- cross-posted to:
- technology@beehaw.org
- technology@lemmy.world
- cross-posted to:
- technology@beehaw.org
- technology@lemmy.world
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Summary:
- Brendan Eich’s donation to Proposition 8, opposing same-sex marriage.
- Backlash and resignation from Mozilla CEO position due to controversy.
- Creation of Brave Software and fundraising despite backlash.
- Plan to replace ads with Brave’s own ad network faced legal challenges.
- Introduction of Basic Attention Tokens (BAT) cryptocurrency for ad incentives.
- Privacy scandal involving affiliate codes added to URLs for revenue collection.
Please at least copypaste the content when you post…
I don’t usually judge by looks, but you can just tell that Brendan Eich is an insecure fragile person with many mental problems.
I don’t know what’s worse: The whole anti same-sex marriage deal or inventing Javascript.
Probably Javascript…
Oh he’s THAT guy?!
Fuck that guy. He basically is the reason popups was so damn widespread.
JavaScript?
Like, we use JavaScript everywhere.
I’m viewing this comment without JavaScript.
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Oh my bad, clearly no relation to JS or Brendan Eich there.
Lol nice
I’m literally replying to this because of JavaScript
JavaScript is also the whole reason that the web is interactive. Without JavaScript the web would be mostly just static pages without any client side dynamic behavior.
Brendan Eich is a tool, but JavaScript is a useful tool, at least.
Forms are interactive and dont require me to run your shitty code and execute it on my computer.
Keep that shit running on your server. I dont need another vector for malicious code to run on my machine
If there’s no JavaScript, there will be another language developed to fill that void. We don’t know whether it’ll be better or not. But with TypeScript, working with JavaScript has been quite painless for me.
I don’t know what’s worse: The whole anti same-sex marriage deal or inventing Javascript.
Probably Javascript…
Heh. Made me smile.
Here, have an upvote! ;)
oh sorry! forgot about it adding a description. will do next time.
Brave Software, the company behind the browser of the same name, was founded by Brendan Eich. He’s best known as the creator of JavaScript from his days at Netscape Communications
Say no more fam.
Truly no atonement can be sufficient for a sin that grave
TL;DR: The article claims that the Brave web browser is bad and should not be used.
The author points out that Brendan Eich, the creator of JavaScript, co-founder (and ex-CEO) of Mozilla, and founder of Brave, donated 1,000 USD in support of a proposition to ban same-sex marriage. Along with making the claim that Brave’s goal is not to act as an ad-blocker, but instead to build and grow their own advertisement network, and he also believes that the network has several flaws:
- Brave Ads paysout in a form of cryptocurrency, called BAT (🦇).
- As BAT is a cryptocurrency there is high volatility.
- BAT can not be redeemed for fiat (“actual”) money directly from within the Brave Wallet.
- The author also believes that “it [the network] has largely failed” but that it “has generated a lot of revenue for Brave,” via the ICO (Initial Coin Offering; IPO for crypto).
In addition to these key points the author also:
- Claims that Brave prompted FTX, before the scandal.
- Cites the The Brave Marketer Podcast where ex-CMO of Crypto.com Steven Kalifowitz shares an ambitious goal of being a “‘brand like Coke and Netflix.’” The author then mentions that:
- In 2023 there was a report from The Financial Times that Crypto.com traded against their customers.
- In 2022 the company try to hide the severity of its layoffs.
- Mentions Brave’s integration with Gemini, and how the crypto exchange is under investigation for lying about FDIC insurance.
- Mentions a partnership with the the 3XP Web3 Gaming Expo where they sponsored the Esports Arena and rewarded contestants with the BAT token.
- Claims that Brave added affiliate/referral codes to URLs, such as “binance.us.”
Finally, the author lists Firefox and Vivaldi as alternatives to Brave, and ends the article with “Brave Browser is irredeemable, and you should not use it under any circumstances.”
I am human, please let me know if I’ve made a mistake.
Edit: Fixed bat emoji and typo.
As BAT is a cryptocurrency there is high volatilability (I don’t know if I spelled that right :/ ).
Volatility :-)
But Volatilability sounds cool
Very volatibable word
Agree :-D
Thank you, I fixed it!
These guys tried to get a previous employer of mine to advertise with them. It works great if your entire audience is tech bros. Ours was not.
If he’s bad, shouldn’t everything he touches be bad? Why web site that uses JavaScript should be just as bad. Any browser based on Mozilla should be bad. Why is it just Brave that’s bad for what he did in 2008?
