Hot Take uBlock Origin MV2 no longer Featured extension in Chrome Web Store

[nicolaasjan]

Thanks to Chrome Web Store removing the Featured badge from Manifest v2 extensions, people are now being sent to the scammy "uBlock" extension.

 

[Bot]

That's unfortunate. It's always important to double-check the authenticity of an extension before downloading. Hopefully, Google will address this issue soon.

 

[SpiderWeb]

I wonder if this will be enough to make people switch browsers. People need to understand that sticking with Chrome is sending a message that this path is what they want. It has become the new Internet Explorer, just stuck doing things its way.

 

[nickstar1]

Do you think the v3 versions will end up adapting better to environments over the next few years and become the same as what version 2 was?

 

[Morro]

Do you think the v3 versions will end up adapting better to environments over the next few years and become the same as what version 2 was?

I doubt there will be a v3 version from Chrome browsers. But I seem to remember some people mentioning that it would come for Firefox?

 

[Marko :)]

Do you think the v3 versions will end up adapting better to environments over the next few years and become the same as what version 2 was?

The reason why ad blockers worked wonders with MV2 was because there was no limitation what they could do. MV3 severly limits the permissions and those limitations can't be avoided or bypassed in any way. The only thing that is certain is that ad blockers will become worse and worse on Chromium now.

I wonder if this will be enough to make people switch browsers. People need to understand that sticking with Chrome is sending a message that this path is what they want. It has become the new Internet Explorer, just stuck doing things its way.

Honestly, it's possible, but we need to make some kind of campagin and spread Firefox that way. There should be a reason for people to switch to Firefox because they won't do it just for sake. I switched to Firefox few days ago and I really couldn't be happier and it's now my primary web browser. Brave remains on second place and I use it only for PWAs and Shazam as Firefox doesn't have those two.

 

[oldschool]

MV3 severly limits the permissions and those limitations can't be avoided or bypassed in any way.

Not true. Look at µBOL or Adguard for starters. The former has a permission-less option or 2 others where users may grant more permissions. Adguard, for example, can do more than µBOL. But it is true MV3 does severely limit the things adblockers can do.

 

[Marko :)]

Not true. Look at µBOL or Adguard for starters. The former has a permission-less option or 2 others where users may grant more permissions. Adguard, for example, can do more than µBOL. But it is true MV3 does severely limit the things adblockers can do.

Look, I'm not saying there aren't any ad blockers now with MV3 or that they don't work. Ad blockers still exist and they work, but not as efficient as their MV2 counterpart. Since they are now severly limited, they can't use modern ways for blocking ads. Instead they have to rely on old generic rules which are being used less and less in advertising industry; which constantly tries to find new ways to avoid ad blockers.

And while they currently work in limited functionality, be sure that Google is already making plans to limit them even more. They are ad company afterall and I'm surprised they didn't do that earlier. They claim the reason is security which might be a valid claim. But then, they could easily make exceptions for safe and trustworthy extensions while forcing MV3 for new ones, and unpopular.

The funniest thing is–Microsoft tried so hard to make Edge popular by forcing it everywhere. Now it's on its way to lose that tiny amount of users it has because MV3. Firefox remains the only obvious choice.

 

[kailyn]

I wonder if this will be enough to make people switch browsers. People need to understand that sticking with Chrome is sending a message that this path is what they want. It has become the new Internet Explorer, just stuck doing things its way.

People are like sheep. They need the farmer to come open the gate for them to let them out (even though all of them can easily jump the fence). The farmer runs their entire lives because the sheep have no inclination to change.

There will be no user uprising to affect change. Users always want the softer, easier way. They do not want the mental discomfort of having to think - of having to make decisions - of having to figure things out and to identify the best decisions. They just want the convenience of being fed.

Anybody that says users are not the problem is just dead wrong. Users are the problem. They always have been and they always will be. People and their proclivities, their behaviors, no matter how those come about - shape the entire world.

 

[Gangelo]

The funniest thing is–Microsoft tried so hard to make Edge popular by forcing it everywhere. Now it's on its way to lose that tiny amount of users it has because MV3. Firefox remains the only obvious choice.

If MS Edge starts losing users it will not be because of MV3, it will be from the constant and shitty nagging to become the default browser on any system and pushing MS services like a bully.

I would argue that MV3 blockers are working just fine for the average Joe and if you want something more 'advanced' you can always pay for Adguard Premium which is browser agnostic.
Even if you are a Linux user and cannot use Adguard, an MV3 extension with a small ruleset can work wonders if done properly (like Ghostery for example), especially if it is combined with a DNS filtering method like NextDNS, all possible under Linux.

As for Firefox, it will never be the obvious choice other than the cult following of greybeard users it has. It will fade into oblivion unless they change their browser engine to chromium. Also, I highly doubt that they will keep supporting MV2 forever as all major extension developers will keep only MV3 versions active in development.

 

[kailyn]

Thanks to Chrome Web Store removing the Featured badge from Manifest v2 extensions, people are now being sent to the scammy "uBlock" extension.

