, in their infinite wisdom, removed it because apparently their main mission now is to antagonize all their loyal power users.
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/search/?q=Tab groups
This is definitely a feature that needs to be an addon rather than in core Firefox, as it could easily interfere with users who organise tabs in different ways (e.g. Tree tabs)
Right now there’s no built in options and it could just be deactivated.
Also the add ins I’ve seen still lack chrome’s feature of auto grouping. They just allow me to manually group.
If you refresh it generally works. I’ve had zero issues with it. Not sure though
No amount of refreshing or clearing cookies and cache has helped so far. It just says “video not supported” no matter which file I try to play.
What are you trying to play ? Probably should contact mods. Would be good for them to know. Others will have similar problems.
Do you have add one ? I need to turn off dark mode for some sites as it breaks it. Those are the only issues I’ve had.
It is probably a very specific issue, since I can’t find anyone else that has it, at least not doing the usual google-fu.
When using the Stremio web client, firefox refuses to play anything I throw at it, whereas everything plays fine in the chromium browsers I’ve tried.
No amount of turning extensions off or clearing cache or cookies or refreshing has fixed it so far.
Fire through the link and maybe folk can check it out. I know GeForce now doesn’t work on Firefox and steam doesn’t play nice.
My Firefox does tab groups. Just find an extension
Which extension are you using?
To abuse a saying…
Best time to be on Firefox? Yesterday.
Second best? Today.
Free ad for Firefox. Funny enough can’t be blocked by ad blockers.
How long until Google starts paying sites to require chrome? The already tried rolling that concept out a few months ago. They only stopped because of the backlash that was publicly associated with it. They already pay major phone manufacturers to have google as their default or only search option.
So who’s going to stop them when we start finding that major popular sites suddenly don’t work on firefox?
Hopefully the EU
People could start configuring their sites to ban Google Chrome. Give a scary message that says something like “Google Chrome is not allowed on this site for your protection. Google Chrome has severe vulnerabilities that allow for easy infection. An autistic teenager was falsely convicted of selling CP after being infected and now must register for life.”
People would switch away from Google Chrome incredibly fast if website owners started posting that.
I like the way you think, but that sounds like a lawsuit with one of the richest companies on the planet behind the prosecution. Could work for sites based outside of US jurisdiction.
They can’t sue millions of people.
It could also be made very hard for them to win. All someone has to do is make a site making that claim and their ability to win will be gone. Any defendant can claim they read that site.
They don’t sue millions of people. They sue one person and make an example out of them and the chilling effect does the rest. That’s how this kind of thing goes.
That’s only if everyone else complies.
Plenty of organizations would likely jump in. Someone could make a site alleging the bad thing that happened as the result of Google Chrome and that pretty much tanks the entire case. It would be very hard to prove reckless disregard for the truth when there’s a website that alleges the claim. Furthermore, someone could simply write the code and distribute it, and every site displaying it would have grounds for displaying it.
All someone really has to do is find one thing that could potentially be a vulnerability in Google Chrome and they have grounds for making a scary notice about it.
If that does happen, can’t we just spoof our user agent to be chrome?
Their web integrity API they were planning was specifically to prevent that.
I had no idea… didn’t that end up being canceled at some point or am I mistaken?
As it is customary, companies drop bomb shells to gauge their user base reaction. They pull back if the reaction is too strong and slowly reintroduce it piece by piece when the things have cooled down a bit.
The moment they announced their intention to DRM the web meant that they will try to push however they can.
With something like that, it’s usually just rebranded and pushed out after backlash calms down.
I think there are more reliable ways to identify your browser. The user-agent is self reported, so not reliable. It’s just the simplest option that’s usually good enough unless you’re doing something malicious.
They won’t pay them it will be smarter than that. Possibly with proprietary APIs that only work on chrome etc. some sites already don’t work on Firefox.
They’ll also further enshitifiy their own services on non chrome browsers.