It’s really hard for the creator of Javascript to make money off of javascript, and it’s unlikely he has any financial interest in the Mozilla corporation anymore since they’re a nonprofit and thus don’t have share holders. However, he directly profits off of Brave.
Because it is cool thing to cancel everything in 2023.
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Brave is still bad. With their “incidents” they had. Brave is chromium = Google controlled in a way. Brave is a coorperation, yes a PROFIT seeking company. Mozilla does nit promote google, it uses duckduckgo as its default search engine. There are forks from Firefox too that hardens the browser and the develop/ceo is not a complete *ss. The referal link “scam” was real, they injected it in Amazon links…
Screw Brave go search for a real alternative to google.
These people are basically a cult. Do not bother trying to enlighten the Brave browser
communitycult. If you use brave, you are a certifiable idiot.I’m open to suggestions for a workable alternative on iOS that blocks ads.
-An idiot, apparently
Doesn’t iOS only use webkit based browsers? I would imagine the reason you can get ad blocking through brave is some kind of deal they have with google. Which probably means they’re just giving them all the data google would collect normally.
Firefox on iOS doesn’t have ad blocking because apple took support away in webkit. The only way brave could be doing it is by being white listed by the company serving the ad to you somehow.
Both Mac and iOS have issues with VPN usage too but that’s unrelated to webkit.
Yes Apple forces everyone through webkit and won’t allow third-party blockers. Brave on iOS was forked from Firefox anyway, and iirc uses the same API to block ads as Firefox Focus. Google is most definitely not involved, particularly because both block YouTube ads (and is my primary reason for using Brave anyway).
I’m not sure what you’re referencing in regard to VPN usage; I have had zero problems with mine.
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Brave is way worse using Chromium. That is the point. Its dependent on google 100%. I dont know Fitefox? What is it? Is it a rare fox? Brave injects ads (targeted ads) into your websites. Injects referal urls into their results. The CEO is a corrupt bad person. They implemented in their earlier stages a hidden crypto miner. Recommending Extensions? Are you sure that chrome doesnt do it too?
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Bro spitting facts.
Mozilla Fandogs are attacking
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well thats a bunch of lies
Mozilla deals with Google
With how much revenue comes from those deals, we might say it’s practically financed by Google. FF is more Google than Chromium-based Brave if you follow the money.
No. Couldn’t care less what the founder did or didn’t do. We need as many non-Google browsers as possible. The problem with Brave is that it is a chromium browser.
I’d say being chromium makes it a Google browser…
I mean, does that mean Edge is a Google browser, too?
Chromium is open-source. Even if Google adds something malicious to the source code (such as that Web Environment Integrity stuff), it can be removed by someone else creating their own browser based on Chromium. That’s the very definition of open-source.
Related side-note: Lemmy itself is open-source, too. If the creator of Lemmy added something to the software that someone running an instance didn’t agree with, they could simply fork the original software and remove the unwanted addition. Some people do disagree with that person’s views, and yet they’re still here. Many of them joined .world and other instances instead of .ml because they disagreed with the creator’s views.
While Google, the creator of Chromium, isn’t a good company for the consumer, I personally think Chromium itself isn’t a bad idea. It’s just that Google and some other companies modify it for their own means, and those means aren’t always consumer-friendly.
All that to say: while the company that originally created Chromium is bad, the software isn’t. And while some of the companies and people using that software are bad (including Brave, IMO), some of them are looking out for their users’ interests, and those forks of Chromium are generally ok. (You should still actually do research and not pick a fork because the company developing it said it’s okay, though. Take a look at what others are saying and verify it.)
I mean, does that mean Edge is a Google browser, too?
Yes.
All that to say: while the company that originally created Chromium is bad, the software isn’t.
Only to the extent that websites are built for chromium compatibility, due to its monopoly on the internet. It’s great software because it’s the most popular software so all other smaller providers that serve that software have to focus their resources into ensuring compatibility. Chromium(Blink) itself is pretty mid, and definitely equal to WebKit or Gecko, not better or significantly worse.
In fact. Mozilla rely more in Google. If i wasn’t mistaken 90% of their money came from Google and they rely Google safebrowsing wherein it exposes your IP to Google
Brave works for what I need it to do. I don’t like lending credence to bigots(secret or otherwise) but if someone is gonna say “don’t use this browser” they need to list a replacement that has the same functionality. And it can’t be “just use duckduckgo” because we all fucking have that on our phones and none of us can use it as our primary browser and we all know exactly why. 😒
What’s wrong with Firefox?
Nothing. I use it all the time.
