I've been blocking ads for so long that actually seeing them feels perverse
I use ad blockers and open source privacy focused software whenever I can but occasionally I have to use computers that don't belong to me or an older phone where my usual applications aren't installed and seeing all the advertisements just feels dirty and dystopian.
I think the worst ads are the text to speech ones that say "Download this app today". The unblinking energenic people saying you can make a living at home are probably a close second.
Same, it's so weird seeing normal TV or using the internet without blockers. Feels like living in Idiocracy.
One of my most used sites has a banner that says "Sign up for a small fee to remove the ads."
I was a confused for a second, because I had never seen one.
Tried the site with another browser with my default protection off and holy shit, so many ads. The webpage is mostly unusable because of the shear number.
Yeah I agree.
It's made me very intolerant of ads. It's kind of surprising how much effort I will invest to avoid ads, and avoid supporting people who make a living from advertising revenue.
That’s a lot of people, lad..
...just imagine if they were all doing something productive instead.
Props to @DogMuffins@discuss.tchncs.de for helping to discourage their parasitic behavior and ushering them toward career paths that might actually utilize their potential in a positive way!
Lots of the web is still run by advertising revenue. I know a few of the sites I like to go to rely on advertisting. I certainly don't consider them parasites like you do, they're just working within the system, because the alternative is to not exist, and I'd rather not have that.
That or force a subscription to use which I think nobody really wants
False dichotomy.
There's loads of ways for content producers to get paid.
I don't think that's true at all.
If advertising didn't exist then content producers and content consumers would embrace an alternative funding model because everyone wants content.
Enough to pay for it? Nope. I've been on the other sides of this equation, that is a very naive take.
Enough to pay for it ... if it's good enough to be worth paying for.
It's that last part that kills most content creators. There's people whose work I'll idly browse as long as I don't have to pay for it (even with ads: I love my ad blocker!). But you're right, 99.44% of content creators whose work I idly look over would not get a single red cent out of me from direct payment.
So maybe it would be good to switch to payment-only schemes. That would kill off the crap creators and leave those behind who make something people think is worth paying for.
I mean ... I still pay for books and music. I do pay for content. Just not shit content.
I'll give you an example. I use a site called lacemarket which is a buying/selling site for a niche hobby of Japanese street fashion. It will never be popular enough that enough people would be using the site in order for them to make enough to pay for hosting the site.
So they're forced to run ad's cause they have no other way to keep the site up. The owners are also not taking a percentage of people's sales so they can continue to bring in people who want to use the site. But in order to not take money from the sellers, the only other option they have to keep the site running is ad funding.
It sucks but its too niche to do it any other way.
If it is that niche, it is not a self-sustaining business model (with the evidence for this being that they instead have to sell their users to third parties).
Perhaps it's just better left to die than to propagate an economic model that commoditizes human beings who aren't even part of the business?
no, its a hobby community and its been running since at least 2014. There is a demand for it but only in that community.
So letting it die wouldn't be an option. It's not a ton of people but I can think of lots of communities that have like 300 ish people in them who would be fucking livid if that site went down.
That's the very first result I found.
And you need ads to support this!?
No, only like two people run the site.
The groups I'm talking about are the people who use the site to buy and sell the clothes on there.
You mean you're a content producer that couldn't get people to support you directly? Did ad revenue solve the problem?
If advertising didn't exist other funding models would be embraced.
You just think that because advertising exists as an option. If that circumstance was different, everything else would be too.
Alright so journalists and reviewers can fuck off, then?
Journalists don't make money from advertising revenue. Reviewers can fuck off.
Actually, since the Internet began to be public domain, physical newspapers has lower and lower sales. Since people can find the news online. This is one reason behind ads online.
Today, many local areas have nobody that works as a journalist, no local news=local politicians can do whatever they want without anybody question them.
So, what do you prefer? A community that has journalists asking the tough questions, digging for dirt or a community where corruption can flow free?
Support your local newspaper/news station with a subscription and use adblock.
Actually I personally believe that public funded media is vastly better than independent. Private media has prudent itself incapable of being anything other than corporate / conservative shills.
There are no more local newspapers or stations for all practical purposes. 70% of the UK's "local" news media (print or broadcast) are owned by four media conglomerates. Most "local" television media in the USA is owned by the (right wing asshole collection) Sinclair Broadcast Group or (fellow right wing asshole collection) Rosebud Media. About 2/3 of "local" newspapers in the USA aren't locally-owned or operated and don't hire local reporters. Of these, about half are owned by 25 companies (themselves part of larger conglomerates in twisted, difficult-to-unravel relationships).
So it's kind of difficult to support your local newspaper/station. Because it's a unicorn for most people.
I want to agree but I live in a place with a popular local newspaper that moved online and it's still corrupt as ever here.
I’m beginning to think you lack fundamental knowledge of how the internet sort of.. works…
Oh my sweet summer child...
That's a lot of people who are a net drain on society both economically and in terms of accomplishment. SO MUCH EFFORT is wasted on trying to get my eyes on their graffiti. The greatest engineers of the 1950s and 1960s put humans on the Moon. The greatest engineers of the 2000s onwards struggle to get eyes on ads.
It's fucking repulsive.
Not really?
I'm always disgusted with tv ads and it blows me away that people just let commercials scream at them all day to buy viagra, anal leakage meds, insurance etc. Why would you let that shit in your home? Ugh
Because you didn't buy the anal leakage meds.
That's literally my parents "background noise" it's a news argument or commercial 24/7 over there.
because I find it amusing and it doesn't do anything actually harmful.
I just feel annoyed... I hate their fake humor, fake happiness, fake everything. And they are so dumb.
I only see ads when I use YouTube on my phone, but my god the "humor" is terrible. Especially those "aren't we weird and kooky?" Liberty Mutual ads, not one of which is remotely funny.
