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dep @lemmy.world

1y ago

Mobile web browsing in 2023

75 comments

I had to use the mobile version of Chrome recently on a locked down work device with an MDM policy that prevented installation of other browsers. It made me realize I had no idea just how far gone the mobile web has become with ads.
As an experiment I grabbed a random article on my Google News feed for today and opened it in Chrome with no ad blocking allowed and Samsung Internet with ad blocking enabled to compare.
Chrome produces a nightmarish hell scape of ads that just gets worse the further down you scroll.

Samsung Internet isn't perfect because there is still a large banner taking up space at the top of the screen, but it blocks all of the ads in the article along with the website's own ads for other articles.

The cynic in me, however, acknowledges that the truth of the situation looks more like this, even with ad blocking enabled.
- Thanks for the this, I got a chuckle. Especially gizmodo...

aD BloCkeRs aRe RuINinG oUR wEbSitE!
- Uhm yeah? The more ad blockers are used the more ads they have to show to the rest of the users to make up the lost revenue

Weird, I don't see anything like this on firefox.

What godawful browser is injecting that ai nonsense? The ads are bad enough but the browser itself seems to be using 1/3rd of the screen
- This is on an iPhone. They're using Microsoft's Edge "browser" which is just a reskinned Safari.
  For those who don't know, Apple's developer terms explicitly state:
  2.5.6 Apps that browse the web must use the appropriate WebKit framework and WebKit JavaScript.
  https://developer.apple.com/app-store/review/guidelines/
  
  Until Apple changes the rule to comply with new EU laws. Hope those laws will affect users globally, not just in the EU.
  
  Does it support add-ons?
  
  It’s not Edge. They’re using the Google app.
- Idk why the other guys saying it’s some edge browser. This is the google app on iPhone. The bottom part pops up when you click on articles because they’re pushing their AI summaries. It’s actually a great feature but it’s annoying how much space it takes up

Honestly web browsing on mobile has been a piece of sh1t for a long time, without adblockers it's a total cancer.
And even with an adblocker it's always the god damn cookie popups...
- Firefox has a plugin called I Don't Care About Cookies, Which basically just ignores the pop-ups and auto except / rejects them, but for some strange reason that plugins you can add to the mobile version of Firefox are extremely limited.
  Essentially the plugin implements the functionality that should have been mandated under the cookie law to begin with which makes the choice browser side rather than web side
  
  I think ublock has a block list for cookie notices as well
  
  You can install any extension in the beta version. Some won’t work though.
  
  use the i still don't care... one, official one got bought out by avast and contains google analytics
  
  If you want more addons on mobile you can use Nightly and create a custom addon collection. However the nightly app gets updated daily and you have to get a firefox account so be warned
  
  If you use Firefox nightly it has this feature built-in

Firefox and uBlock Origin…. Now sadly I wish I could find something like that on iPhone.
- Change the phone dns to nextdns.io or adguards dns. Use dns over https if possible.
- I use 1blocker on the iPhone. Unfortunately (iirc) they stopped doing lifetime purchase and went the subscription route. Luckily I purchased it before they did that.
  It works great.
- iPhone has AdGuard pro.
- Setup a PiHole. Not 100% guaranteed but it stops a lot.
  
  Can’t exactly carry a pihole with you everywhere….
- Just use adguard on an iPhone. I see 0 ads across all apps I use.
- Not sure atm what the extension I use for safari on iPhone is called, but it works great for me. I‘ll look it up when I get to it
  
  Late Update: I use Hyperweb, the free version is totally enough for me and works great
- Firefox and reader mode is your best option for mobile.

I love how it just keep getting worst as I scroll.

Why do you choose to view ads? Inaction is a choice.

Yup. I work from home and have a pihole on my network at home so I've gotten used to not seeing the ads.
Was browsing on mobile data while on the road and was reminded why its necessary. It was unbearable.
- use nextdns
- I do the same with an (almost) always-on vpn to the same pi with wireguard set up. I use Tasker on Android to auto start the wireguard tunnel if I disconnect from my home Wi-Fi. I typically only disable it if I'm running into issues with an app etc, and I'm too lazy to dig into and whitelist any relevant domain.
- I'm working on setting up a VPN, so even when mobile I'll connect back through my home network to view filtered adverts. At least, I might end up using DNS from my home anyway.

Would be nice if such behaviour tanked SEO
- From what I understand, web crawlers see a totally different version of the site than users do
  
  Only due to using a different user agent, it's totally possible to build a for-the-people pagerank that would see what we see and deprioritize stuff like ads and fluff on recipe pages

What, you don't enjoy ads on your articles that are also ads?
- don't you enjoy discussing with your friends and family what interesting ads you've seen lately? - what marketers think people actually do

And yet they're baffled as to why so many people use adblockers

huh
- Just to clarify what's happening here - The top 15% of the screenshot? That's the website itself. The rest is an ad. That's actually insane.
  I've been wishing for an ability to blacklist search results somehow, because of websites like this. For tech, stuff like CNET or Zdnet. For gaming, it's gamesradar, or CBR, or especially gameranx. All just garbage information with 300 cookies to feed the ad networks
  
  Have you considered Kagi? I've not used it but it looks like it has the exact features you want.

Spot on for what browsing without adblockers looks like. What a hellscape

Calyxos+firefox+ublock for phone
Gentoo+librewolf+ublock for the home
- Or just Brave
  
  I don't use chromium based applications.

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