Then we’ll develop add-ons that make the sites pretend Firefox is Chrome. It may not be perfect for a while, but it’ll still block ads.
Sounds like they will create a non-corporate version of the internet by accident. Sound good to me, but I feel like it won’t fly in EU to well.
When sites see the drop off of users.
Also, Chromite exists.
This, but computer literacy rather than literal literacy
title as it should be: ‘google did not die a hero, it instead lived long enough to become the villain.’
such old news though
google became the villain the moment it decided to become publicly traded and chose to be the internet’s ad pimp rather than a search engine
most of us are too young to remember but there was a time when you could search for something obscure and actually find it
did you want to talk about it over Winamp? 😭 so many cool projects Google created to only abandon or kill them short of success.
Winamp wasn’t a Google project.
Winamp was Nullsoft and AOL bought it to ruin it.
It really whips the llama’s ass.
Laughs in Firefox
Came here to laugh at this.
I just can’t get used to Firefox. Last time I tried it (earlier this year), I tried for 2 months. Can’t remember all the reasons, but using the adresbar as calculator and see the results without pressing enter is so ingrained in my way of working. Just alt+d, 2+2 shows the result. Give me something better than that and I’ll give Firefox an other shot.
Edit: lol at my downvotes. That’s what I get for asking a genuine question I guess. People really looove their Firefox here. (me too, but I’m missing some features)
You can map a keyboard shortcut to the calculator in Windows and have a more robust option no matter what browser you use.
deleted by creator
They’re going to burn their own browser. If they stop allowing adblockers, a lot of people are just going to change browsers.
good, and good riddance too
I would love to see this happen but I suspect that the number of users who actually install ad blocker extensions and are willing to switch to a new browser once they stop working is fairly insignificant compared to the total numbers of people browsing in Chrome.
Agree, i have rarely seen people who actually use adblock outside my work. I had to practically tie up my entire family, in-laws included to get ublock installed on all their computers.
Why the hell aren’t you on Firefox?
Because bold fonts look weird in Firefox and I have not found a way to change that
Weird do you have a screen shot you can share? they look fine to me.
Could it be something withyour windows installation?
Here is a picture that demonstrates the problem. On the left is Firefox and on the right Thorium (Chromium). I’ve had this problem on Windows before but now I’m using Linux and it’s the same unfortunately.
Yea, just tested it myself and i have the same problem. but not in choromium.
Weird!
Using DuckDuckGo (Android), which is chromium-based, it has the same problem, all text weights are bolded at the maximum values.
It looks like Firefox is trying to be more respectful of the text weights, when deciding how to bold text.
Here is a picture that demonstrates the problem. On the left is Firefox and on the right Thorium (Chromium).
If I’m understanding that screenshot correctly, it looks like Thorium (Chromium) is ignoring the text values and bolding any of them at the max bolding value, where Firefox respects the text values and bolts off of that just slightly.
I did have a strange issue with that in the past, but not any more.
I think it went away after going through the Windows ClearType gubbins again.
Oh god, that menu is the worst shit. I literally downloaded an open source program to tweak it.
I remember trying this as well but it didn’t help, and the problem also exists on Linux
It’s been forever since I last looked, but can’t you actually change what fonts are used from within Firefox directly?
That’s new to me. Can you share a screenshot?
Sure, please check the other reply in this comment thread
google chrome will suck my balls
Username checks out
thanks reddit
Google Chrome has always been near my taint
In other news: Firefox installs are breaking records.
Is that true? I would love for more people to experience Firefox
I want to switch but I really like Vivaldi even though it’s still chromium based…
Vivaldi feels like its filled with bloat tbh.
Vivaldi is nice. I don’t just it but I’ve tried it.
I was in your same exam position until someone recommended me Floorp. Jump on in, the water is great.
Hi Firefox. It’s been a while…
It shouldn’t have been a while
Eh, when Chrome first came out, Firefox was incredibly clunky and slow in comparison.