They aren't creating awareness of their brand, so much as they are making people associate their brand with being pissed off. Looking at you Liberty.
What fake humor are you talking about? There was a snickers commercial last year that made me laugh. It wasn't fake - it was hilarious. Had a pretty raunchy joke in it too.
YES the dumb skits are fucking excruciating. and they air them over and over. and some people laugh!
You actually find ads blaring at you amusing? What a truly horrid unpopular opinion. I'll respect that though if you're actually serious but it's hard for me to comprehend.
I bet $5 they work in the advertising industry in some way, or maybe benefit from it.
Nope I work in customer service.
Fair enough, I'm just not able to relate to someone who enjoys ads without a personal interest involved. I'm at the point where I hate ads so much that even if it is something that interests me, most advertisements are more likely to get me to avoid a product than pursue it.
I do understand hating ads to some extent because when I was growing up, they made me feel uncomfortable but later on I realized it was because I was watching tv with other people. So it was really just other people making me feel uncomfy and not the ad's - when I watched ads on my own I found them interesting when I actually paid attention to them.
What do you mean by personal interest though? Most tv ad's I see now aren't even for someone like me. Like I have no need for viagra pills or dog meds. I'm not a guy with dick problems and I don't own a dog. I see a lot of ads for like 65+ people too cause that's who's left watching and they know it.
For personal interest, I meant like a direct personal benefit in some way from it. So not an interest in the ad itself, but the results of that ad. It might have been clearer if I had said "financial interest" instead, though it could also be say an actor in an ad that was already paid but liked being seen, or someone who likes a show liking ads for it because they want the show to grow in popularity.
oh yeah, I'm not getting any kind of financial gain lol
If anything, companies make money off me like they would anyone else.
Ads are never "blaring" at me. I control the volume on my tv.
Sorta. But the FCC does, too, because advertisers were being dicks about even that: https://www.verifythis.com/article/news/verify/government-verify/loud-tv-commercials-regulated-by-fcc-under-calm-act-fact-check/536-277e7a74-5e9b-427c-982b-fbf2bf49e2aa
oh yes! I remember hearing about this a few years ago from someone I use to be friends with. I always wondered why suddenly I'd be watching comedy central, and having to turn down the volume as fast as possible because some ad was just insanely loud.
I haven't experienced anything like that recently but I notice some channels are quieter than others. Like everything is more quite on FXX than it is on COZI tv. I feel like that's something else though cause the volume doesn't vary for the ads like it use to.
I don't often watch TV, but I get what you're saying. Sometimes it's fun to just watch through the ads and make fun of them with my gf until a movie comes on, it's sort of a guilty pleasure
I hear you, it is an interesting cultural and quasi historic experience. It's fun to go back and compare commercials over the decades.
Yeah, that's why I have a bunch of VHS recordings from the 90's. They're like little time capsules and the ad's of the time are telling of the events at the time.
One of my dad's friends would mute the TV when commercials came on. We'd entertain ourselves by making up new narration and dialogue.
The viagra commercials were the best.
Haha, I understand both of the points made. I can't get over the feeling I get from the obvious in your face push to tell you about a product. the obvious act of pushing a brand name and product to me is either annoying, depressing, or disgusting.
I would rather live happily with what I have. I am simply not the target audience. I can pick out that every ad and commercial I see is targeting the consumer and experts you to buy or think about it. I am neither right now, but that does not mean I am not going to get influenced to buy a product. Also, I want to prevent myself from being influenced by outside sources. I don't know how to do it for everything, and advertising is an easy target to get rid of.
On the other hand, it is interesting and almost comical how some ads are made. Unfortunately, almost every commercial or advertisement made is short form content. There is almost no depth, and each video/ image/ text is made to be self-contained. I am someone who likes to have an overarching story tied with character development and meaningful changes from events. These commercials seem to be like family guy flashback/reference jokes or acting like a poorly done transition in between scenes that was introduced to force you to stop watching for 5 to 15 minutes with the added benefit of earning the Channel money.
I guess I am a special case in this way because I grew up in a religion that basically forced me to learn how to block out something so it doesn't influence me one way or the other. I had go for 7 years blocking out religious garbage in my face so I am just use to looking at something, and not being influenced by it.
But most people don't have that so no wonder its so invasive for them.
I also don't get modern Family Guy hate but whatever. To each their own.
Less of a family guy hate and more of a comparison. Family guy is OK and not the greatest thing to watch continuously. Which is why I dislike commercials more because they are always happening. I can tune into family guy when I desire, but advertising is never a choice given to me. Why can't I just choose the adverts instead of all the personal data collection so they try to guess my desires(literally call it personalized targeted ads, like some kind of weapon name). Just like parasites, I hate invasiveness. I want to be clean and will seek refuge or remove it from my life.
Interesting. To me its a choice. I choose to skip ads or watch them.
How about choosing the ad you want to watch? instead, you have "random personalized from harvested data" ad feed to you at intervals that are becoming ever imposing in the normal content you wish to enjoy. The only option is to skip, watch, or turn off the device/service. There isn't an option to choose your ads. Like a social media feed where anyone who pays can enter your feed, and you just have to skip them or look at them. It is not good enough and purposely limits your control. Plus, blocking ads should be considered a form of skipping ads indefinitely. Also, they don't even allow skipping ads in some situations and force you to watch them. F that noise. Some will even go out of their way to force you to watch ads or mask links with tracking.
Even then, ads are terribly made content wise because of the forced randomness of placement and viewership. Moments where youtubers do sponsor driven ad breaks are a decent change, but that relies on the youtuber matching up the content with the sponsor, and the sponsor allows creative freedom. Even then, I desire to have content I search for. Instead of serving me random content in between everything as a general strange form of psychological torture.
