Adblock Plus Returns To Android and Arrives On iPhone For First Time

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Adblock Plus Returns To Android and Arrives On iPhone For First Time

Posted by samzenpus on Wednesday September 9, 2015 @06:42AM from the don't-look dept.

Mickeycaskill writes: Adblock Plus has returned to Android — two and a half years after ad blocking services were removed from Google Play — and has been released on iOS for the first time. Adblock Browser for Android has been in beta since late May, with well over 300,000 people downloading the beta in the browser's first week. Meanwhile the arrival of the app on iPhone means developer Eyeo has beaten Apple to the punch, as the company has confirmed iOS 9 will feature an adblocker built into Safari. "With the popularity of the iOS platform in places like the US, we considered it critical to offer an app in the Apple App Store," said Till Faida, co-founder of Adblock Plus. "We're thankful to Apple for working with us on this project and we look forward to their new iOS 9, which will give web developers additional ad-blocking tools. It's a big step for this industry."

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Awesome by Anonymous Coward · 2015-09-09 06:44 · Score: 2, Insightful

I hope that puts the final nail into the coffin of online advertising.
1. Re:Awesome by Anonymous Coward · 2015-09-09 06:54 · Score: 1
  
  Why?
  If everyone is blocking ads, then there can be no ad supported web sites.
  Everything on a mobile device will become an app so that the developer has control over the ads again.
  It has already happened with most major sites. Why do you need an app to read a blog? More ads.
2. Re:Awesome by ArmoredDragon · 2015-09-09 06:54 · Score: 1
  
  I doubt that, but I also wonder why this is news.
  For a long time now, I've been running Firefox on Android with AdblockPlus, Searchonymous, Ghostery, and Lastpass installed.
3. Re:Awesome by Wycliffe · 2015-09-09 07:08 · Score: 2
  
  I hope that puts the final nail into the coffin of online advertising.
  I highly doubt it. It's more likely to put the final nail in the "ad blocking" industry. As soon as ad blocking goes mainstream then ad supported sites will start to actually care and start actively circumventing ad blocking via either embedded content or requiring you to download an app, etc... The vast majority of people have voted and they have voted that they don't want to pay for apps and websites and would rather see ads instead.
4. Re:Awesome by FranTaylor · 2015-09-09 07:17 · Score: 1
  
  Why?
  If everyone is blocking ads, then there can be no ad supported web sites.
  Why can't web sites run their own ads? Why do they HAVE to use a service?
5. Re:Awesome by FranTaylor · 2015-09-09 07:19 · Score: 1
  
  As soon as ad blocking goes mainstream then ad supported sites will start to actually care and start actively circumventing ad blocking via either embedded content
  then they are responsible for the content and they are culpable if the ads contain malware
  if you get your ads from a service, then you can just shrug and point if your customers get infected
6. Re:Awesome by Dins · 2015-09-09 07:21 · Score: 1
  
  I'm not using an app right now. It's extremely easy for me to just go to a competing site if you don't want donations or paywalls.
  There are very few sites that will publish content out of the goodness of their hearts. If they can't get paid through advertising, then it's apps or paywalls or something but not free.
  Don't get me wrong; I use adblock and never see ads. So I guess I'm a hyopcrite. But if online advertising can't unltimately make money somehow we're gonna have a very different web on our hands.
7. Re:Awesome by FranTaylor · 2015-09-09 07:22 · Score: 1
  
  If they can't get paid through advertising, then it's apps or paywalls or something but not free.
  why do sites HAVE to use an advertising service? why can't they run their own ads?
8. Re:Awesome by Dins · 2015-09-09 07:28 · Score: 2
  
  Just convenience, I'm sure. Certainly doable though. Would be kind of a mess if every web site rolled their own, though....
9. Re:Awesome by JackieBrown · 2015-09-09 07:28 · Score: 1
  
