My work does not filter anything ( it won't let me use some websites, but will happily let me see ads for new yard gizmos ) so the few times I actually am forced to look for something on work PC, it is a quick reminder why I bother doing all the things I do.

Yeah, I've said before that whenever my wife wants to show me something from the web on her laptop, I blown away by how bad it is. The experience in her browser (Chrome with all defaults, usually on ad-supported social media or puzzle or pop culture news sites, or shopping sites) is like being assaulted to me.

Of course the other thing that's been happening is that most of it isn't "reading the internet" anymore; it's all watching short-form videos (also laced with ads).

Not installing ublock on your wife's laptop? Why are you so cruel?

The real difficulty hurdle isn't installing it (or having someone install it), the real hurdle is when it breaks something important and you have to realize that Ad Block belongs on the suspect list and you have to know how to disable it, reset cookies, and try again.

This basically never happens if you're using default config uBlock origin

Happens occasionally. It is uncommon but happens enough to ruin the day of unsuspecting users.

For example, go to https://community.ee.co.uk/t5/My-EE-app-and-website/EE-Site-... and search for "Adblocker" in this page. You will find a story where their mobile service provider blacklisted their IP because they clicked on a button on the website while their adblocker was enabled.

Exactly the same thing happened to me with the same mobile service provider except that I was using uBlock origin when my mobile service provider blacklisted my IP.

Bank websites sometimes breaking in the presence of an adblocker is a common occurrence in many parts of the world.

You live in one geography and you visit websites that you need in your life. Do not assume everyone else is having the same experience as you. Websites breaking in the presence of adblockers is a real thing that sometimes makes us hesitate to install it on the browsers of our friends and family who may not be as tech savvy as we are.

My no contract phone provider is broken by adblock, and will shadow ban my IP temporarily if I forget to entirely disable it and then grant all permissions the site requests.

I still install uBlock Origin on most of my friends computers, but make sure they know to open any sites that break in a private tab.

Yeah, except that has never happened to me in 20+ years of using ad blockers.

Never? So many news websites detect adblocker use and stop you from reading the article till you disable it

I feel like it's not that it never happens to me but that I quickly leave and forget the site that blocks me. Non-survivorship bias.

It depends on how strongly you filter.

The default rules probably won't cause issues, but you'll still see a lot of ads. As you optimize these away, things start breaking

I just use Firefox with unblock for general browsing. Chrome if I'm trying to buy something and I need the page not to break.

i think that is grounds for divorce

I've offered, but she declined. She really likes sales and coupon offers, extensions for cash-back that are based on tracking, etc. Someone else said it best about their spouse on another thread:

"...whenever a website doesn't work for any reason I get an earfull about my 'damn adblocker'..."

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30150762

x3

"I like the ads." - Wife

And this is exactly why I don't feel bad about blocking ads and not purchasing YouTube Premium and the like. There are zillions of people out there who actually like looking at all these annoying ads, so the advertisers don't need to bother me when I'm not going to buy their crap anyway, and these other ad-lovers will happily do so.

I hooked up my pihole’s on/off switch to HomeKit. Whenever a website doesn’t work, my wife knows she can open the home app and turn off the Pi-hole and try again.

Do you have any more details on this? Sounds like a great idea for the rest of my household.

Yea, it’s a homebridge plugin: https://github.com/arendruni/homebridge-pihole

Really easy to setup once you have homebridge itself running. Just enter in your Pi-hole api key and add it to HomeKit.

Thank you!

I would highly recommend installing pihole at home.

I've been using uBo since the start. Went to use the web without it and it was like using the web naked. It didn't feel right.

Pro Tip: That's why you need to pay for what you read.

I bit the bullet and subscribe to Bloomberg, WSJ and NY Times which is a good mix of center, moderate-right and left

and this is far improved my experience. it makes me sad that people arent/cant get these articles and have this other rage-bait experience, but I’m glad I opted out of that crap

anyone visiting HN should be able to install Bypass paywalls chrome clean and uBlock origin

none of which work for the default mobile browser, or those service's associated mobile apps

and there's an experience beyond archive.is

moving on

HN crowd is unable to install non-default browser? Firefox and Kiwi browser both sorry extensions including these two

not sure what has archive.is to do with extensions I mentioned

I'm not going to subscribe to some random regional newspaper to read one article. And some of the most egregious advertising implementations don't come with a way to pay to make it go away, like Fandom.

Every time I setup a new OS and forget to install uBO, I'm instantly reminded when I go anywhere but HN. Then I feel like I have to wipe the harddrive again just to be sure I'm not infected with something after the exposure.

HOLY CRAP! this is a good statement.

As someone who has sat in front of a computer daily for nearly 30 years, this really hit me.

I am REALLY good at maintaining a no-ad/no-spam experience for my self with high-density-information content, that I almost never see ads.

My viewing is clean, I have never been accidentally rick-rolled, I have never seen TG1C, TubGirl, etc... no Ogrish or other crap...

I am my own 'curator'

-

But yeah - if you dont take time to set mental-health-boundaries against the internet - then the internet is the same as the experiments when they just plugged in a machine (win98? xp? cant reacall) - pwnd in matter of minutes.

Thats the same as your mind.

put mental firewalls up.

Be open to positive content, but destroy negative impacts on your mental health with impunity.

ad agencies: caring about you since -oo