Most ads I see are for products I don't ever want to buy. It is just noise and an eyesore.
You are wrong. There is no choice given.
No, I've seen services where they let you choose what ad to watch before the program.
Also I only see ad's on YouTube TV which was my choice to purchase. So I went into that purchase knowing that I would be getting ad's. It was my choice entirely.
I still disagree because I doubt the services I use will implement that kind of system ever. Also, I am interested in hearing more about the services that do offer that benefit. Maybe elaborate some more instead of a blanket lazy statement. Youtube TV and cable TV are all commercial driven with monthly costs. I hate that I have to pay and still get advertising stuff shoved up my face. On the other hand, congrats to you for making that "choice." 👏 As I stated, either you are allowed to skip, forced to watch/listen, or remove yourself from the "platform." In a dystopic future, you will not be able to make that last one as there will be no true alternatives, only fake another "iteration" of the same stuff. Can see it happening to some streaming platforms and especially TV broadcasts.
blanket lazy statement? Sorry, I just wanted to respond and be concise.. but here.. let me write you a fucking essay I guess.
It was awhile ago but I was at a friends place and she was watching a version of Hulu that had ad's but she was being prompted to pick an ad instead of the ad's just coming on. She got like three choices and after you picked one and watched the ad, there would even be a survey for the ad.
Now, this is something that happened probably a year ago now cause I don't hang out with her anymore. So I could be wrong in that it was Hulu, I think it could have also been an ad version of Amazon's streaming service. She was one of those people that uses a ton of other people's passwords to stream stuff. You know before a lot of them blocked that. Again, like a year or so ago.
I mentioned YouTube Tv because that's what I have. And I did choose to get it fully knowing it had ad's and that I wanted there to be ad's. Please let me know how that isn't a choice or how that isn't me choosing to see ads.
I also have a ton of VHS recordings spanning back to fucking late 70s that have ads in them! And I have those because of the fucking ads!
Like sorry but this is a choice for me. I think ads from the past are interesting and I like being able to compare them to now. Sorry I'm just that rare kind of nerd.
but I get it. You're worried the world has been taken over by ad's and that's why we're living in a dystopia. You said future but I'm in the US lmao. It's already dystopian here. Like too late.
Also I've heard a lot of people are like, falling out of favor with shitty streaming services and they're doing what I've been doing for years now. Going back to physical media. See, I'm not worried cause where I'm at, its fine to watch cable tv and collect VHS tapes and DVDs.
Nostalgia's a great feeling.
I understand, I felt insulted how you mention that there are services offering a choice in viewing selection of ads that was offhandedly thrown it out there like it is the norm. From your statements it was obviously not a different way of watching advertisement/commercial content but instead it was to gain feedback on what ads work and which do not.
you decided to join that streaming service, and while it is a choice, my issues is that is the only choice available, either join or do not. there is almost no inbetween. There is no further choices in commercial content, it is just hammered in and the only way it can have meaningful targeted ads is by harvesting a shitload of personal data all the time. I believe that having to either join or not join as a choice is Orwellian like. If there is a oligopoly or monopoly formed you are essentially trapped in or out. I see no freedom in this path.
Feeling hopeless, I do too. Hopefully there is an alternate reality or a future where the world stops being invasive and learns to prosper. at least movie theaters are better than Cable TV. those premovie ad reels are annoying but a quick bathroom break and back to my reserved paid seat is a great feeling.
I am not sure why cable tv is getting roped into vhs and dvd. Cable tv is most certainly not the same as having unedited full featured, high definition(as high as possible lol), free of external influence physical copies. you have a good heart, I hope you paid for getting those instead of burning them from online copies or recordings of cable TV. i would support those creators for their content instead of dealing with the noise of cable TV, the throwaway nature of streaming services, or support commercial ridden subscription platform models.
Sorry about that. I guess I think of it as the norm here because its a package that's offered. Anyone in the US can go get it if they have the funds for it and want to pay for it.
What other choice do you want there to be? I'm all for being middle of the road. I mean, I'm bisexual. I'm a fence sitter. I like the third option or the pick all option the most.
But when it comes to ads, how do you get a middle ground? To me, an ad is just that. You see it, or you don't see it.
From everyone in this thread, it seems like most people just choose not to see the ads. And that's a fine choice isn't it? Or do you want the ad's to not exist at all? Like is it upsetting that you have to decline because its like a yes or no question?
I'm not actually feeling too hopeless cause I'm in big favor of that writer's strike and I hope it goes on as long as possible. I don't give a fuck about new media. Halt that shit forever. We clearly needed a break.
Because that was an era. Back when we had Cable TV, we bought VHS tapes and DVDs. It's like living in 2004 in my apartment. Its like the closest I can get to a time machine.
And both VHS and DVD's had ad's on them. VHS tapes always started with trailers and ad's for either merch or production companies. DVD's would often have extras that were just ad's!
My VHS recordings are actually from a site I don't have access too anymore but I'm not the person who recorded them. They're also from like decades ago. No one at Adult Swim is hurting cause I have a tape from one of their blocks in like 2003 that has all the ads in tact and includes shows they don't even run anymore.
It IS perverse. You're having your eyes groped by strangers, all trying to get you to do what you have no desire to do. You just want to get what you came for and leave, but no, everywhere you look something is trying to block your path and distract you from your goal. And it's not even honest: you already know that none of these extraneous, unwanted come-ons you're seeing is anything close to true. In some cases, it's a full-on mental assault.
It's vile. I used to leave some on, but now there's not even such a thing as "acceptable ads" anymore just because of the sheer numbers involved. So now I don't just block: I go full extermination mode. I'm usually on desktop so if it's a one time thing, like a single ad on YouTube that managed to sneak by all of my walls and filters and I can't just pass it by because it's stuck in my field of vision, I'll actually do an "inspect element" and delete it on the spot. But otherwise, if I can't block 100% or very close to it, I find a different site or source, or shut down altogether.