  How would they do that? Contact walmart/samsung/apple/etc and ask them to send you a check to pay for advertising space on your blog?
10. Re:Awesome by Anonymous Coward · 2015-09-09 07:30 · Score: 1
  
  Because time is a valuable resource and keeping contacts, setting up agreements with the people purchasing ad space from you, and implementing your adspace takes soft-skills and a non-trivial amount of time.
11. Re:Awesome by Anonymous Coward · 2015-09-09 07:46 · Score: 1
  
  And just screwing the consumer is a reasonable response to the difficulty of running a business. Kinda like dumping thousands of gallons of mine waste into a river because it is easier and more cost effective. Can you say "Tragedy of the Commons"?
12. Re: Awesome by Anonymous Coward · 2015-09-09 08:02 · Score: 1
  
  "Don't get me wrong; I use adblock and never see ads. So I guess I'm a hyopcrite. But if online advertising can't unltimately make money somehow we're gonna have a very different web on our hands."
  Yeah, it'll be like 1995 again before all those idiot dot-commers fucked it all up. Before them, the web was cool. And frankly, all of the ad supported websites really don't have anything that'll be missed.
  If Dice fails to sell Slashdot and decides to shut it down, well, Big fucking deal. Same goes for Reddit, Fark, Yahoo!, Google, etc...
  The web was actually a better place before them.
  And the important stuff, email, banking and other services is already being paid for by me.
  Adblock is just blocking the parasites of the web that offer nothing but just take - steal - bandwidth for their stupid business with questionable ethics.
13. Re:Awesome by ProfBooty · 2015-09-09 08:07 · Score: 1
  
  Like the washingtonpost.com just started doing today?
  http://www.buzzfeed.com/matthe...
  
  --
  Bring back the old version of slashdot.
14. Re:Awesome by cyn1c77 · 2015-09-09 08:34 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  I'm not using an app right now. It's extremely easy for me to just go to a competing site if you don't want donations or paywalls.
  There are very few sites that will publish content out of the goodness of their hearts. If they can't get paid through advertising, then it's apps or paywalls or something but not free.
  Don't get me wrong; I use adblock and never see ads. So I guess I'm a hyopcrite. But if online advertising can't unltimately make money somehow we're gonna have a very different web on our hands.
  Like it would really matter if 90% of the advertisement-supported web disappeared.
  Where would we be?
  Back to the newsgroups that we had originally... which arguably was better than the highly predatory environment that it's evolved into today.
15. Re:Awesome by Ol+Olsoc · 2015-09-09 09:33 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  I'm not using an app right now. It's extremely easy for me to just go to a competing site if you don't want donations or paywalls.
  There are very few sites that will publish content out of the goodness of their hearts. If they can't get paid through advertising, then it's apps or paywalls or something but not free.
  Don't get me wrong; I use adblock and never see ads. So I guess I'm a hyopcrite. But if online advertising can't unltimately make money somehow we're gonna have a very different web on our hands.
  I actually don't think you are a hypocrite. When a web page takes a minute ot load on a fast service, only because it's ramming a little story, and many megs of ads, it starts to become a real mess. And when a fair amount of that is malware pretending to be an ad, it becomes an arms race.
  I think we are reaching a tipping point, when Websites are finding out that there is going to be a choice. Go out of business because people are blocking your ads, or go out of business because no one wants to visit a page with 50 scripts, a bunch of trackers and analytics, and all the malware you'd ever not want. And it isn't even a security thing for some folks. It's so much loading time that an unprotected machine might take so long ot load a page, they assume it's frozen.
  I block ads for the same reason I don't invite methods into the house.
  I'll remove adblock when sites start acting responsibly. Then I'll see all their ads. What a concept.
  
  --
  The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
16. Re:Awesome by Ol+Olsoc · 2015-09-09 09:44 · Score: 1
  
  Like the washingtonpost.com just started doing today?
  http://www.buzzfeed.com/matthe...
  Oh
  My
  Fucking
  GAWD!!!!!!
  NOES!
  What on earth am I going to do? The end of western civilization. If I cannot get my daily fix of the Washinton Post, I'm just going to end it all...
  umm actually no, I just won't visit their site. Just like I haven'y visited their site for years. The last time I visited, IIRC, I did a script count for some research. They are a huge source of scripts and trackers and tasty malware. My loss, I guess.
  