At least it was for me, which was why I switched back then.
Google’s YouTube shenanigans earlier this year got me back to Firefox though, and the more Google does crap like this the more I’m thinking my next phone may take me back to the Appleverse.
Trust me, if you care about what’s happening to Google and YouTube right now, you won’t love what has been happening to Apple and it’s products for the last decade or so.
Why not CustomROMs?
Because I don’t even know what that is?
To put it simply, a “custom ROM” in this context means a modified version of Android. Many of these versions are based on AOSP (Android Open-Source Project), which is still maintained by Google, but is in fact open-source and doesn’t include Google services. Therefore, there is a possibility to use Android phones (given you have one with unlockable bootloader) without any Google apps or account.
I guess I am just past the time where I enjoy…or even am willing to…delve into the way my devices work, run non standard stuff on them, or have some unique setup on them.
I don’t feel like my needs or desires are too awfully picky or niche at this point, I just don’t want my shit to be actively fighting me in day to day function.
When I got my first smart phone, I went Android for the increased options to customize and more hardware and app options.
As time went on, I got to a point where the hardware all sucked compared to iPhone, couldn’t find a phone I liked that did all the things as well as an iPhone, so I switched, trading customize-ability for function.
While that was a trade that worked, I still missed Android as I found the iPhone trying to constantly force me to do things a certain way. And when I went looking for ways to change that, most of the apple community basically said, “If you don’t want to do things the apple way, you’re the one that’s wrong and needs to change”
So after that one, I came right back to Android.
My last phone was pretty good but this one has so many quirks and hardware issues that just the experience of using the phone frustrates me and I’ve only had it a few months.
Not seeing anything else I like on the market, my options seem to be annoyance with hardware, annoyance with software, or annoyance with hardware and fuss with installing non typical software.
I get it, I have a similar situation, except since I came back to Android I have been nothing but happy.
I used to be into running custom stuff on Android before my switch to an iPhone. And I, too, have found it frustrating to be forced to respect Apple’s rules.
Now, however, I have a Pixel 7 and it’s been a perfect experience so far. Running the stock OS non-rooted, it finally feels like my phone.
Yea, i swapped to chrome when it was on the rise, and it was subsantially faster than firefox.
These days i find firefox as fast, or faster.
Yeah I honestly expected some growing pains with the switch but it was a lot smoother than I expected.
People keep saying (and corpos keep believing) that normies will just “get used to the ads or pay a premium”
But everybody has a breaking point. People who already dislike it have left chrome or are in the rush to leave. Once people reach this point, they will start asking their more tech savvy friends or the Internet for a better way.
I honestly hope Google will not change its trajectory because sooner or later, people will get fed up with their bullshit.
Yes, I like the direction Google is going. More people need to favor non-profit software.
I paid for YouTube premium for quite a while but cancelled because it wouldn’t stop recommending the same video I’ve “not interested” for too many times, and also for pushing far right propaganda and pseudo science when all I watch is gaming related content and some space and engineering content.
Browsing the Internet without add blockers literally breaks the pages and makes one vulnerable to malware.
Would you like to rewatch this video you already watched? i even removed the fact it has been previously played?
No? How about now? Or now?
Sometimes youtube’s recommendations are excellent, serving interesting woodworking or tech videos, other time it just shovels me the same drivel over and over.
My current feed is 4 videos that I’ve already watched completely and the red bar is still full, but I get a lot of already watched videos where the bar resets as well. Then it’s a bunch of videos from 14 years ago. These old videos started appearing earlier this year and I get a lot of them since, besides clicking ‘No Interest’
Then there’s one or two videos that have been there for months in my feed that I’m afraid to dismiss because I like the general topic just don’t have interest in these particular videos.
And then from time to time it it shines for a day or two and I get interesting stuff that disappears as quick as it came.
One thing it’s getting better at recently is showing me long videos that are over an hour instead of the under 15 minute ones.