I genuinely don't think our minds were made for this level of constant information onslaught and never-ending manipulation campaigns, and I don't think it's healthy or life-affirming to subject oneself to it without limit. So I don't. People get angry about it, but hey, more for them to enjoy if that's how they wanna roll.
I had a 16+ year old Reddit account, but was shocked when the whole 3rd party app situation was going down to learn that patently Reddit had ads. Between pihole and browser ad blockers even when I used the web version I never saw them. Don’t think I was missing anything.
You paint an image in my head of a guy stopping you on the street to sell you a knock off Rolex.
And to ensure I don't accidently use their site again, I grab it's most background element and block it, hence effectively blocking the site as a whole.
This is the thing that got me.
I never used to mind ads that much, yea they were there but the sites had to earn money somehow and advertising was a fair way for them to do it. I’m not going to pay a subscription for every site that I want to visit.
Then one time I was looking at jeans on GAP and was bombarded for the next 3 weeks with ads for them on basically every damn site I visited.
I don’t hate ads that don’t track me about and are obnoxious in their presence, but that just doesn’t exist anymore.
Whenever I see someone's computer who doesn't use adblocker it blows my mind. I can't imagine going back to that shit.
I just install uBO without saying anything ;)
Chaotic Good
Used to do this, however nowadays I worry it will fuck up their YouTube and they won't be able to fix it themselves lol
It's a fun game of too many ads leading to adblockers, which leads to those not using adblockers to get twice as many ads, more people use adblockers, etc. Until the only way for a company to make money on a website is either to sell your data, or charge for the service.
Yay.
I'd happily pay for a service if I could have a guarantee, with legal teeth (like a service level agreement with truly massive penalties for breach), that the service won't ever do any of the following:
I used to pay for some services to get the "ad-free" version, but almost invariably this chain got subsequently followed: ad-free → opt-in "curated" ads → opt-out "curated" ads → "curated" ads → dropping all pretense of there being any advantage to paying as the site becomes ad-o-rama.
So I won't pay for sites. I just block their ads.
The pattern is always the same. No ads - ads - no ads if you pay - no ads if you pay but we sell your data - personalised ads because you pay, and we sell your data.
I put
dns.adguard.comon their browsers and phones."Jarring" would have also been acceptable.
Most people are so desensitized to ads that they barely register. So the advertisers ramp up the attention-grabbing. Repeat. So when I actually see an advertisement it nearly knocks me out of my chair because I'm not desensitized anymore.
My sister shared me an Instagram reel for a [brand] bag review and asked me to buy it for her (there's no [brand store] in her city).
It was such an obvious advertising campaign by the brand, when I walked into the store the same reel she shared me was playing in the store screens
I'm 90% sure I understood what you are saying, but I wouldn't be angry if you ninja edited your comment to fix some of the typos. Here's a cute turtle to indicate I'm not trying to be a dick, just gently nudge you cause I want to understand. 🐢
no worries mate, idk why my comment was missing some words, spaces and letters
Ads nowadays are little more than psychological assault and it can't be healthy to be exposed to it regularly. My Home Ec teacher back in the day had a whole unit about the different manipulations present in advertisements and it was really enlightening and upsetting. Modern advertising should be banned or severely regulated.
I support significant regulation, but it won't happen. But having a course like the one you took as well as media-literacy should be required middle-school education with a more sophisticated follow-up in high school. That also won't happen because then you don't get the people who vote for GOP pieces of shit. It's in their interest to have citizens who are easily manipulated.
My father said babies were being aborted basically when ready for birth. I said there's no way that was happening, said send me a link. One glance at the page and I didn't need to read the article because of the gimmicks all over plus obviously bogus ads. He had a doctorate of mech engineering, but he couldn't handle life on the internet. Typing this, I'm horrified to realize that I'm glad he passed when he did and didn't end up with ever-increasingly wacko beliefs that could have harmed our relationship.
Every once in a while I find myself looking at the Internet without ad blockers. Like, newly-installing a browser on a newly-installed OS, or trialing a new browser on my phone or whatnot. And when it happens it's a massive shock to me just how unusable the modern Internet is without an ad blocker.
If I were forced somehow to not use an ad blocker, I would probably stop using the WWW portion of the Internet and likely grossly cut down on other facets of the Internet.
its really jarring, and to see people just accept it, kinda hurts my soul.
Do them a favor and install an adblocker.
If i had a dollar for everytime I've done this and been asked why I "downloaded a virus" because Google Chrome has a little red icon in the corner and now things don't "feel right", I'd have like 7 bucks
I mean, don't do it against their will. At least put some effort into selling the idea of an internet without ads to them first. Then explain that Google and other companies are going to try to manipulate them into thinking that not viewing ads is a bad thing with false warnings and scare tactics like those. That it's fine, and if they read carefully the warning it doesn't say anything bad is actually happening.
I had a family member visiting that left early because their “games didn’t work right”
(Network blocking)
Sounds like you blocked a different kind of annoyance.
If they left for that reason, they weren't visiting you, they were visiting your internet connection. :-(
Most people don’t appreciate it when you install software on their personal devices without their permission.
Boy would this be the quickest way to make sure I never allow you to touch my electronics again.
Nobody said that.
Fine. I don't appreciate it when assholes inflict ads on me, so we'd be even!
I will occasionally suggest it if I am doing any kind of tech support but I don't push it. Occasionally it can cause issues with webpages and if they aren't savvy enough to have an ad blocker already I don't know if they would have the knowledge of when to toggle it on and off.