  --
  The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
17. Re:Awesome by Yosho · 2015-09-09 10:15 · Score: 2
  
  There are very few sites that will publish content out of the goodness of their hearts. ... But if online advertising can't unltimately make money somehow we're gonna have a very different web on our hands.
  Ahh, that sounds so nice.
  But seriously, there was a time, somewhere around two decades ago, when web pages were not covered in advertisements. If a web page had a banner ad, it was because it was part of a circle of related pages who all agreed to display each others' banners; they weren't earning money, they were just sharing places of interest.
  Believe it or not, many web sites were published out of the goodness of peoples' hearts -- many of them just wanted to share information or connect with other like-minded people. That kind of thing doesn't really happen any more, though, now that social media has provided people with a way of easily connecting with others and sharing information without needing to write your own web page or host a server... and Facebook will gladly provide you with that service, funded by their corporate overlords.
  If online advertising fails to make money and we have to go back to the good old days, then bring it on, I say. If your business model depends on annoying people, you deserve to go out of business.
  
  --
  Karma: Terrifying (mostly affected by atrocities you've committed)
18. Re:Awesome by wbr1 · 2015-09-09 11:20 · Score: 1
  
  I block ads for the same reason I don't invite methods into the house.
  What about procedures & functions?
  
  --
  Silence is a state of mime.
19. Re:Awesome by Wycliffe · 2015-09-09 11:51 · Score: 1
  
  What on earth am I going to do? The end of western civilization. If I cannot get my daily fix of the Washinton Post, I'm just going to end it all...
  umm actually no, I just won't visit their site. Just like I haven'y visited their site for years.
  This is the best way to vote but it does have its limits. I use google news and I notice more and more sites are paywalled (or limit you to 5 articles a month or something). I block them from the feed and move on but this only works for so long. If enough people do this, then they will either change their business model, go out of business, or someone with a profitable business model will replace them. If enough people put up with ads and/or pay then eventually the people insisting on no-cost ad-free content will be very limited on what they can see.
20. Re:Awesome by Ol+Olsoc · 2015-09-09 12:00 · Score: 1
  
  I block ads for the same reason I don't invite methods into the house.
  What about procedures & functions?
  Yikes! Gotta turn off that spell check. Or maybe not.
  
  --
  The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
21. Re:Awesome by mjwx · 2015-09-09 12:31 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  I actually don't think you are a hypocrite. When a web page takes a minute ot load on a fast service, only because it's ramming a little story, and many megs of ads, it starts to become a real mess. And when a fair amount of that is malware pretending to be an ad, it becomes an arms race.
  And when your telco has a small data quota, it literally costs money to see ads.
  
  --
  Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
22. Re:Awesome by amxcoder · 2015-09-09 13:39 · Score: 1
  
  ADP on android even blocks ads embedded in apps as well in my experience. The app was available as a side-load for quite a while, and I've tried it out, and it killed any and all ads, regardless of whether they were on a webpage, or in an app.
  
  The bad part of it is that many websites and apps are written poorly, and crash/won't load when the app servers don't respond. I've seen many websites with this behavior... they start loading, and then try to reach the web server, which is blocked, and boom, the whole page load comes to a halt and won't complete. When I come across sites written this way, I have 2 options, disable ADP, or leave the site, I choose the latter.
23. Re:Awesome by AmiMoJo · 2015-09-09 20:52 · Score: 1
  
  That would be suicide for many of those sites. Doesn't mean they won't try it of course, look at paywalled newspapers that instantly become ghost towns. It only works if the revenue they get is enough to keep going, and I think a lot of sites over-estimate the value that their users see in them.
  The ad industry needs to come to the table and negotiate a truce. Unobtrusive ads and no tracking, or it gets burnt to the ground.
  
