this post was submitted on 29 Jan 2025
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Firefox

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Almost all the links in my front homepage are sponsored now. What's next, a few ads in the bookmark bar? How about when I enter a URL, I then have to type "McDonald's" before I can actually navigate there?

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[–] subtext@lemmy.world 281 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

These can be turned off. Not great that they’re on by default, but you gotta pay the bills somehow right?

[–] BombOmOm@lemmy.world 177 points 3 weeks ago (5 children)

Yeah, this is basically the least offensive thing possible that ensures the lights stay on.

[–] tigeruppercut@lemmy.zip 85 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

Remember when most sites had simple banner ads, and there was no widespread outcry about how much they sucked and we needed ad blocking software? Then they started flashing, then the popups and pop-unders came, then vids started autoplaying, and now here we are.

If advertisers hadn't gotten greedier than banners on the sides of sites, maybe no one would've gotten around to blocking all their shit.

[–] Gork@lemm.ee 30 points 3 weeks ago

Pop-under ads were obnoxious. As were the popups that were like 1 pixel large but it still had the windows bordering around it.

[–] lemmeBe@sh.itjust.works 10 points 3 weeks ago

Nicely said.

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[–] Kushan@lemmy.world 12 points 3 weeks ago

People keep giving Mozilla shit for taking money from Google, yet they see an ad for a different company and lose their shit.

[–] davel@lemmy.ml 136 points 3 weeks ago (4 children)

I think the downvoters can’t hold these two thoughts in their mind at the same time:

  1. Firefox is the best browser.
  2. Firefox has serious problems because Mozilla is a terrible steward of it.
[–] comfy@lemmy.ml 51 points 3 weeks ago

Firefox is the best browser

It's only real competitors, in my eyes, are Firefox forks.

Agreed. I love Firefox and don't really like Mozilla.

[–] Scipitie@lemmy.dbzer0.com 32 points 3 weeks ago

No it's the complaint about one of the few transparent revenue flows Mozilla managed to pull off.

It's disabled one step deep on the settings

There is a shitload of stuff going wrong with the Mozilla foundation and this doesn't even make the top 10.

That's the reason for my down vote: it's nothing I want this community to focus on. It's basically engagement bait with the topic "ads bad".

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[–] TrickDacy@lemmy.world 113 points 3 weeks ago (10 children)

This has been the case for several years. Super easy to turn them off

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[–] lemmylurkaround@lemmy.world 80 points 3 weeks ago (16 children)

See ads, "how dare they" Sees paid version, "how dare they" Development costs time and money, pick your poison.

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[–] Kbobabob@lemmy.world 78 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)
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[–] stevedice@sh.itjust.works 57 points 3 weeks ago

Skill issue 1000017516

[–] ColdWater@lemmy.ca 55 points 3 weeks ago (9 children)

The browser itself is free, and they have to make money somehow to keep the company running (if the CEO didn't keep most of it for themself). If you don't like it, you can turn it off or download an ad-free fork.

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[–] mvirts@lemmy.world 50 points 3 weeks ago

Better than the unlabeled sponsorship behind the default search engine.

[–] Reddfugee42@lemmy.world 44 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

If they make some money from harmless icons, I mean, I can live with it

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[–] Aeri@lemmy.world 34 points 3 weeks ago

Yeah but you can literally just turn this off with no fuss.

1.Firefox for Android.

2.Tap the menu button.

3.Tap. Settings.

4.Tap Homepage.

5.Deselect Sponsored shortcuts under Shortcuts.

[–] Vincent@feddit.nl 32 points 3 weeks ago

This was a bug

And looks like it's been fixed :)

[–] callyral@pawb.social 30 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)
[–] skizzles@lemmy.world 39 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Yup, you can turn it off.

It's not overly difficult to get to the setting either.

[–] ghen@sh.itjust.works 11 points 3 weeks ago

There's literally a settings button on that new tab page to take you right to the correct setting.

[–] Gingerlegs@lemmy.world 28 points 3 weeks ago (3 children)
[–] Artyom@lemm.ee 21 points 3 weeks ago

Or, ya know, literally any other browser that's not a fork of Firefox.

[–] Ephera@lemmy.ml 9 points 3 weeks ago

And Brave has significantly lower costs, given they don't develop an own engine, but rather just put lipstick onto Chromium.

[–] UltraGiGaGigantic@lemmy.ml 8 points 3 weeks ago

I bailed on brave when I learned more about the shenanigans that one dude pulled.

[–] superglue@lemmy.dbzer0.com 25 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

If we want software to be FOSS we have to stop bitching so much about developers trying to make the math work.

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[–] a9cx34udP4ZZ0@lemmy.world 20 points 3 weeks ago (3 children)

So how exactly were you planning on them making money if they don’t take money from Google to be the default search engine and they don’t take money to place advertisements on the default home page?

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[–] Evil_Shrubbery@lemm.ee 20 points 3 weeks ago (3 children)

I say let them cook a little, they arent drowning in donations and still do a tone of things for foss communities.

Let's remember that the de fuckto market (ie pleb) alternative is overwhelmingly Chrome.

We dont need such projects just so we as individuals can have privacy focused experiences but also for how that influences markets and society. And to have any influence you need certain power of masses.

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[–] Jimmycakes@lemmy.world 13 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (4 children)

Either that or they go bankrupt. Design your own browser and give it out for free if you don't like it

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[–] Redex68@lemmy.world 13 points 3 weeks ago

Personaly those shortcuts are a feature I literally never use so much so I don't even register their existence anymore.

[–] Vincent@feddit.nl 12 points 3 weeks ago

Ads are one thing, but this seems excessive and probably unintentional. Looks like someone just filed this bug, which is another sign that it might be an unintentional problem: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1944704

[–] lowleveldata@lemmy.world 11 points 3 weeks ago (5 children)

How do you get this? My home page just has some recent links

[–] superkret@feddit.org 20 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Depending on where you got Firefox from, default settings are different. Maybe your distro ships with these deactivated.

[–] lemmeBe@sh.itjust.works 8 points 3 weeks ago

Yep. I get it from Librewolf. 😁

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[–] LWD@lemm.ee 11 points 3 weeks ago (3 children)

I thought you said "What's next, a few ads in the URL bar?" ...because Mozilla has put a few ads in the URL bar.

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[–] possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip 9 points 3 weeks ago
[–] greedytacothief@lemmy.world 8 points 3 weeks ago

Honestly, I don't care. I don't even look at that stuff, I just type in the bar thing what I want. Mozilla has to fund the project somehow.

[–] krolden@lemmy.ml 8 points 3 weeks ago

The best thing about this is that you can turn it off

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