I've wondered how businesses advertise anymore because I never see advertisements. I don't watch TV. I don't listen to radio. I have ad blockers on my devices. I just assumed most people used as blockers too.
there's always the boomers who can't do it/don't know it's even possible and others that know nothing about computers that they can prey on
Paid sponsorships mostly, since sponsorblock can't do anything without anyone marking a segment as an ad, you will see it in a video eventually.
I feel like this whenever I'm subjected to cable ads. Who the fuck can sit through like 4 or 5 minutes of ads every 15 minutes?
And they’re paying lots of money for it! It’s mind blowing
They even speed up old shows and movies to run more ads!
The person who was instrumental in the development of modern advertising was also involved in the notorious little Albert experiment. That really says a lot about how unethical modern advertising is on a psychological level. As a psych major myself I am constantly disgusted by how manipulative and toxic advertising is. It actually troubles me how we've essentially just accepted this as part of our society now.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Albert_experiment
There's a documentary called "Manufacturing Consent" that is an interesting look at the PR and advertising industry that goes into the psychology of it.
Though some of them have no subtlety. Even as a teenager, I remember noticing the insidiousness of minivan adverts. They weren't selling vehicles, they were selling the idea that a new vehicle will make your kids want to spend time with the family again. It was probably because I was a teenager at the time that I noticed it because I thought minivans were lame and knew I'd resent having to go for family rides just because we got a new vehicle that I thought was dumb anyways.
But these advertisements wanted to convince families to spend money they may or may not have been able to afford for an emotional result that was at best going to be short term even if your kids had undergone enough brain trauma to get excited by minivans. Eventually the novelty would wear off and they'd want to go back to eating paint chips or doing whatever kids who think minivans are cool like to do. And then the lonely parents are stuck with a vehicle that reminds them of the thing that made them sad and have a new incentive to get a new vehicle to help them forget about it.
I never got that from minivan commercials. They mostly focused on storage capacity without needing to get a full size van, not really family. Family was more incidental because someone without a bunch of kids didn't need the space.
Yeah, to be fair that might have been one specific commercial or a trend that has since passed. It's been a while since I was a teenager.
I'm used to seeing brief YouTube ads when I cast from my phone, but I was in a hotel recently where the only option was live TV (we were in the back of the hotel and the Chromecast didn't have a good enough antenna to pick up the router), so it was the first time in years I saw full-on commercials. If the movie hadn't been so good- After the Thin Man- I wouldn't have put up with it.
Look into the gl.inet travel routers. I've got one of the smaller ones and it has helped me on a few trips. It can run as a hotel wifi extender. An AP for your devices while it logs into the hotel wifi or ethernet on their behalf, etc. Can even channel all your data over a VPN over the hotel connection which is useful if you're overseas and want to use your services back home but need to un-geoblock yourself.
Worth a look for under $100.
I agree, and those routers can be extremely cheap. I recommend people plug them directly into ethernet whenever possible otherwise speeds basically get cut in half when operating as extenders (just like at home, excepting backhaul).
And in hotels without an obvious ethernet port: check behind the TV. There is usually a less metered port on the wall back there for use by the TV. Sometimes it is restricted, but I've been pleased to find that enough hotels don't have the foresight to do more than simply obscure things a bit.
How do they handle the web portal login requirement that hotels typically have?
Thanks.
Tangentially related, I recently replaced my Chromecast with a "Chromecast with Google TV". It's an Android TV box which you can install SmartTube on and cast YouTube with no ads. Yes, I am aware of the irony of paying Google for new hardware instead of paying them for their ad-free service, but the new device cost less than 2 months of YouTube Premium and I like tinkering.
Oh nice! I'll have to look into that! Thanks! It's not glacially slow, is it? That's one of the reasons I never use the apps of my so-called smart TV.
My smarttube is glacially slow, but it's the TV hardware that can't keep pace, I assure you.
I've also noticed when the stream is cut by YT, smarttube will almost always manage to get it back, very rarely do I have to actively pick up the remote to fix it.
When my TV plays nice, it's a perfect YT replacement, and I highly recommend it.
Thanks, I'll definitely look into it.
I wish you a pleasant, ad/sponsor-free viewing experience sir.
As the other commenter said it's about the hardware really. I tested it out on a really old device first to make sure it actually worked - it did but at a glacially slow pace. The new box is pretty snappy though!
I've actually come to appreciate commercials after cutting Netflix. It's a set time for me to take a little break, and it's out of my hands. (I mute it too, of course.) Otherwise I could just keep watching on and on without a break, and that's not really very good for you.
I have no will power.
To each their own, I guess. They know you're putting it on mute, by the way. That's why they try to make it as eye-catching as possible.
Appreciating commercials because you have no willpower sounds... fraught, at best.
The Thin Man series is worth commercials for.
Totally. I was loving it and watched the rest when I got back home.
My husband refuses to use ad blockers for some unknown reason (I installed them on his computer, he won't fucking use them/turns them off) and also is the person who gets the cookie settings menu and clicks "accepts all" every time. I get so stressed trying to use his computer but also like dude! Have you any idea just what you are allowing them to access??? Granted, I'm somewhat ignorant when it comes to how to be completely safe and private on the internet, but I try, and to see someone just blatantly not care makes me lose my cool a little.
My condolences on the divorce
I use a VPN which has an excellent ad & bs blocker. But occasionally some sites need me to turn it off to pay for things or whatever and I forget to turn it back on and end up browsing the internet in its normal state.
And wow... welcome to commerce central. It's not that all the ads are obnoxious though some are, but the quantity of them is out of control on some websites.
To be fair, I've found it's a good rule of thumb that the quality of a website is usually proportionate to the less amount of ads they have.
