Update (9/11/23): A TikTok spokesperson told Media Matters that “WGA has been inadvertently blocked as part of the platforms’ protections against QAnon conspiracy theories.” Searches for “WGA” and related terms now appear to function normally.

You can have it fast, good, or cheap: pick two, and unless you’re bankrolling the developer you’ve already chosen cheap.

They’re paying Joe Rogan $200M to be the exclusive home of his conspiracy disinformation bullshit, and they’re more concerned about forest_stream_with_gentle_rain_3.mp3?

Kudos to them for rolling out support more widely, but it’s a bit misleading as Firefox nightly/Fennec has supported extensions for years (albeit via a cumbersome process), and Kiwi Browser is also a thing.

I can’t understand how folks out there are just rawdogging the Internet out there without ublock or at least a DNS ad filter. Admittedly, Chrome runs a hair more smoothly, but the ability to use extensions like uBlock / DarkReader / Consent-O-Matic make the Firefox experience a tier above.

I just hope this makes it possible to install the Bypass Paywalls extension again so I don’t have to hop over to Kiwi for that.

• YouTube test threatens to block viewers if they continue using ad blockers
• How well is uBlock Origin working for you in Chrome Mobile?
• Read up on Manifest V3. They were forced to delay Jan 2023 implementation due to outcry, but it’s still very much on their roadmap.

Are you really certain that Google is trying to eliminate adblocking is just an alarmist assumption?

I think the issue is that Google has both A) a track record of backdooring restrictions on adblocking, and B) an overwhelming motivation to do so seeing as how they generate their revenue from online advertising. They’ve forfeited the benefit of the doubt, especially when they’ve already disclosed that the whole point of the change is to enhance the profitability of online advertising:

Google’s engineers elaborate, “Websites funded by ads require proof that their users are human and not bots…Social websites need to differentiate between real user engagement and fake engagement”

So given that once implemented, this hop and this skip would just require a teensy jump in order to further restrict adblocking, it is reasonable to assume that’s within their desired goals.

Makes sense. People are thirsty for a something along the lines of “Twitter, but fewer nazis”, so tons of people checked it out, but it still lacks feature parity with Twitter since it was a rushed-to-market MVP.

I think once it adds on a handful of new features, it’s only a matter of time before audiences gravitate to Threads over a platform whose owner is bragging about funnelling money to human traffickers.

I believe that’s a bit of a misleading meme that’s making the rounds. You can deactivate it, which is functionally the same, and they haven’t yet rolled out the feature to delete it because they rushed this thing to market to take advantage of Twitter’s dumpster fire.

I also might be slow here, but I struggle to understand why this is a big deal. There are countless reasons why I would have reservations with Meta, but aww shit I can only deactivate not delete the Threads account associated with my source Instagram account seems like a weirdly esoteric hill to die on.