Slashdot Mirror
Google Now Automatically Converts Flash Ads To HTML5
An anonymous reader writes "Google today began automatically converting Adobe Flash ads to HTML5. As a result, it's now even easier for advertisers to target users on the Google Display Network without a device or browser that supports Flash. Back in September, Google began offering interactive HTML5 backups when Flash wasn't supported. The Flash-to-HTML5 conversion tools for the Google Display Network and DoubleClick Campaign Manager created an HTML5 version of Flash ads, showing an actual ad rather than a static image backup. Now, Google will automatically convert eligible Flash campaigns, both existing and new, to HTML5."
I have flash turned off (who doesn't?) but lately I've noticed that ads have begun to autoplay again.
So, how do you make html5 "always ask first"?
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
Great Scott! It appears I've been leading a sheltered life thanks to AdBlock, Ghostery and the like. I did not expect that level of douchebaggery from them, though. Well, hope AdBlock is ready for this.
Thanks, assholes, now we're going to have to figure out how to block this crap in HTML 5.
Will someone please kick the Google CEO in the crotch?
I'm tired of the internet being shat upon by asshole marketers.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Just use Lynx
While everyone else is bitching about ads being displayed (hey, adblock targets the CONTAINER, not the AD itself, so it is still blocked, just like static images were before!)...
I'm extremely THANKFUL for this! Seriously, can we not count the number of end-user exploits that have been transmitted through Flash advertising on some of the worlds largest and most visited web sites!? Adobe and the Flash platform have a horrendously bad reputation in the security market. As someone who has to constantly fix other people's computers, this is a much MUCH welcomed change!!
oh wait, shit, what am I saying... less broken computers = less paychecks for me... FUCK. NNNOOOO, BRING THE FLASH BACK!!! :-O
The FlashBlock extension for Firefox has an option for "Block HTML5 video as well." Silverlight, too.
Thanks to the War on Drugs, it's easier to buy meth than it is to buy cold medicine!
I cannot even begin to count the number of commenters here who pushed HTML5 as the best way to end, once and for all, those incredibly invasive and annoying Flash ads.
You got exactly what you were asking for.
So long as business is on the web, there will never, ever, ever be a technological "solution" to online advertising. There's simply too much money at stake for that to happen.
Obliteracy: Words with explosions
The way to block ads, is to black list certain third party sources for web pages. That way regardless of the technology used behind the ads, it's never requested for.
Complain to the sites that you like that only have an ad-supported model. THEY choose to fund their sites through ads.
On the one hand, I know flash is bad and HTML5 is good. And even though advertising is bad it follows that advertising in HTML5 must be less bad than advertising in flash.
So, um... yay?
Chelloveck
I give up on debugging. From now on, SIGSEGV is a feature.
Single thread CPU performance stopped improving a good while ago - or more strictly speaking it goes up very slowly. Please.. these ads will only make everyone's life worse.
End result, everyone will have to block ads. I'm not buying a new motherboard, CPU and RAM to have the PC not struggle under the load of ads.
The FlashBlock extension for Firefox has an option for "Block HTML5 video as well." Silverlight, too.
I actually didn't know that.
Thanks for the info!
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
I love this rant, because it's so true, but it immediately struck me: Why is it that the same company that makes the darlings-of-the-industry Photoshop and Illustrator also makes the pariah-of-the-industry Flash? I vaguely remember that Adobe bought flash from Macromedia, but still, they reached a point where they said "Push forward on the stick and let's auger this baby in..."
I love a good train wreck.
Which has more power: the hammer, or the anvil?
Bitching about Adobe only accounts for the last 10 years of Flash vulnerabilities. But, don't forget Flash was created by Macromedia, which was far more evil than Adobe. Macromedia used to not have an uninstaller for Flash, because they didn't want you to be able to uninstall it!
Unfortunately it doesn't seem to work for me, not on Slashdot at least. I went to this link the other day and I got a black box with the usual flashblock symbol but the video still autoplays in a layer behind the black box. I double checked and I do have "Block HTML 5 video as well" checked. Maybe it literally only works for video, not audio?
Bitching about Adobe only accounts for the last 10 years of Flash vulnerabilities. But, don't forget Flash was created by Macromedia, which was far more evil than Adobe. Macromedia used to not have an uninstaller for Flash, because they didn't want you to be able to uninstall it!
(this is where my reply meant to go, but I screwed it up and added it as a separate comment below)
Unfortunately hosts file can't prevent me seeing your posts.
Scalar vector graphics and sound are cool, but Flash was not wonderful technology. Adobe was not to blame; they just bought the existing monster.
Flash was foremost a huge CPU waster. And an easy to use vector for all sorts of security exploits (because the original code from Macromedia was an abomination).
And don't forget, Flash was so important you shouldn't even be able to uninstall it.