I also reviewed mobile games for a while and had to play without a VPN to get the same experience most players would get - game ads are the worst. Unrepresentative of the games they're trying to sell, but also often sexist (veering towards misogynistic), obnoxious and with false endings.
Which VPN?
I use Surfshark but I expect most of the quality ones offer something similar. Nord and Express often get mentioned as the best VPNs but Surfshark as the best cheap VPN - I'm impressed with it, would recommend. You can even use Chrome on Android and most sites seem like normal, though I've switched to Firefox anyway
(If you are thinking of using a VPN just don't use a free one because they're probably dodgy)
"inversely proportionate"
Level 99 mafia boss checking in 😎
yes, I despise ads. It's gotten to the point where if I'm forced to endure an ad before a youtube video, I'll mute it and avert my eyes. It feels like a psychological assault out of nowhere. it's worse at gas station pumps, where I can't always mute it
Oh right? I never watch or listen to them. Given no other option I'll even cover my ears and hum. Ads breAk the soul, and I literally feel healthier not being subjected to them.
Wait your gas station pumps have ads!? Where do you live?
United States. there are Ads everywhere. for the wildest shit, too. Ads for medications and prescription drugs are the worst of them, shouldn't even be allowed... but, ya know.... lobbyist money (A.K.A. bribes)
The NHL put computer graphic advertisements on the boards and it has nearly ruined the sport for me. There are some bootleg streams that have a broadcast without the advertisements but most of them I find have the ads. Flashing shit. Cars driving down the boards. Animated logos. It's insane what the NHL decided to do with their broadcast product.
CEOs, man.
To be fair to those soulless coldblooded monsters it is literally their job to maximise profits, and if they fail they will be replaced with an equivalent bastard
The worst ones I've ever seen by far are ads for mobile games. Some, if not the majority, are full of fetish content, gore and other gross and disturbing stuff just for the shock value; most of the "gameplay" that's shown has nothing to to with the actual game.
Some ads have real people in them act out what (supposedly) happens in-game, those are almost worth watching for their trash value.
Those ads bother me more than most because It's entirely false advertising. Nothing shown in those ads for the most part reflects the actual gameplay in any way shape or form.
There was somebody who actually released a mobile game that has all of like the fake game mechanics from all the advertisements that you see on those ads and it's awful but really funny lol
Pihole was the best thing I ever set up for home Internet consumption
Add on a OpenVPN instance to keep mobile devices behind that pihole when on mobile data/external wifi.
Plus a little extra encryption across public networks couldn't hurt.
I always get the same 2 responses:
Its not that bad or I dont notice.....grrrrrrr
“I’ve been beaten into accepting it.”
so you've never heard "It makes me feel nostalgic and I enjoy it"?
Honestly, nope. That would be a new one!
I guess I'm a new one lol
I have VHS recordings that have ads still in them and its like my prized possession. I love those recordings.
My latest ad-shock was over at a friend's house. I've not had cable since probably '03? They have cable because a parent lives with them and insists/pays. Just having the TV on playing random things felt weird. Weirder still is having the movie interrupted by ads every 5 seconds. And the ads are just gross. The only thing that was decent was using it as a discovery service. The movie, one of the X-Men that was not one of the good ones, was what we stumbled upon. We watched for a bit, then ended up switching to watching it elsewhere to dunk on it. In ad-free, interruption-free, 4k with surround. Paying for the cable experience (which is rapidly the streaming experience) seems entirely anachronistic.
I notice this more when I have to search for things online on the work laptop. I had no idea how bad some sites were. Things blinking on the one side, a video playing on the other. Huge banners everywhere telling me to download this or click here for this clickbait article.
I’m so accustomed to Firefox, uBlock, Facebook Container, Privacy Badger, and a VPN at home that I feel overwhelmed when I’m online without them. Even my phone has ad blockers and the VPN. It’s a nightmare when you’re running sites…raw.
Can you not install uBlock Origin on your work machine? I'd argue that it will improve your productivity and reduce the chance of losing the company's info to trackers and the like!
Nope. It took a coup for me to just get Firefox installed instead of just using Chrome and no add-one are allowed.
Mental.
I feel you, I've been using an ad blocker for so long I've lost count of the years. I'm always obliterated by how vapid and meaningless modern ads are, its all psychological hacking which is a violation of our mental sovereignty.
I also feel like the "happy young people, living their best life with our product" style ads help keep people delusional about the current state of the world and where we are heading. Like that "Everything is fine" meme, but the dog has a vr headset on and sound cancelling headphones that constantly chant "The heat you are feeling is good for the economy. Everything IS fine!".
I agree, it is 100% dystopian.
I just recently watched that movie for the first time a month or so ago, and it was so jarring how accurate it was with the subliminal messaging
Absolutely. And it's getting even worse, since some ad networks also broadcasting executable code in the form of javascript snippets intended to make interactive banners, where e.g. you move the mouse cursor over it, and an in-ad mouse button moves along. A bunch of those have been used to run malicious code on the machines and actually cause harm to the user, from crypto miners to keyloggers and trojans.
In this day and age, I consider a system without adblock to be compromised by default.
This makes me wish noscript wasn't a game every time I loaded a new site. What a pain in the ass to figure out how to make the site load properly without loading garbage scripts.
I'm using uBlock origin with the cosmetic filter activated in combination with Ghostery, that gets most of the shit sorted without a whole lot of manual interventions.
I stopped over at my parents' house a few weeks back for a get-together and the TV was on. I nearly felt physically ill at the amount of ads- at one point I saw an overlay ad on top of an actual "commercial" ad. The program that was on was definitely less run time than the adverts that ran in-between short sections of the program.
Did you know that most people won't notice a ~2% increase in the play speed of shows, and that by doing so you can squeeze in an extra 30 seconds of ad time into a 30 minute block?
Because TV companies know this. Many of them do exactly that.
