
Opera Browser adds integrated adblocker - vermilingua
http://techcrunch.com/2016/03/10/opera-adds-a-built-in-ad-blocker-to-its-desktop-browser/
======
sccxy
I use Opera daily. I really like its "Opera Turbo" feature. It compresses
images for lower bandwith.

Also uBlock Origin for ads and blocking images larger than 200KB.

Saves a lot of mobile data for me.

~~~
runn1ng
Some people might think that Opera Turbo reduces privacy, since everything
goes through a centralized proxy.

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yev
if ((!!window.opr && !!opr.addons) || !!window.opera ||
navigator.userAgent.indexOf(' OPR/') >= 0) { throw alert('your browser is not
supported'); }

~~~
akerro
I stopped using at least 4 websites which I followed for years just because
they tried to enforce on me turning off PrivacyBadger and uBlock. It will hurt
only you in long term. It's more important for me to use my browser then you
website that doesn't respect my choices.

~~~
Kiro
> It's more important for me to use my browser then you website that doesn't
> respect my choices.

Likewise I have the right to reject you if you can't comply with my terms.

~~~
Touche
What terms? They send you a GET and you responded with 200 OK. What they do
with the response once it reaches their property is up to them, you have no
claim to how they view it.

~~~
hsod
The terms that are presented and (quasi-)enforced by the javascript returned
with that 200 OK.

"This site is not supported on browsers that block ads. Please switch to a
different browser or disable your adblocker to proceed"

Those are terms. You can choose to ignore or circumvent them but they're still
terms.

~~~
Touche
FWIW I have no problem with sites doing this. You can participate in ad-
blocking arms race if you so desire. I have no obligation to run your
JavaScript just because you sent it to me. You can try to make it a
requirement and I'll probably just use software to circumvent it.

But underlying point is that you have no moral or ethical claim to how people
view your content, just as you have no moral or ethical claim that a person
cannot rip ads out of a magazine. If you want them to pay for your content,
the Open Internet is not the place you should be publishing.

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Moru
Opera is being bought up by a Chinese consortium. Will they be adding a new
big firewall too? :-)

~~~
aw3c2
At least they were not bought by an US consortium. A firewall beats pervasive
surveillance any time.

~~~
Moru
Well the surveillance can't be any better in China. Mabe less covert but still
there.

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yjgyhj
We are in the beginning of the end of the era of online advertising.

~~~
INTPenis
No, not a chance.

We are in an arms race between the people and the corporations.

As long as you can see content on a website, there will be corporations trying
to monetize that fact. And as long as corporations have to operate within the
borders of an open system there will be people trying to circumvent their
methods.

~~~
philipov
An arms race like that will end with the richest corporations lobbying for an
end to an open system. I'm sure we'll soon start seeing legislation attempting
to criminalize ad-blocking.

~~~
pdkl95
[http://boingboing.net/2016/03/02/uk-minister-compares-
adbloc...](http://boingboing.net/2016/03/02/uk-minister-compares-
adblockin.html)

The UK is already moving in that direction.

This is yet another battlefield in the War On General Purpose Computing; you
either have the right to run whatever software you want on your computer, or
someone else is the _de facto_ owner of your computer through their ability to
control what software is allowed to run. These battles need to be fought now,
because it's hard to fight over property rights once someone else has already
taken possession.

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jbmorgado
I understand that to some ads are an important revenue, but this idea that
interesting content will stop existing if we greatly reduce advertising seems
false.

Just think, how many time do you spend sharing content in social networks for
free? Most of the time it's uninteresting content it's true, but some people
are actually interested in sharing highly interesting content made by
themselves with the world for free, both in social networks and out of them.

May it be due to personal promotion or just out of some societal need.

True that the content provider (unlike the creator) will probably always want
to be paid to provide it, but in that case, the monetization comes from other
products and not from advertising. Think about GitHub personal pages for
instance.

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fwn
I used Opera (v5 to 7) for a long time and it always had an internal URL
filter I used to block ads. I guess they just reimplemented it with a
different focus.

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deprave
Opera has long been known for being ahead of the pack. Let's hope at least
Mozilla and Microsoft follow suit...

~~~
rockdoe
Firefox already has tracking protection, which also blocks ads (because they
almost universally track you). It's Opera that is following suit, probably as
a reaction to the publicity Brave is getting.

~~~
cataflam
Opera actually had an integrated blocker years ago in their previous engine.
However, they scrapped most of the functionalities when they switched to Blink
in 2013.

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tempodox
Logically, the new owners of Opera want to infect you with their own spyware.
And then blame it on the ad blocker.

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herbst
As publisher, fuck you. As consumer, that was the original reason i used Opera
years ago, the natively implemented blocklist was just amazingly fast,
especially compared to the extension on the other platforms.

Its a little sad that they changed so much that they have to reinvent the
wheel now.

~~~
marklgr
As a publisher, you should say fuck you to the ads networks that pay you to
track your readers, not to the readers trying to protect themselves.

~~~
herbst
I dont. Its the decision of my readers if they want that. I dont care about
adsense tracking at all, its not harming me, i am more afraid of other
companies tracking which are not as secure and somehow privacy respecting as
google.

~~~
pdkl95
> its not harming me

You're selling out your readers, who _are_ harmed by that. The cross-site
aggregation that Google does is _far_ more harmful (see: "pattern of life"
analysis) than a smaller tracker with bad security. This makes you just as
responsible.

~~~
herbst
Its how the internet works, i am not happy with it ether and tell anyone to
use a AdBlocker plus something like PrivacyBatcher. Hence i am in the progress
to block all this directly on my Firewall.

My point is its the users responsibility to protect himself, if he goes on the
Internet without any idea whats going on its just naive and my ads are the
smallest of his problems.

~~~
herbst
I dont think Google is particularly bad and that its a bad thing they are
analyzing their traffic to deliver custom tailored ads. Yeah i actually prefer
them by far over the classic ad approach, i rather see things i am probably
interested in.

I dont want to be tracked personally. That does not mean that other people who
also use Windows, iPhones, Dropbox and whatever even care. Why would i tell
them obivous things they dont even care about?

Not sure what gives you the idea that i would depend parts of my site to
external services, i dont even use S3/AWS even thought thats industry
standard. My sites work perfectly without ads, i even include ads in a way
that they get invisible when blocked, so there are no UI (or any other) issues
for people who prefer to block them.

I am not going to play the internet hero and miss out on my awesome extra
income just because some people have radical thoughts about Google. It may
makes you happy that i only have ads on sites which are worth it, but all the
others have Adsense, so i assume you dont care.

Edit:// I also use Cloudflare if that helps ;)

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hoodoof
Why would I want to deprive sites of their ad revenue?

If you use ad blocking, just be sure that you and no-one you are close to
depends on advertising - directly or indirectly - to get their bills paid.

So damn childish to have such a sense of self righteous indignation that
people turn off ads but expect the Internet to be free.

~~~
aw3c2
To protect yourself from tracking and malware. Being able to inform and
educate yourself without several third-parties profiling you should be a
cornerstone of our society.

