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Firefox begins its mass rollout of ads on new tab tiles
TaoPhoenix:
Okay, Firefox just stabbed themselves in the foot with a fork again. (Less dangerous than shooting it! And if you keep stabbing it enough, it raises the bottom line! ... Uh... by treating the (slightly smarter than IE) userbase as ... idiots?!)
Now they have decided, after testing in the test channels, to roll out ad tiles in Firefox.
Fine, there's plenty of ads everywhere else, and we go through the big discussion of adblock vs whitelisting a very few sites.
But ads in the browser proper?! That just feels wrong on so many levels! That's just smelling like giving the FF mod editions a lead in the race. The first few Slashdot comments are up, and so far they're "restrained". (I used the new Firefox Forget button, and I now forget ... didn't Firefox lose their big Google revenue stream contract? So, did they hit a cash crunch that the CFO decided to fix with ads in the browser?) But more importantly, I'd half expect the other Big Companies to do this, but Mozilla?! They were (once?) "the cool kids". So how can they not know that some corners of their base won't be so ... restrained?!
So for y'all on Palemoon, I so hope they use this to further promote themselves.
Iceweasel came up, which is also a good option at least for Linux. Is there a Windows version of Iceweasel? I ignored long running performance problems because the rule is "assume incompetence before malice" ... but now they just added malice! That's enough to make me boycot them, and just use the derivative mod editions out there. So, besides a guess at iceweasel for Win, P-M I have, is there a third such mod edition out there so I can go back to my 3-copy set usage style I just started working on today?
bit:
I haven't noticed anything on my Firefox like this yet.
But I've got some old VCR tapes of movies, complete with tv used car commercials and other sales pitches, and you know what?
I used to hate those old tv ads, or not care for them so much, and now, the nostalgic value is incredible.
I mean, when I see the old movie, and then those old commercials pop up, it's like being in the past, before all the modern things that went bad and made the world go crazy (crazier than it already was) happened, and I wouldn't trade those old shows for nothing because of those commercials.
But as for your Firefox, nope, haven't noticed anything like you pointed out yet.
PS - I use AdBlock Plus and Ad Muncher.
app103:
Once upon a time, there were browsers with ads in them, in which you could pay to have them removed.
* Opera
* CrystalPort (very innovative tabbed IE based browser from the late 90's)
* Plenty of others
But they all either disappeared or got away from that business model. I believe Opera was the only survivor from that era. (A shame, because I really liked CrystalPort and still miss some of its features)
And now here we have Mozilla that hasn't learned from the past and the mistakes of others, creating an even worse set of options with Firefox: ads or screw you, use something else...not even a paid option, without ads.
I haven't noticed anything on my Firefox like this yet.
But I've got some old VCR tapes of movies, complete with tv used car commercials and other sales pitches, and you know what?
I used to hate those old tv ads, or not care for them so much, and now, the nostalgic value is incredible.
I mean, when I see the old movie, and then those old commercials pop up, it's like being in the past, before all the modern things that went bad and made the world go crazy (crazier than it already was) happened, and I wouldn't trade those old shows for nothing because of those commercials.
-bit (November 11, 2014, 12:51 AM)
--- End quote ---
This is different, very different. There will be no nostalgic ads involved.
TaoPhoenix:
I haven't noticed anything on my Firefox like this yet.
...
But as for your Firefox, nope, haven't noticed anything like you pointed out yet.
PS - I use AdBlock Plus and Ad Muncher.
-bit (November 11, 2014, 12:51 AM)
--- End quote ---
Well, let's get into what variant of definition of "notice" you meant, and that's one reason I made the thread - because I didn't "notice" it either, for *both* variants of "notice".
1. Cruising along, (I'll get into Adblock soon), and happen to have tiles turned on, and then you make a new tab, and then suddenly one or more of those tiles makes you exclaim "Hey! I never visited any pages like that!?"
2. See this official announcement:
Slashdot's copy where I learned about it: http://news.slashdot.org/story/14/11/11/0412210/mozilla-updates-firefox-with-forget-button-duckduckgo-search-and-ads
Venturebeat article: http://venturebeat.com/2014/11/10/mozilla-updates-firefox-with-forget-button-and-duckduckgo-search-rolls-out-sponsored-tiles-to-new-tab-page/
Key phrase that Slashdotters began discussing: (( Double Parens are mine))
In addition to ((the debut of the Firefox Developer Edition, Mozilla today announced new features for its main Firefox browser. The company is launching a new Forget button in Firefox to help keep your browsing history private, adding DuckDuckGo as a search option, )) and rolling out its directory tiles advertising experiment.
...
After experimenting with adding ads to Firefox Nightly in late August, Mozilla is now ready to start pushing its sponsored directory tiles to all Firefox users. Previously, Firefox’s new tab page would remain empty until you established a browsing history.
When you first launch Firefox now, a message on the new tab page will inform you what tiles are (with a link to a support page about how sponsored tiles work), promise that the feature abides by the Mozilla Privacy Policy, and remind you that you can simply turn tiles off. If you do turn them off, you’ll get a blank new tab page and will avoid Firefox’s ads completely.
Firefox users should “expect a lot more experimentation in advertising,” Mozilla Senior Engineering Manager Gavin Sharp told VentureBeat. That may not be what most want to hear, but Mozilla is eager to find new revenue streams, as long as it manages to keep the privacy of its users intact."
TaoPhoenix:
Now for the second half of "notice", I will pick either FF regular (and / or FF Developer!) and begin seeing what triggers an ad and how long it takes. (How bad are they blanketing the ads?) To do this I am turning Adblock off, "to give them their fastest shot at me", and then we can see what effect Adblock does with tiles if my turned off copy starts getting something and then other people don't. A bit loose for methodology, but the best I can do ad-hoc. What I most wanted to do was raise the topic. Normally I just turn tiles off altogether and someone on Slashdot says that also removes (most?) possibilities of tile-ads off.
Yeah, PS App I agree with you, but fortunately, by starting with open codebases, we aren't quite as trapped as back then, so those other FF-mod projects out there will be an alternative with (almost?) the same features as "brand FF". (And think, full circle, Mozilla was so feisty about their brand vs the Debian crew not budging, that's how IceWeasel showed up to begin with ... though I don't know what they'll do about this, if all they did was a logo change. Palemoon seems more active with direct code optimizations they feel are right.)
Edit: To best simulate a "normal user", I am also re-toggling "remember browser, search, and form history" back on, and not using any private browse pages. There's a small chance their ad-base is small and the ads may not show up for a while. But that's why the topic is here - DC is really good at having us "put stuff in the back of our minds", then waiting for updates in news.
Better yet, if anyone can stand it, let's do a mini faux award for "FF Ad Bingo"! The first one to get an ad tile wins! (Screen shot highly suggested so we can study it.)
Heh - it will be a little unnerving surfing the web "without a winter jacket" and the regular user tools!
Edit2: My tiles started off blank. I'm getting my first few "normal" ones in. PS I never realized how painful Youtube ads are without Adblock! 45 second ads for like 3 min of content! Start your percentage skeet shooter guns!
:o
Edit: I just got a sponsored tile! (Oh dear, I'm excited to get an ad. But just the first one. It's hell from here on out!)
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