Some of them push it all the way to 5-10% and it kills the pacing of the dialogue and writing. But hey more ads more money I guess
Me on my way to speedrun my telenovela
I'd heard that somewhere. shiver Normies who watch TV scare me.
I've heard that actual football action is about 11 minutes. And yet football broadcasts lasts hours.
FOOSBALL IS THE DEVIL
and really, REALLY boring
At this point I actively avoid brands that shove ads into my web browsing.
sat down to watch TV with the parents for the first time in a loooong time and when ads came on I was astounded how many there were and how long they were... insufferable TV ads >_>
"When I'm watchin' my TV
And a man comes on and tells me
How white my shirts can be
But, he can't be a man 'cause he doesn't smoke
The same cigarettes as me"
The Rolling Stones
I forget that YouTube has ads. And then I go to watch on a platform that doesn’t have blocking and it freaks me out.
yeah, i've been trying out different browsers and it's so so bad. like, they're pure garbage
don draper era ads actually had fucking thought in there. people made art and worked on the typesetting. now it's pure AI vomit garbage that means nothing to nobody, nobody along the entire chain of making this gave a single fuck about it, no one that's ever seen the image has had a genuine feeling come from it other than disgust and doom.
You're seeing the past with rose-tinted glasses. Ads fucking sucked as well back in the day, and you're only remembering the ones that are, well, memorable. And even that means that the fucking advertisers won; because you're still thinking about those ads - and remember: ads are created specifically to get to your hard-earned money.
My colleague uses chrome like Google intended and every time she shares her screen I question her sanity. Terminal instead of iTerm, ok. Not using oh my zsh, well, if you insist. But that? You can barely identify the information you're looking for between all that screaming nonsense.
Whenever I use a browser without adblock, it takes me back to the early 2000s, and not in a good way.
I gave up trying to get my wife to use anything that blocks ads, and she won't switch away chrome. When she bakes, she leaves her tablet or phone open, with multiple video ads destroying her battery. Seeing this thing just turns my brain to mush as I don't see any ads. I don't know how she puts up with having ten video ads on one page.
Time to set up a pi hole on your local network and kill it at the source!
And then hear 10,000 times how her web site is broken by the ad blocker, and show her again how to disable it for the 10,000th time. Or is that just my hell?
I can relate. I permanently removed all her devices when I still used it. Now I just use https://ovpn.se/en, it comes with ad blocker built in to the client.
That could mostly be you! 😁
That must be some janky-ass website if it gets broken by an ad-blocker.
Yep! Every damn time.
My wife is on board with pretty much all of my shit in this area. That said, do I have exceptions in my pi-hole for a shitty mahjong clone's ad service? You betcha.
Of all the games infested with ads, your wife is subjecting herself to them for a common-as-Hell type of game that you could get a non-malicious version of from F-droid?!
That's just downright stupid.
I tried that, it seemed to break some sites she used. So she made me remove it. Yet she complains about Facebook and google knowing what she’s browsing 🤦♂️
My condolences on the divorce
😂
Is she one of those people who does it to support creators? Or is it just too much effort for her?
She doesn’t like change…
When I'm not using computers behind my three layers of filters I have here at home.. I feel very sad for the internet.
so of course I have ublock origin on my computer, AdAway on my phone and pihole on my network, but the school computers actually prevent you from installing any adblocking extensions
anyway at school I see a lot of "download Wave Browser/OneLaunch/PC app store/other random crapware" ads and videos in the corner and I can barely read anything on the site
It's insidious. I worked IT at a nonprofit that cares for disabled people, and every so often I'd find that OneLaunch toolbar at the top of one of our PCs and have to go in and uninstall it. I'd look in the history and see that one of the care personnel googled something like "printable calendar" and got tricked into clicking one of those ads. I don't know how google expects you to use the Internet without blocking all that shit.
It's times like these that you remember how the Internet has become filled with advertisements to the point that it interferes with normal use. Not suprising to hear older folks still getting random crap on their devices when it's shown in their face every moment.
Wavebrowser/Onelaunch are fucking CANCER literally everywhere all the time in ads. Tired of google letting them use their ad service, but ya know, gotta get that money anyway how and in every way.
Is it wave browser or are you misspelling brave? I haven't seen an ad in a while
Wave browser is a real thing. It's a PUP adware web browser based on Chromium with Yahoo as the default search engine
I will go to many lengths to avoid ads. I never use the YT app for example unless I’m on my desktop which has multiple ad blocking extensions and containers. Been using Yattee for iOS that plays nice with nvidious or piped
Get fucked advertisers
I’ve been doing it for so many years across all devices and platforms that I actually get…confused for a second when one slips through. It is normally YouTube that slips through (they seem to be trying new things almost daily to get around any possible ad blocks), but sometimes it is from a major news web site or something. I actually have to look around for a second and then realize what has just happened.
I've been using uBlock Origin for years, and in that time I've never seen one YouTube ad. And I watch a lot of YouTube.
I got onto the YouTube vanced train back in 2018 and every now and then I hop on desktop YouTube and it's soo jaring.
Ublock origin made it so I never see an ad on YouTube
That's because it is.
I‘m that asshole, but when I‘m with my friends who don’t heavily Adblock things, whenever their YouTube music choice plays an ad, I get on my soapbox and start recommending how to avoid.
Dear god, they read themselves to you now?!? Kill it with fire!!
I want the creator drawn and quartered.
I signed up to Vessel [1] when they were giving out the 1 year free trial, and it was only 9 months or so in that I realised that it had ads. It was kinda jarring, especially for a paid (not that I did) service.
[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vessel_(website)
Only time I ever see actual ads anymore are when I'm out and about and see billboards, when my parents are watching TV, or when I go to furaffinity on TOR for some NSFW images.
