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Opera Max Turns To Nagware, Now Prompts Users To Re-enable It Every 12 Hours (androidpolice.com)
Opera has long advertised its free VPN service Opera Max to customers. But it looks like, the company isn't pleased with users keeping its servers at work at all times. Over the last few days, according to a report on AndroidPolice, Opera Max has introduced ads on its apps, as well as links to sponsored apps. But the company is not done yet. It now requires a user to go back to the app and "add time" to the free VPN service every 12 hours if they wish to continue the service. Adding time doesn't cost anything, but it will subject users to an ad on each occasion.
I don't think that's unreasonable. It's a free service. They should've known better than to think they could afford to process that much traffic, but something like this was expected. At least they're not actively charging for it.
If something is free, you're not the customer, you're the product.
What a wealth of personal info.
Seriously, this stuff isn't free. It costs real money to run a VPN service and you get a whole day's worth of browsing for the cost of viewing one ad. You can still use the Opera browser without nagware if you don't use the VPN.
it has to come from somewhere or someone.
This is just Appera making their app even appier, unlike LUDDITE software!
Apps!
I used it during and after it emerged from beta and even back then it would bother you to "top up" to continue using it. I uninstalled it soon after. I don't know what it does these days but services like Tunnelbear give you a small-ish amount of data for free per month but you can pay for unlimited use if you want. Maybe Opera should do likewise.
I'll take another at look at vivaldi but I've been waiting for it to become full featured the popup blocker and popup blocker controls hadn't been fully implemented last time I looked... I was happy to see the ad-ins and adblock plus worked last time I checked.
Opera has "long advertised" its what?
#DeleteChrome
Opera browser was ad-supported but also pay-for to remove them before - what? - 3.5?
It was removed because it just discouraged users and made only a pittance. In fact, the browser went free and then produced its best and most popular versions. Oh, and they had Opera Turbo which is basically the same VPN thing for all that time.
It's only when the development team was sacked many years later that they threw the browser away, made a similar-looking (but severely lacking) Chrome-clone, and then wondered why everyone disappeared and made old-Opera-clones that they feel the need to ad-support it again in an era where "ads" = things to annoy users with because who cares about them, so long as we get 1/1000th of a penny?
Glad to see that I made the right decision to not continue with Opera past version 12.
But that will; come. First, someone will analyze the protocol used and develop some plugin or app that automatically calls the "extend my service for 12 hours" every 11 hours. And as a response to that they will be "forced" to make it a payed service.
Seriously, this stuff isn't free. It costs real money to run a VPN service and you get a whole day's worth of browsing for the cost of viewing one ad. You can still use the Opera browser without nagware if you don't use the VPN.
When useless mobile apps, like Candy Crush, force users to watch an ad every 2 minutes no one cares. When an optional service with real value shows users an ad once every 12 hours it's nagware. /internet logic
TANSTAAFL ... duh!!
Both are properly called adware. Nagware is shareware that nags you to pay to register it.
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Everytime that ad pops up, I remember to stretch my legs, get some coffee, take a pee, order some pizza.
Not necessarily in that order, though.
Free, as in your money being freed from the confines of your account.
A Chinese company, Qihoo, purchased Opera. More ads are showing up in Opera Mini on Android, even with the built in ad-blocker on. If you use any Qihoo product, ads are now a way of life, slightly annoying, but tolerable. 360 Total Security, a decent free anti-virus program, has had "offers" all along.
I get the difference. Candy Crush puts interstitial ads up when you take certain actions. Opera lets you schedule your ad anytime you want. But that means that the ad isn't incidental to using the product, you have to go out of your way to select it. Which means that Candy Crush feels like it has ads, whereas Opera feels like you have to opt into using it (and also see an ad.) Opera's way is definitely objectively better for the consumer, but can be spun in a worse way.
Your ad here. Ask me how!
uBlock is fine. Adblock is generally OK, but its author accepts payment in exchange for letting some ads through.
The APK guy has been spamming Slashdot for years trying to get people to download his program that installs a host file on your computer. The problem is, host files are very 20 years ago and are outdated/limited technology.
The file he's spamming about has to have one entry for every single ad server, otherwise it doesn't do any good. Advertising companies are spinning up new servers on a daily basis. For example, Google's DoubleClick is constantly creating new servers with names like this using random numbers:
1016557.fls.doubleclick.net
1412173.fls.doubleclick.net
4331660.fls.doubleclick.net
4338244.fls.doubleclick.net
Now, if you use a host file like APK suggests, you need one line in that file to block each one of those servers. DoubleClick has hundreds of servers and they add more all the time, meaning your file will always be out of date and trying to play catch-up to the advertising companies. Not to mention all the other ad and malware servers out there. That dork's file has hundreds of thousands of lines worth of one-at-a-time attempts to block bad servers.
Ad blocking browser extensions (like Adblock or uBlock) can match on wildcards, meaning they can block entire bad domains like *.doubleclick.net, no matter what new server names they put online today. APK's lame file can't do that because hosts files don't support wildcards. Try as he might, he still can't overcome that deficiency. He'll probably show up and post 10 replies to this comment either attacking me or pretending to be other people who like him.
Ugh this again? No. It is you who is wrong.
free |fr|
adjective (freer |frr| , freest |frst| )
5 given or available without charge: free health care.
It's free if you don't pay for it. "Being exposed to the thing that is being given away without charge", whether or not that thing has ads, doesn't make it un-free.
Things that don't cost you money are free. That's what the word means. If you "pay" for it by looking at ads, then it's free. If you "pay" for it by giving money to the makers, then it's not free. That's what the word means and you should stop trying to subvert the meaning of free .
How much money do they get for one ad impression? Like, one or five or ten cents? Let's go with the high end of the range, ten cents.
Does Opera offer their service for twenty cents per day (two ads)? If not, they're screwing their customers.
I see this all the time: I get to choose between a service with ads that might add up to half a dollar a day, or I can pay $99 a month for the service. That's bull. That's a way of making sure every single one of your customers is a chump -- either a chump willing to look at your stupid ads, or a chump willing to way overpay for your service. I hate it when companies make me feel like a chump.
It sounds a lot like a software firewall I used many years ago on my Windows 98 box. It worked pretty well, and didn't seem to slow things down too much, (I think the box had 64 MB of RAM).
One fine day the programme prompted me to update, which I did, and it started displaying all sorts of ads and nags to purchase the "Premium Version". It took about a week for me to get sick of that nonsense.
I'm trying to remember what it was called, but the name has slipped my mind.
That's what the word means and you should stop trying to subvert the meaning of free .
... and you are extremely naive if you still think when a for-profit corporation offers something as "free" they mean it per the definition in Websters.
Wait, what? You say your host file is ~3Mb. So instead of blocking an entire tld with a wildcard, I should be downloading a 3Mb (and growing every day apparently) every day instead of performing a single query? You've been struck down many times before, by myself and others, and you still spew this crap. Ahh, good times.
"Freedom in the USA is not the ability to do what you want. It is the ability to stop others from doing what THEY want"
Yeah. They do. They mean you don't pay for it. They make money by charging someone else for some other service which isn't free.
And that sucks and we all don't like it blah blah blah free still means you don't pay. If your stock broker takes you out to lunch and tries to sell you futures the lunch is free but the futures aren't.
Listen, the AC can biatch all she wants but she shouldn't try to pull of some bullshit dictionary-based attack if she's not going to use the dictionary definition of words.