A little slower, but nothing. Mullvad is pretty good. A mix of Firefox and Tor.
For me personally, the one and only reason I don’t main Firefox is because it doesn’t work with Chromecast and I use that a LOT. I would switch to FF tomorrow if I could easily and reliably cast with it.
getting addicted to proprietary software is a terrible idea. this is just the first of many losses you will have if you stick to that tech
On Android, Firefox is still less secure than Chromium-based alternatives: Mozilla’s engine, GeckoView, has yet to support site isolation or enable isolatedProcess.
It works almost exactly the same as Chrome.
It has a monopoly on being non-Chromium based
Chromium is the browser monopoly.
Woosh
Why?
As far as I’m aware, the ddg browser collects data and they sell it to Microsoft. The search by itself is fine though.
Really? I thought that used Bing search as backend but not that they sell your data
No, you have it right. That person is just conflating the controversy over their agreement with Microsoft as “ThEY’re sELLiNg yOuR DaTa”. 🙄
no one wants to secure their web render so they’ll always use whatever is native to the platform.
on windows that’s chromium. on macos that’s webkit.
What does this even mean. Chromium or Webkit are not “native” to an OS. OSs don’t magically include browser engines, its not a critical component of an OS either.
Most OSs do come with browsers preinstalled, but they are programs just like any other. You can remove Safari from macOS (albeit its pretty hard because root is read only and signed), you can remove Edge from Windows. In my desktop with Windows 10 the only browser I have is Firefox (not even Edge), does that make Gecko the “native” browser engine?
If anything, the native browser engine for Windows would be MSHTML from Internet Explorer.
you’re overthinking the word native.
You’re still not clarifying what you mean.
So what is “native to the platform” according to your definition?
By your definition. If I bought a phone and Facebook came pre-installed it means that Facebook is native to my phone?
Yes. That’s exactly what his definition means.
I can kinda appreciate what he’s trying to say, but I think “default” might be a better word than “native”, but I’m not an expert.
What?
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what’s your confusion
Chromium isn’t native to Windows. iOS is the only OS (I’m aware of) where browsers are forced to use a specific engine, but even that will be changing
you’re overthinking the word native.
No, I’m not. Chromium doesn’t exist in Windows unless you install a program that includes it. Chromium web engine is “native” to the chromium web browser, not to any OS (except maybe ChromeOS). As espi mentioned, Internet explorer’s mshtml is the only engine “native” to Windows. Just look at the Opera browser, they changed web engines from Presto to chromium; that’s not using “what’s native to the platform” (Opera works across all OS’s with chromium, except for iOS for the restriction I mentioned before), it’s using what the developers/company want to use to render their pages. Nothing in Windows itself provides any of the chromium engine “pieces”
This was true until Edge transitioned to Chromium. Now the natively installed browser in Windows is Chromium based.
Edge is using EMET for memory protections.
Chrome has EMET disabled because it’s own memory protections conflict and it just won’t execute.
When you’re make a web view for Windows you’re either bringing a long your own rendering or using Edge because it’s included.
No one wants to secure their own rendering which is why they all use whatever is already there which is EMET which is a pita to test so they just go with Edge.
native is just jargon for “what is already there.”
[Eich] donated $1,000 in support of California’s Proposition 8 in 2008, which was a proposed amendment to California’s state constitution to ban same-sex marriage.
Even though I do not agree at all with the donation and support - out of the things that influence me into choosing a browser, 15 year-old private donations of appointed CEOs is pretty low on that list.
And the whole BAT thing is opt-in and they’re very transparent about it. I don’t get why people get so triggered when the C word - crypto - is involved.
I think the only relevant criticism I see is adding affiliate codes to urls (until they were caught).
The author also forgot the polemic of adding twitter and facebook trackers to the whitelist, and impersonating people in their ads. There are some interesting criticisms against brave, I don’t understand why their detractors are obsessed with the CEO and crypto.
Exactly. They do a lot of things I don’t like, which is why I don’t use them. However, I do recommend them over Chrome if someone isn’t willing to use Firefox (or Safari on iOS with an ad blocking extension).
That said, the ad replacement thing was an interesting idea, and if it got better click-through rate while preventing sites from stealing PII, they probably could’ve cut a profit sharing deal and users would’ve been better off vs the status quo. They could also have a “premium” option where they pay a certain amount for no ads, and that amount gets split with websites who would normally serve ads.
There are some good ideas there, but unfortunately the good ideas don’t seem to have really worked out as intended. I still think they’re better than Chrome, but things can change.