View attachment 284040

How being sent to "scammy" uBlock extension?

ublock.org is a fork of the original uBlock Origin that did not agree with Gorhill and his decisions. He was right and they were wrong, but that extension is not "scammy." It just is not nearly as good as the original uBlock Origin.

I see uBlock Origin Lite in the list. People have to figure it out for themselves - which I know users are not good at this. Just look at these comments about the original uBlock Origin extension from the Microsoft Edge Store - you can tell the users making the comments are completely oblivious to Manifest v2 and v3 issues. Typical users... LOL. If users are "scammed," then it is their own fault whether it is their ignorance or lack of effort to figure things out.

 

[BSONE]

uBlock Origin Lite is working well for me. I like the little slider where you can change the level of filtering: Optimal works well for most sites, but some will require setting the toggle to Complete for proper cosmetic filtering.

 

[SpiderWeb]

Do you think the v3 versions will end up adapting better to environments over the next few years and become the same as what version 2 was?

No. Personally I think the Internet is just going to get progressively worse. I have already left almost all social media platforms, I cancelled my streaming services, and I am pulling all of my data from cloud services to my private Synology cloud. These companies are determined to milk every piece of information out of us and I won't stand for it.

 

[SeriousHoax]

Do you think the v3 versions will end up adapting better to environments over the next few years and become the same as what version 2 was?

I tested uBO Lite and AdGuard MV3 again and I have to say that they work really well, and most users will not notice any difference at all. They also in my brief test worked faster than MV2 extensions on most sites. I don't know why but it could be down to lack of rules, or it could be due to the fact that for MV2 adblockers, the blocking/modifying requests, etc was done the extension itself. The more optimized it is, the better and faster it was going to be. It seems with the declarative MV3 API for adblockers, the extension tells the browser what to do with network requests and blocking is done by the browser itself which is probably faster.
With MV2 + DNS based blocking, anything not blocked by the extension would have been blocked by the DNS, with MV3 adblockers, DNS will block/redirect queries to 0.0.0.0 first before they are handled by the extension. So, DNS based blocking IMO is probably more important now.

 

[oldschool]

The more optimized it is, the better and faster it was going to be. It seems with the declarative MV3 API for adblockers, the extension tells the browser what to do with network requests and blocking is done by the browser itself which is probably faster.

Indeed, and gorhill says as much GitHub - uBlockOrigin/uBOL-home: uBO Lite home (MV3)

uBOL is entirely declarative, meaning there is no need for a permanent uBOL process for the filtering to occur, and CSS/JS injection-based content filtering is performed reliably by the browser itself rather than by the extension. This means that uBOL itself does not consume CPU/memory resources while content blocking is ongoing -- uBOL's service worker process is required only when you interact with the popup panel or the option pages.

In fact, the very term declarative net request says it all. The extension "declares" the request and the browser carries out the request. Pretty self-explanatory.

 

[SeriousHoax]

Indeed, and gorhill says as much GitHub - uBlockOrigin/uBOL-home: uBO Lite home (MV3)

In fact, the very term declarative net request says it all. The extension "declares" the request and the browser carries out the request. Pretty self-explanatory.

I see, yeah it makes more sense now. But it's unfortunate that gorhill is being stubborn regarding adding the ability to add custom rules or even third-party filters of user's choice. With ADG MV3, I can add Bypass Paywall Clean filter and read nytimes articles, but I can't do that with uBO Lite. He's pretty determined to not add this function.

 

[kailyn]

Do you think the v3 versions will end up adapting better to environments over the next few years and become the same as what version 2 was?

Google knew what it was doing when it specified a limit of 30,000 rules. It will take advantage of that limit such that 30,000 rules will not be enough to block ads.

 

[oldschool]

But it's unfortunate that gorhill is being stubborn regarding adding the ability to add custom rules or even third-party filters of user's choice. With ADG MV3, I can add Bypass Paywall Clean filter and read nytimes articles, but I can't do that with uBO Lite. He's pretty determined to not add this function.

He's indeed idiosyncratic.

 

[kailyn]

I see, yeah it makes more sense now. But it's unfortunate that gorhill is being stubborn regarding adding the ability to add custom rules or even third-party filters of user's choice. With ADG MV3, I can add Bypass Paywall Clean filter and read nytimes articles, but I can't do that with uBO Lite. He's pretty determined to not add this function.

Gorhill does not want to add functionality that assists its users to violate copyright protections and theft of product. Bypassing the pay wall and then reading the content is a criminal act. So cannot blame Gorhill in being steadfast against incorporating anything that enables users to steal. Theft is theft. Somehow people think in the digital space it is not or that it is not that big of a deal. It is and people go to jail for it. Any software publisher that creates software that can be used to steal content can be charged as an accessory or for aiding & abetting in certain legal jurisdictions.

 

[lokamoka820]

uBlock Origin Lite is working well for me. I like the little slider where you can change the level of filtering: Optimal works well for most sites, but some will require setting the toggle to Complete for proper cosmetic filtering.

The problem with most people that they use the default settings or filters, and then blame the developers that the extensions didn't work well.