So what does this mean for me?
Ads and privacy concerns aside, does this mean that if I unblock ads for a site to help their revenue, will these HTML5 adds be less CPU-intensive than the Flash ads? Will they decrease in size (bandwidth concerns on smartphone)?
Try out Flash Control, which does block both Flash and HTML5 videos, and not just on YouTube.
What I want to know is, how all these technological innovators managed to make PDFs, Flash and JAVA allow security exploits on our 'computers'. I thought the 'sandbox' was supposed to provide protection.
Dammit. As a flash refusenick for years I've gotten used to the quietness of the modern flash-free web. Now I have to investigate ad-block technology again.
Scalar vector graphics and sound are cool, but Flash was not wonderful technology.
There was a lot of great stuff in it. ActionScript was WAY ahead of javascript for a long time, implementing fairly cutting edge ECMAScript.
The old interface was very simple and very easy to use with keyframes and animation and sound syncing etc etc... if that's what you wanted to make, it was pretty great.
Flash was foremost a huge CPU waster.
It grew into that, and really only once it was abused in awful ways. Simple stuff used very little CPU, and by that I mean P133 level CPU could handle it just fine.
IMO, the single biggest factor / thing that should have been done different : the plugin/player should have been open sourced. I'm not going to claim it would have solved all their problems, but things like dragging their feet on 64bit support for YEARS would have been solved, and I'm sure it would have got some assistance in other ways, and probably some forks for good measure, and wider platform support. DRM is a large part of why this didn't happen, and it's the second thing I would have change (they shouldn't have including that in it; let someone else implement that in actionscript and add some way to optimize actionscript better, for example).
On the HTML5 side, we're re-living some of the same mistakes. Where's the easy to use controls for what a page can do, and what I can dynamically enable/disable?
The only reason adblock (and similar) work is because ads are still counting impressions the same way they always have. It's be easy to change that technically by either:
a) deliver the ads proxied through the site, so they are sourced from the same IP.
b) deliver the site through the ad network. IE. treat the ad provider as a CDN and deliver the entire page content through it, and let them integrate the ads.
"a" would make impressions difficult to track (no secure way to do so).
"b" would require site operators to give up more control, but they'd also gain a CDN for free, and they could use that for caching as well to greatly reduce their own bandwidth. I don't know why this hasn't been tried.
In any case, we need proper controls, not filters.
Luckily greasmonkey userscripts are great for that sort of thing:
// ==UserScript==
// @name noAPK
// @namespace noAPK
// @description Attempts to hide posts by APK on Slashdot
// @include http://slashdot.org/*
// @include http://.slashdot.org/*
// @version 1
// @grant none
// ==/UserScript== /apk-hosts-file/im;
var posts = document.querySelectorAll('.commentBody');
var pattern =
Array.prototype.forEach.call(posts, function(el, i){
if(pattern.test(el.innerHTML)==true) {
el.style.display = 'none';
}
});
Flash or HTML5,if HTML5 is crapware and Digital Restrictions Malware rolled into one.
Yup, that works. Please mod parent +1 Informative...
...have flash ads. That promise lasted less than a year. Now the site is full of crappy flash ads. I called the owners out on it and they tried to pass the blame onto the ad network. There was a very easy fix for that...
Too many times crappy flash ads have crashed the flash plugin or spread malware/viruses.
"A plan fiendishly clever in its intricacies"- Homer Simpson
These are all great opinions, but before I can take frequent contributor *apk* seriously, I need to know what opinion on 'hosts' is held by Frequent Contributor (TM) BENNET HASELTON!?!
"Our opponent is an alien starship packed with atomic bombs," I said. "we have a protractor"
Nothing to do with Flash, the popup covers most of the screen on my Note3, and there is no obvious way to get rid of it other than leave the site. I thought it was a varus, til I found I did not have the problem on other sites.
This is a major achievement in the foot shooting league.
Posted from my PDP8 using an ASR33.
Sent from my ASR33 using ASCII
I would make the assumption that a company that creates a flash ad owns that content. Isn't it a violation of the DMCA for Google to use their content in a way not approved by them?
Amen to that. I finally had to make the switch, too. The ads and Javascript everywhere were just too much to bear on my tiny screen. There's even a version of NoScript for mobile Firefox .
I tried AdBlock Plus but it broke updates for MedScape and a couple other apps that I need. The Firefox addon version works like a charm, though.
These are all great opinions, but before I can take frequent contributor *apk* seriously, I need to know what opinion on 'hosts' is held by Frequent Contributor (TM) BENNET HASELTON!?!
There are good contributors, there are bad contributors, there are plenty of truly horrendous contributors: but there can be only one Frequent Contributor.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
All you ad-base are belong to us!
Some settling may occur during posting.
Oh for mod points. That would be a +1 funny.