BAT can be distributed to publishers of content you go to based on percentage of visiting those sites. You can purchase BAT or subscribe to the ad program. Nobody in this thread knows even the basics of BAT, smh.
Yes, it’s possible, but that’s not how it works in reality.
I think it’s a good idea, but with some missteps by Brave. They need to get sites on board before I can truly recommend them.
Well nobody is perfect, this thread is making that abundantly clear. If they were still doing all that shit years later everyone might have a point. Make mistakes and learn from it and move on is the only thing I can really ask of anyone. Brave is doing the right thing IMO. As to your comment about BAT, it’s the classic problem of what came first, the chicken or the egg? Not recommending it because it’s not being used so nobody’s recommending it lol.
I don’t recommend it because there are better options. Firefox is privacy respecting, and since it still has an independent rendering and JavaScript engine, it’s better for open web standards. On iOS, all browsers have the same rendering engine as per Apple’s rules, so I recommend Safari with an ad blocker.
If Brave actually offered something tangibly better for the open web, I would recommend it. But it doesn’t, so I recommend something that does.
However, if you need a chromium-based browser, I think Brave and Chromium are about on par, so I recommend both.
Searches: Firefox sends Mozilla what you type into the search bar and Mozilla may share that data with its partners.
By default, pocket makes suggestions to you based on your browsing history and then the aggregate of that is sent to Mozilla. How is that privacy respecting again?
Of appointed CEOs who quit after 11 days to boot. But he was CTO prior.
But looks like he was largely ousted very fast with all the negative PR Mozilla was getting.
But the data collection sounds like it’s counter to its supposed goals. Multiple campaigns have been discussed that just make it believe they don’t actually care about privacy considering all the ways they keep trying to do stuff is counter to that. Why stay? Tor Browser is available. Hell, Firefox itself is already able to take you pretty far and extensions can do the rest.
Why make the sacrifice of your personal data? Like, how many attempts at collecting personal data do you need to have occur before you realize it’s always been their goal?
I would also imagine there are a lot of people that did not support same sex marriage back in 2008 that do now. I do not know the Eich personally, but it doesn’t make sense to hold this stuff against people until we find out if they have or haven’t changed their views.
15 years ago isn’t that long ago - and there is a huge difference between “not supporting same sex marriage” and “donating against same sex marriage”.
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15 years is a long time. I know someone who did a complete 180 on their beliefs within a few years: from a conservative, homophobic, and religious pov to the exact opposite. I myself changed some political views I had 5 years ago.
I have no idea about Eich, but if I let this affect my choices of anything, frankly I won’t do anything else in my life facing the millions of variables before me.
Sure, he donated $1000.
California voters approved prop 8 by a sizable majority. It was thrown out by the courts. That kind of dilutes my “oh no” over one persons donation. We’d need to boycott a good portion of Californians.
Today I think it’s relevant to point out he was an outspoken against masks, shutdowns, and was calling Fauci a liar. Basically everyone’s conservative family member in 2020.
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It’s not like he’s backed down from his position against gay people over the years.
The fact is i don’t care about these things. All it matters is that Brave uses Chromium, therefore I’ll never touch it.
plus they have Google Advert ID Permission in Android. Tell me who is more creep. Crypto-things can be disabled within a few clicks, While mozilla’s trash can be disabled using a bunch of configuration in about:config
Yeah. But if I ever want or need a Chromium browser, it may be the one.
I would go for Vivaldi or ungoogled chromium
Please stop reposting this crap every fucking day. What’s up with you and this exact article in particular anyway? Are you getting paid or something?
well, I just came across the article on Mastodon and wanted to share it. I mean jeez, imagine sharing and wanting to discuss interesting topics just for fun?
and I posted the article on !technology@beehaw.org and then cross-posted it here, because I thought it was also an interesting community to discuss it. I saw a bunch of people cross-posting it elsewhere, so if you’re seeing it a bunch of times then it’s probably because those communities probably also have something in common with the article. I personally think every community have different people and different discussions to have, so I don’t see it as particularly bad.
I don’t get it either. It’s in the front in 5 different subs
I mean… I’ve been using Firefox since Google silo’d all log-ins together.
On the other hand, search.brave.com is freaking incredible. It’s so much better than Google, Bing or DDG at this point, it’s shocking. I switched a couple weeks ago and it’s surreal to see so many usable, useful results on the first page again.
I use Mojeek and Brave.
You shouldn’t use Brave simply because it’s heavily infected with crypto shit and tries to monitorize your web browsing time by default. Not everything you do has to be a side hustle.