  --
  const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
  SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
24. Re:Awesome by martin-boundary · 2015-09-09 21:47 · Score: 2
  
  I will never remove adblock. I consider ads to be theft of attentionspan. Who authorised some thirdparty ad peddler to divert the image recognition neurons in my brain on some silly profitseeking mission that doesn't benefit me and actually lowers the quality of the text recognition task they are supposed to be performing in the first place?
25. Re:Awesome by scarboni888 · 2015-09-09 23:31 · Score: 1
  
  There, now how hard was that?
26. Re:Awesome by JackieBrown · 2015-09-10 00:47 · Score: 1
  
  Let me know once you have done it
27. Re:Awesome by sglewis100 · 2015-09-11 09:22 · Score: 1
  
  What are the major sites that can't be read from a mobile web browser? They may OFFER apps, but require them?
MS, Amazon, Google payoff Adblock+ by Anonymous Coward · 2015-09-09 06:52 · Score: 1

MS, Amazon, Google bribed Adblock+ to not work fully http://www.businessinsider.com... by default
1. Re:MS, Amazon, Google payoff Adblock+ by ArmoredDragon · 2015-09-09 07:00 · Score: 1
  
  Well in order to make that list, it has to be benign advertising. However if you want it to "fully" work, just uncheck the box marked "allow some non-intrusive advertising."
2. Re:MS, Amazon, Google payoff Adblock+ by FranTaylor · 2015-09-09 07:23 · Score: 1
  
  there are plenty of benign ads, here is one:
  buy fresh vegetables today
3. Re:MS, Amazon, Google payoff Adblock+ by jonbryce · 2015-09-09 07:41 · Score: 1
  
  If you the likes of Taboola and Outbrain to be benign. I don't.
4. Re:MS, Amazon, Google payoff Adblock+ by Tough+Love · 2015-09-09 16:13 · Score: 1
  
  Ad servers don't just steal bandwidth, they often add massive latency. Google's front page search gets really slow sometimes because of that.
  
  --
  When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
Re:And for WP8? by ArmoredDragon · 2015-09-09 06:58 · Score: 1

Microsoft has Windows Phone locked down so badly that there's not a chance in hell you'll ever see any kind of ad blocking for that platform. And they've already sunk so much money into it (over $20 billion so far, and rising) with nothing to show for it, I highly doubt they'd allow anybody to bring any harm what little money they get from it.
That said, even if you could run third party browsers, (REAL third party browsers, not just alternative shells for the Trident rendering engine) they'd NEVER let you configure it as the default browser.
Adblock Edge is better by Spy+Handler · 2015-09-09 07:02 · Score: 1

Adblock Plus takes money from advertisers and shows you their ads. Edge doesn't.
1. Re:Adblock Edge is better by vux984 · 2015-09-09 07:41 · Score: 1
  
  Some of us merely want to create a balance between ads and content. We're happy to have static ads out of the way to help fund the content. We don't freak out about adds in news papers.
  We just don't want adds that pop up, hover, float, move around, overlay what we're looking at, interfere with browsing, track us, flash, animate, play sounds, disrupt normal browser controls, alter the cursor, rotate, etc, etc, etc, etc...
2. Re:Adblock Edge is better by msimm · 2015-09-09 08:58 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  Adblock Edge (ABE) is discontinued. ABE's developer is recommending uBlock Origin which apparently:
  
  outperforms Adblock Edge but is also available on other browsers and, of course, without "Acceptable Ads Whitelist".
  
