This is my recollection of events, is it wrong?

1. Brave replaced ads on creator's websites with their own ads.

2. Brave's ads generated some sort of tokens, that the creator then could claim and cash out.

3. Brave happily collected those tokens on behalf of creators who didn't want to be a part of the scheme (e.g. Tom Scott). They stripped the creators of revenue from the original ads and just kept the tokens/revenue from their ads.

I'm not a Brave supporter and hold no BAT, but for point #3 they only took back "promotional" coins that were given away for free for trying Brave. They don't take back "donated" coins from however one buys/earns BAT in the other methods. Not sure if they still offer this promotion.

Points 1 and 2 are mostly correct, but it's not like it replaces a banner with their own banner but they still show you ads while blocking other ads. I feel the others saying it's wrong are not being honest, the result is the same: a site owners ad is not shown and a Brave ad is. It's an extortion scheme IMO.

The BAT text notification rewards are off by default.

The adblocker is on by default. How is that replacing?

If you turn the BAT rewards on, you get system text notifications at intervals, it's not anywhere on the site or triggered by browsing.

They are two completely different features. The adblocker is a basic utility for everyone.

The BAT rewards is an optional program you can enable if you want extra tokens.

Yes, as many have parroted this defense the ad system is off by default. However, when you turn it on, it's effectively replacing the ads, and extorting content creators to say "if you want a piece of the Brave ecosystem, you need to play by our rules." This is why every thread about Brave turns into this conversation, and why it's clear to many of us the system is flawed. Repeating the same points about it being "off by default" doesn't change that Brave still uses this system, and it doesn't mean it will never change to be on by default. As Brave is a for profit company, I'm sure it will be at some point.

Users have a right to block intrusive banner ads on their user agent if they so choose.

Users also have a right to enable a separate rewards text system notification ads program if they so choose.

If content providers want to paywall adblockers they can choose to do so.

You're not having an honest discussion here, trying to spin this as if Brave gives the user more choice. What we're talking about Braves built in ad blocker and ad scheme. Users like myself in this thread have a right to call out what we feel is not an honest system.

That's like your opinion man. You are totally free to feel that way, but I don't agree.

> They stripped the creators of revenue from the original ads and just kept the tokens/revenue from their ads.

It's been a long time, but what I remember was the tokens went back into a pool that were used to pay out other creators who were signed up. Not sure if I have the details right, but when I looked into it I came away feeling like it was in good faith, though misguided.

Downvoted, but am I wrong?

> is it wrong?

Yes. I've been using Brave for six years and have never been scammed.

> 1. Brave replaced ads on creator's websites with their own ads.

Nonsense.

Uh, nothing about this is about scamming the user of the browser? I'm not understanding what makes your comment a relevant response to your parent comment.

> 3. Brave happily collected those tokens on behalf of creators who didn't want to be a part of the scheme (e.g. Tom Scott). They stripped the creators of revenue from the original ads and just kept the tokens/revenue from their ads.

People can't seriously be complaining about this given that everyone here is basically upset that Chrome is making changes that impact ad blockers?

I imagine they would not suggest moving to Chrome and instead would suggest moving to Firefox.

Paid for by Google.

Brave's ad blocking and advertising are separate things - the adblocker is basically pretty much like uBO, but written in Rust and integrated as part of the browser.

Brave Rewards is a separate module that lets users watch ads that get delivered as toaster popups. Brave uses a part of the revenue to buy BAT from the open market and gives it to users who viewed the toaster popups. The company also operates a tipping service that lets users give those crypto tokens to content creators they like. (Since Brave buys the tokens, the tokens will have a buyer who pays with real money from the real, normal advertising business).

> 3. Brave happily collected those tokens on behalf of creators who didn't want to be a part of the scheme (e.g. Tom Scott). They stripped the creators of revenue from the original ads and just kept the tokens/revenue from their ads.

As far as I know, this was a Brave-held extra pool of BAT they had to kickstart the whole tipping system. If a creator wasn't onboard, they held the BAT for 90 days and if the creator hadn't signed up by then, returned it to the pool to be directed by the users again. I don't know if it happened to the users' own BAT, but in any case Brave didn't hold onto the coins.

The original UI back when the whole thing happened was pretty bad at distinguishing whether a creator was or wasn't a part of the program, if old screenshots are anything to go by. They fixed the UI to be clearer.

Here's a discussion about why lobste.rs blocks (or blocked?) the Brave user agent: https://github.com/lobsters/lobsters-ansible/issues/45

Here's a hacker news discussion about the issue: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18734999 (archive of the linked tweet: https://web.archive.org/web/20190203094117/https://twitter.c...)

EDIT: Oh, and we can't forget the time when they silently changed links to contain their own referral codes: https://www.theblock.co/linked/67594/braves-browser-has-been... (HN discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23441605)

Thanks for sharing the links