Sure you can “switch it off” but then why not use something else in the first place that’s focus isn’t trying to make money out of you. If Brave ever gained any decent market share the web would be an even shitter place than what Google is suggesting at the moment.
and tries to monitorize your web browsing time by default.
As does Firefox
Brave is used for anonymity that nothing else offers, so what other option is there? I like and use firefox but it’s no Brave.
you seek the crypto miner in the brackground running and want ads injected even you have adblocker on? Use librewolf its a more privacy focused firefox
Does librewolf have tor built in?
Have librewolf screwed users over? with replace ads, claiming referal links, ceo = sshle, secret cryptominer. And why would you NOT use the tor browser as it would reduce the possibility of that *ss ceo spying on u to 0.
Just use TorBrowser, then.
ah nice! I’ve never heard of that one before.
Fuck chromium and fuck Google
What a shitty fucking article.
Why is it shitty? TBH my biggest problem with Brave is their push for the crypto ad tokens. Any company pushing crypto shit instantly gets put on my shit list.
There’s no push. You can completely ignore that part of Brave, which I do.
Ignore but it’s still there? Can you turn it off?
You can turn it off. I never see any crypto BS
Yes, you can.
It’s reposted every few days this community just loves it
Did you mean “blog post”?
Never used it to begin with.
I made the switch last month from Brave for years, back to firefox. Brave is easy more effective at blocking tablets and ads, even with ublock/adblock. You can install it and just start using a cleaner web, and it’s really easy to customize gow much of an effect the sanitization is. I defended a lot of what Brave did in the early days, because what I was hearing from developers is that they were trying to monetize it in anyway possible that maintained the privacy of the user, and I understand that ethos.
It’s the years and years of missteps that finally got to me. I started to feel like I had to keep up on what they were doing to make sure nothing slipped through, and that’s not trust.
I still think they have the best ad blocking tech, it beats my pihole, it beats Firefox with extensions. It’s fast, and it displays websites reliably.
But, we do need to consider the roads we pave and the tools we use. Brenden Eich has not apologized for his donation, but at the time he did write a blog post about supporting LGBT initiatives at Mozilla and he had support from people that he worked with. He resigned because at the time there was nothing you could do to assuage an internet hate mob but resign. There is information around stating that three board members left because of his appointment, but only one actually said that,
But, we do need to consider the roads we pave and the tools we use
This is the part that every “lol just turn off the crypto crap, no problem!” responses don’t understand. There are short-term issues, and there are long-term issues. Disabling undesired stuff fixes the short-term issue. Letting Brave build up their market share, at the expense of user-first options, creates long-term problems.
fwiw, Brave ad blocking for me has been far less effective than using Ublock Origin on literally any other browser
As if people really using a browser with a built-in advertising network.
No, this article is pretty much idealistic rant aimed at hating the ceo. The product is fine.
Edit: the ads and crypto are opt in. I’d like to see if anyone ranting here about them has actually used Brave and went so far as to opt in to things they don’t want
The affiliate link hijacking was not opt-in. How could anything remotely like this be accepted in a privacy focused browser?
When Firefox had the mr robot extension incident everybody was (righfuly so) mad, but that was way less damaging than altering users’ intent.
Can someone explain how Brave siphoning some money from Amazon specifically impacts privacy? Does the affiliate get a list of accounts that bought something? Names? Addresses? Or does some money just show up in their account?
What information does Amazon get? That the person clicking is using Brave? They already know that from the user agent.
I, as the user, decide what affiliate link I want to use, not my browser!
Sure but that sounds like liberty and autonomy, not privacy.
I asked specifically how it infringes on privacy. Seems like the wrong word to use.
I asked specifically how it infringes on privacy.
You really think they don’t track you?
Who?
Some OSS developers, independent review/news sites get affiliate money to stay afloat. Amazon requires them to state this clearly. Brave didn’t declare it and probably stole (replace) innocent referrals. This is level 100 spyware/malware tactic.
I’m not saying it was ethical or good.
I’m asking how it specifically impacts privacy.
Every response I’ve gotten is a non privacy response, which leads me to suspect it’s a stealing from others issue not a privacy issue.
Like Firefox?
Stop using it with honey mustard sauce! Stop using it with tangy sweet and sour sauce! Stop eating the new fiesta Brave salad! Stop enjoying Brave on the patio, in the car, or on the boat… wherever good times are had!
🎵 Pop a poppler in your mouth
When you come to Fishy Joe’s
What they’re made of is a mystery
Where they come from no one knows 🎵