  --
  Quack, quack.
A new industry. by geekmux · 2015-09-09 07:15 · Score: 1

"It's a big step for this industry."
Kind of funny labeling the blocking of an entire industry as an industry.
Re:And for WP8? by FranTaylor · 2015-09-09 07:20 · Score: 1

what can stop people from using a proxy service that removes that ads?
Adblock BROWSER by iONiUM · 2015-09-09 07:32 · Score: 2

This isn't clear from the summary or article, but the adblock offering on the Google play store (which you can find here: https://play.google.com/store/... -- WHY don't they have the link in the summary?!) is a BROWSER, not a plug-in (which I guess doesn't exist on Android Chrome anyways).
I'm not sure I want a full browser.
1. Re:Adblock BROWSER by iONiUM · 2015-09-09 08:12 · Score: 1
  
  Because I don't trust the people who created it, especially with things like saved passwords etc (not that I use this feature anyways, but still).
  I realize you can say the same thing about trusting Mozilla, or Google, but at least I know (mostly) where they stand and there is someone to answer for it. If some dude's app starts nosing through your shit there isn't much recourse.
2. Re:Adblock BROWSER by Herve5 · 2015-09-09 08:17 · Score: 1
  
  You want Privacy Badger, from the EFF. Unfortunately not validated on the latest Firefox version. ..
  https://www.eff.org/privacybad...
  
  --
  Herve S.
Always had Adblock by CimmerianX · 2015-09-09 07:40 · Score: 4, Interesting

Just because Google play blocked the app didn't mean it wasn't available. F-Droid App store always had the app ready to load. I've been using it nonstop for last few years.
Google Play is just 1 of many app stores.... people don't always realize that.
1. Re:Always had Adblock by wardrich86 · 2015-09-10 01:02 · Score: 1
  
  I was hoping somebody else had made this point. The app is also far more effective - blocking out ads even from applications. The downside is that it requires Root access. This seems to be a feasible solution for non-rooted users to at least get around browser-based ads.
Firefox for Android + uBlock Origin by LichtSpektren · 2015-09-09 07:45 · Score: 3, Insightful

I am just wondering what advantages I get from the Adblock Browser over using Firefox for Android with uBlock Origin (or Adblock Plus/Edge if you prefer)? TFA doesn't seem to enlighten me.
1. Re:Firefox for Android + uBlock Origin by CrashNBrn · 2015-09-09 07:56 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  Likely None --- or Worse. uBlock is the evolution|forkish of the "AdBlock+". Now if you don't mind some fiddly-bits, uMatrix is even better (less memory, less CPU usage, etc). uMatrix is interesting as it takes the reins from all of these: NoScript, Ghostery, Adblock+|uBlock|RequestPolicy.
Re:And for WP8? by ArmoredDragon · 2015-09-09 08:19 · Score: 1

You could do that. Not a 100% solution (i.e. it isn't going to work on every network you're likely to be using,) and may slow you down a bit, but other than hat it should work.
No history control options for iOS? by afmstuff · 2015-09-09 08:38 · Score: 1

I just loaded the Adblock Browser for iOS and don't see any settings to delete history or to not keep history, either in the browser or in iOS' settings menu. As such, this seems to be a step backward. Am I missing something?
Re:Returns? by kav2k · 2015-09-09 08:46 · Score: 1

Previously it was a stand-alone app that would act as a proxy and filter out ads from all traffic. That was yanked from the store since it "interfered with operations of other apps". To some extent, that's a fair accusation.
Now, a FF plugin affecting only FF or a standalone browser are okay by this criterion, so it's "back" in this form.
Internet ads = failed business model by TractorBarry · 2015-09-09 23:07 · Score: 1

Here we go again with the tiresome "but sites need ads to survive" crap.
If your website is based on being funded by advertising you have a failed business model. Users don't want to see them and will not tolerate them.
Like most internet users I pay for my bandwidth and I'm not paying to download your crapulent ads for rubbish I have zero interest in. Plus being somewhat wise I don't allow ads or javascript by default as this is a great start on keeping malware off your machine.
All you "but we need ads" people need to stop behaving like King Canute. The users have spoken. We do not want your ads.
You therefore need to find a better business model. End of discussion.

--
Sky subscribers are morons. They pay to be advertised at !