To be honest, I’m not sure if I understand where these assumptions of malice come from. My own much more optimistic interpretation is that Brave is trying to figure out a new/better revenue model for the web, and in doing so it made a (now-corrected!) mistake in how it works.
Whether their new model actually is better is another discussion, but I’ve never really seen anything to justify calling it a “scam” or comparisons to pickpockets.
The guy I caught pulling wallet out of my pocket returned it when I caught and confronted him.
How on Earth is that an appropriate analogy?
It’s more like, someone created an economy you had no clue about (still have no clue about), and made some changes to make it more fair. You were given money by said economy, and now you’re being given money in a more fair way by that economy. Money you did not do any job for. Money you signed no contract to get. Money that someone else labored for you to have.
Anecdote alert. The only people I know who use Brave are the ones who would use an adblocker regardless. So any funds Brave provides from their visits are funds that the website otherwise would never receive.
Heavily disagree. They are marketing to people that do not currently use an adblocker. They are increasing the ad-blocking population, and giving them ads regardless. And regardless, I do not care if somebody blocks ads on my site with an adblocker, as it’s usually their own choice. I do care if someone changes the ads that are given to others to their own, ripping me off in the process. The difference is similar to that of someone choosing not to buy anything above essentials in a store(which are often sold at a very low profit margin, or even loss) and someone swapping a few shelves in my store with their own with a separate checkout. Would you be fine with the first one? Probably yes, as it’s a reasonable thing for someone to do. Would you be fine with the second one? I don’t think so.
They are increasing the ad-blocking population, and giving them ads regardless. [..] someone changes the ads that are given to others to their own, ripping me off in the process
As a publisher, I have the option to “Allow Brave to serve ads on my website”, which is displayed prominently on the dashboard and off by default. So as I understand it, you’re pretty much in control yourself, and Brave isn’t deciding anything for you regarding the ads on your website. AFAIK it has always worked like this.
You can disagree with someone, but that doesn’t make you right. Here’s a list of false statements you just made:
and giving them ads regardless.
False. Ads in Brave are opt-in.
I do care if someone changes the ads that are given to others to their own, ripping me off in the process
False. You’re being compensated. (Possibly even better than whatever you’re making from selling out your visitors and violating their security and privacy.)
someone swapping a few shelves in my store with their own with a separate checkout.
False. Unless you are the creator of these ads, or are in the business of selling ads, your website’s content is not being changed and this analogy breaks down. Someone else’s content — a malvertiser that you’ve chosen to subject your users to without their consent, whose content you have little to no control over — is being blocked.
And I don’t care if they are opt in. People in a store can choose if they want to buy from their put in shelf.
False. You’re being compensated.
I am not being compensated. I am being offered a compensation, that I may or may not take, or even be aware about. I know about them, but do others? Doubt so.
False. Unless you are the creator of these ads, or are in the business of selling ads, your website’s content is not being changed and this analogy breaks down. Someone else’s content — a malvertiser that you’ve chosen to subject your users to without their consent, whose content you have little to no control over — is being blocked.
Excuse me, but this does not sound coherent to me. Attention to adverts is a way of payment for my content so to say. And usually it’s the content provider that dictates what choices of payment someone should be able to use. It might be ads, it might be subscription/patreon or whatever. If the client does not agrees to those terms they will not get the product(content) from me. Brave wants to force me to accept their way of payment. Now, I don’t know about you, but I doubt that if you, for example, went to your local store, wanted to buy something, and when asked for what method you’ll use to pay for it, answered “Bitcoin”, the store would accept it. They will not care if you say “but the credit cards are used for tracking spendings”. They dictate the rules here, and they don’t want bitcoin. This is what makes Brave’s detection evasion more egregious. People think they are supporting publishers, where really, they just put money in a hidden spot for publishers to take, but only if the publisher knows that it exists from somewhere else can they take it.
(Possibly even better than whatever you’re making from selling out your visitors and violating their security and privacy.)
Oh, you think I cannot choose ad publishers that respect my clients privacy, do you?
The point is you shouldn’t make false statements. Your arguments become stronger without them.
People in a store can choose if they want to buy from their put in shelf.
So you are selling advertisements? Note that I did include the exception for such cases in my comment above.
I know about them, but do others? Doubt so.
I believe Brave sends out emails to domain owners informing them.
Now, I don’t know about you, but I doubt that if you, for example, went to your local store,
My local store does not offer to sell me items by forcing me to watch advertisements and calling that payment. Nor does my local store, as far as I know, inject me with viruses or other forms of disease, in order to pay for the products on their shelves. And if they did, I would be well within my right to sue them for doing so, or repay them with some other form of retaliation. You’re lucky your visitors haven’t sued you yet.
What stores do instead is they ask me to pay for the products with some sort of currency.