I'm fine with the ads on FA since they're at the top and bottom of the pages and not intrusive at all and aren't really much more than ads for probably shitty games (minus the Brok the Investigator ads) and art commission services the vast majority of the time.
FA as in.. Fur Affinity?
Yes. As in furaffinity.
I often forget they even exist
I set up a pihole and installed revanced on my mom's phone. She was surprised when I mentioned that YouTube has ads once haha.
What? What ads?
Spent last weekend visiting family out of state, and it was the first time I've watched YouTube with ads in years. I pay to get no ads on YouTube at home, and the ads at family's home was so irritating. Made me realize that I would either pay YouTube for no ads, OR I would just stop watching YouTube. No compromise on that one.
That being said, I don't mind a few ads on webpages here and there. I run uBlock Origin and NoScript with only site-needed scripts allowed. Occasionally there's an ad that manages to not get blocked by either of those, and I don't go out of my way to also make sure those are blocked. It's because they aren't obnoxious. Usually just a box on the side of the page. Not a problem.
Does anyone have recommendations on how to block ads on Android without rooting? I've tried AdAway but it doesn't seem to be terribly effective. I'm pretty tied into Chrome and would prefer not to change browsers but I understand I might have to.
Change your dsn to dns.adguard.com
Edit: Firefox on Android has unlocked origin as well nowadays
Or if you can afford it, subscribe to a private DNS provider, they offer more control.
Not what you wish to hear, but for web browsing, use Firefox. The Android version still supports plugin like uBlock Origin and Privacy Badger. Ad blockers are effectively dead in Chrome with the advent of manifest v3.
Firefox accounts work very much like your Google account in chrome, so it was relatively straightforward to migrate. Just install firefox on your desktop, get your Mozilla account set up, and use the desktop tools to migrate from chrome to firefox. Then once it's good on your desktop, install firefox on your android devices and sign in to your Mozilla account, everything should sync.
Passwords I'd recommend not using any browser solution and instead use something like bitwarden.
Breaking the Google chains are tedious but doable!
If you really feel lazy, I'd still go with Firefox password manager over chrome.
Firefox with uBlock origin, setting your DNS to "DNS.adguard.com", and using ReVanced with MicroG for YouTube has worked best for me on a non-rooted phone.
You're pretty much gonna have to switch browsers. There are other options, but they don't work as well as uBlock Origin. The best alternative to that is a VPN that blocks ads, like Proton. But they aren't as good at blocking. They will, however, remove most ads, and from other apps as well.
Try adguard. Its a system wide blocker(blocks ads in most apps too) and needs no root. Its paid. For free you can use blockada version 5. Get it on fdroid. Or just use adguard dns.
When not rooted I have two main free solutions.
You can use nextdns on your home network. They have around 200,000k free requests. For 2 people it seems to work out to around 20 days of ad blocks. This particularly helps with the ads on the TV as well.
Otherwise you have the options to use Firefox with extensions or Brave without (I know it's not popular around here). You can also use ReVanced for youtube blocks.
For most usage that free combination suffices for me.
It is jarring. I am feeling a little bad for actual writers though when I have to turn back from a news site because it doesn't like my adblocker or pihole. I haven't relented. But given the whole writers strike thing and the fact that I don't want AI writing pretty much anything meant to be read by human eyes, I do feel bad.
I don't.
If they were worth reading, they could publish.
Idk I just pay for stuff if I like it so no ads. Like including DVDs or streaming services. Or I use FOSS and everything's good.
Streaming services are shoehorning ads in for paying customers. DVDs have unskippable ads when you put them in.
Paying for stuff does not free you from ads.
I want to be there. I browse strictly on mobile I dont have a computer and I haven't seen to be able to get anything to work properly the few times I tried. It's so much worse on mobile cuz I'm so likely to accidentally tap the ad and they usually take up the whole screen and maybe 3 or 4 lines of am article before another ad. Plus one on top and bottom of the browser that is always there, plus a pop-up video auto playing in the corner.
Set your private DNS to something like
dns.adguard.com, it's a game changer!If you're on Android, Firefox have ad block addon, and for YouTube you have revanced
for mobile if you have android try rethink dns 👀
For mobile I would say adding blocklists in the router.
What a great way to put it. Years ago my wife was annoyed when I started blocking ads because it was effecting streaming on some apps. Now if an ad gets through look out!
When we see ads, it is so annoying. Page loads are clunky and games blast you with ads.
I did my annual reimage and it's always jarring having to put everything back on lol.
I’m cool with ads as long as they aren’t filled with malware. Unfortunately they’re all filled with malware.
I remember the times I'd go from watching Tivo to trying to watch live TV.
Everyone here is so passionately hating ad's. I haven't felt that upset about ad's since I was a teenager back in like 2004.
I use adblocker for my browser cause I don't want spyware/malware. But watching TV ad's is interesting to me. I keep seeing comments about people being complete idiots who just settled and they just take it from the advertisers...
That couldn't be farther from the truth for someone like me. I enjoy nostalgia a lot. So I got a live tv package with regular cable tv channels and there are ad's. I did this on purpose though. I am not some idiot who has been brainwashed. I just find advertising interesting in general.
Seems like a lot of commenters here would think of me as some kind of monster. Why, I'm not sure. I guess cause ad's are some kind of big bad we all have to fight against?
Someone here mentioned that people work on those ad's and I think that's part of why I enjoy them. Because technically, that's often someone's artwork. I'm in favor of more animated commercials too.
But I get it. Consumerism = bad.
Just feels like more like "no fun allowed"
Sometimes, if I'm feeling especially saucy, I'll watch 80s commercial supercuts on youtube for hours.
yeah those are always fun to see!
I went to a bar recently that did a 90's trivia night and in between the rounds they showed some retro commercials.