So, in short:
- Google is not killing ad blockers, but merely chopping off both legs and arms in the name of security.
- ublock Origin is implementing a lite version for chromium browsers, supposedly being pretty decent given the circumstances.
- Old Manifest V2 extensions will be disabled in June 2024 and Manifest V2 will be removed in June 2025.
- Firefox is Firefox.
- Privacy and security focused chromium based browsers will have to implement proper native ad blocking.
I am now using Firefox…
I mean I was using Firefox before this, but I also am now as well you know.
I used to use Firefox.
I still do, but I used to too.
I use Firefox btw
On Arch?
Here? Almost. Arch-based at least. Do I btw use arch?
RIP Mitch
Cool story bro. Completely irrelevant comment for this post but cool story anyway.
People are fighting ads and switching browsers.
The question is: switching to what? Firefox is the only browser that is not Chromium based, ie not 95% written and maintained by Google themselves. Every other Google Chromium fork will need to maintain an increasingly complex set of changes to the Google repository, and I imagine Google will start removing non-compliant extensions from their extension store.
So not only will the battle have to be fought by the browsers, it will also have to be fought by maintainers of add-ons like uBlock Origin.
Very messy.
Switching to what? Firefox. I don’t see the problem here. Install Firefox and forget those monopolistic enshitifying fucks.
The problem is that Google directly controls not only two out of every three browsers that connects to the internet, but also many web standards, a couple web frameworks, and a whole lot of funding that goes to Mozilla.
By all means, vote with your feet, but Google can basically do to the internet what Walmart did to retail.
I use Gnome BTW
I went from Netscape to Mozzila and from Mozilla to Firefox and, guess what… my browser never fucked me up in the name of maximizing corporate profits.
Google was already a wholly untrustworth Ad Company With A Tech Arm back when they invented Chrome, and shit like this was already back then a question of WHEN, not IF.
My recommendation is librefox and if you really want a chrome based alternative I’d suggest Thorium (although I don’t know what thorium will do when this is implemented I’m hoping they don’t follow it.)
For anyone interested, as of November 2023:
Web browsers using Gecko (Firefox’s engine): GNU IceCat, Waterfox, K-Meleon, Lunascape, Portable Firefox, Conkeror, Classilla, TenFourFox. Edit: and Fennec
Web browsers using the Goanna engine (which is a fork of Gecko): Pale Moon, Basilisk.
Flow is a web browser with its own proprietary browser engine.
The other active engines listed are: WebKit (Apple’s engine), and Blink (Google’s engine, which they forked off of WebKit, and which is used for Chrome, Chromium, and countless other browsers).
I’d no idea there’s a browser called Conkeror. That’s prertty funny since WebKit was based off of KHTML used in KDE’s Konqueror browser.
Fennec is also using Gecko.
And Mull
I use firefox, but Id never head of these alternatives.
Anyone who does have reviews? Pros, cons, reasons to use them beside variety?
Pale Moon still supports the even older extension model. I used it briefly until my extensions got updated to the newer format. I still kinda miss the old theme engine.
I thought it was pronounced Kay Melly-on, so I never tried it because of the silly name.
Pihole will be unaffected.
Every other Google Chromium fork will need to maintain an increasingly complex set of changes to the Google repository
Yet infinitely easier than building a new browser from the bottom up
It’s easy, but it’s not good for the web as a whole. The field is so complex that only a company as big as Google or Apple, or a company funded in large by Google, can even have a single seat at the table, let alone most of the seats.
I hear people say Chromium is bad for the web all the time but they all seem to think that Chromium = Chrome.
Chromium is bad for the web.
Okay, would you like to elaborate beyond what I just said?
Because using Chromium and Chromium-based browsers reinforces Chrome’s market share dominance which will harm comparability as more and more sites will only be tested against Chrome and in many cases refuse to serve pages to other browsers without user agent string fuckery.
It also cultivates dependence on Google for the extension ecosystem, etc
I don’t get your point, so I’m not sure what to elaborate on. Chromium source code is still controlled and gatekeept by Google, and it’s full of proprietary Google garbage ranging from the obvious to the hazardously subtle.
Here’s what happening to me: I went to Firefox.
Well, you say that, but this is what happened to me: I went to Firefox.
I, too, happened to me: Firefox.
I was using Firefox back when it was cool. And now it’ll be cool again.
I used Firefox before chrome even was a thing and never moved away. Fuck chrome.
I briefly lived in the dark side of IE6 because AOL fucked over the Netscape browser so badly. But then I came back like the prodigal son when Firefox (then Firebird) came along.
Yeah I remember IE5 and NS4, as well as the Firebird/Phoenix/Firefox naming joys back in the day.
If you want to blow your brains out, try getting XHTML 1.1 working in IE6. It is indeed possible if you modify the XHTML DTD. Interestingly it’d render shit so much better since it’d use MSXML instead of Trident as the rendering engine. Sadly it would add about 400k to the page since it needed to load a custom DTD…
You’re an even older user than me then lol. I think it was '08 or '09 when I started using the internet.
We’re all in this together, brother.
I went to Firefox when Chrome had that huge memory leak issue.
Thanks to Lemmy, I’m browsing on Firefox on Linux Arch…
I’m glad to know I’m not the only one who went on a bit of an open-source mania because of all the Linux and FOSS nerds on here.
It’s a great lifestyle, been a Linux main for about 15+ years, or around half my life so far. Highly recommend it to anyone who thinks it’s fun to use good software.
And before you did what?
Chrome on Mac
Did you install Arch on your mac?
Hm, should I try switching my old Surface Pro 3 from PopOS to Arch?
Try Hanna Montana first.
Google’s ads can lick my nads.
Interesting that article comes to the conclusion that uBlockOrigin Lite is basically as effective as the original and works on the new Manifest v3.
I’m glad you read the article, since it seems like nobody else in the comment section has!
When I went to read the comments of this post, and for some reason it took 10 sec for them to show up in my client, I thought of Google…
I am forever grateful for my father having Firefox installed on the xp hand-me-down that became my first computer