Brave is protecting users from website owners who don’t know how to monetize their content properly. You should be thanking Brave for making your work and website appear better than it is. Maybe Brendan Eich even saved you from some lawsuits.
Oh, you think I cannot choose ad publishers that respect my clients privacy, do you?
The point is you shouldn’t make false statements. Your arguments become stronger without them.
The statement was not false, it was not entirely true. They do give them ads after blocking them, just not all the time.
People in a store can choose if they want to buy from their put in shelf.
You once again misunderstood. In that metaphor, I am selling things to look at. Content, that people come for, is sold at a loss, while ads, is the things that bring me the profits. And Brave swaps several shelves of my items that bring me money, and swaps it with their own. And it’s not their stuff that brings people to the store, it’s my content.
I believe Brave sends out emails to domain owners informing them.
After them earning 100$ in 90 days if I recall correctly. A lot of sites don’t bring that kind of money.
My local store does not offer to sell me items by forcing me to watch advertisements and calling that payment. Nor does my local store, as far as I know, inject me with viruses or other forms of disease, in order to pay for the products on their shelves.
That’s a strawman. I did not said that the local store would force you to watch advertisements. In my argument, they offer payment methods that can be tracked, credit card to be exact. Surprise surprise, some people using consider credit cards as invading their privacy, and want to use cryptocurrencies instead. The business that does not want to deal with cryptocurrencies looses out on some potential customers, but the share is small enough, that they don’t really care. In my websites case, those potential customers are Brave users. I don’t want them and their stupid cryptocurrencies. Sadly, they really want to disguise themselves as legitimate credit card users.
And also, “force”? No one is forcing to buy at that store, nor to visit my website. If you don’t want to, you can just not look at the content that I’m presenting, thus not looking at the ads, and not giving me profit. It’s a free choice.
And if they did, I would be well within my right to sue them for doing so, or repay them with some other form of retaliation. You’re lucky your visitors haven’t sued you yet.
You’re out of your mind. I would enjoy seeing you try to come up with actual legal reasons for it. You might as well try, because if you do, you could make one of the biggest class action lawsuits ever.
What stores do instead is they ask me to pay for the products with some sort of currency.
And the currency I ask for is attention to ads.
Brave is protecting users from website owners who don’t know how to monetize their content properly. You should be thanking Brave for making your work and website appear better than it is.
No thanks, how do I disable it. Oh wait, I cannot, since its their profit.
Maybe Brendan Eich even saved you from some lawsuits.
Ok, I don’t understand why are you bringing lawsuits anymore. Please just stop ridiculing yourself.
Oh, you think I cannot choose ad publishers that respect my clients privacy, do you?
I do.
Well, the publishers I choose trust me with their ad delivery. Brave doesn’t.
And Brave swaps several shelves of my items that bring me money, and swaps it with their own.
Yes, Brave does remove ads from your website. But Brave does not swap these ads with anything, “of their own” or otherwise. (Well, unless you count whitespace.)
Huh, must have misread that part somewhere. I still do think the practice is equivalent, as it is presented as a way support the content creators you watch, which traditional ads already do.
“Brave Ads are presented as native system notifications or background images in a new tab, separate from the web content being viewed.”
https://brave.com/brave-rewards/
So the user must first opt-in, and then only sees Brave’s ads on a separate tab or notification.
it is presented as a way support the content creators you watch, which traditional ads already do
Yes, ads are a way to support content creators.
But for users who would block ads regardless, any funds Brave provides from their visits are funds that the website otherwise would never receive.
An analogy might be a taxi that gives a cut of the fare to any store the rider visits.
This would indeed make it possible for Brave to block existing ads on a website and effectively swap them out for Brave’s ads – but only with the permission of the site owner.
Verfassungsblog also does that, and found advertisers among its readers (AIUI it’s now one of the most important fora for European constitutional law, and carries job offers etc).
How did you find some advertisers willing to do along with that?
Verfassungsblog is great BTW, it often has the bestest coverage of constitutional principles and background questions. Recommended for those who like long text more than up-to-the-minute headlines.
Except for the ads that make it past the built-in ad block, I was unaware that Brave had ever shown any user an ad regardless of the user’s choices. Do you have a link where I can read up on this?
Are you saying that you claimed and received ad revenue, and Brave then took it out of your account before you could transfer it elsewhere, then returned it? What happened, could you give any details?
I was gaining ad revenue, then Brave came and took some of it away, and I can only get it back if I ask them for it. That is not how it should be. Simply said, I find it unethical from Brave(which really take pride on being ethical) to swap my way of supporting myself. I chose that I want support myself with ads, and now they are changing that choice without asking me.
No, I don’t find uBlock origin unethical, since some people need it(ADHD, etc.) and it is more akin with stealing, when Brave is more similar to paying someone else for my content, which is basically plagiarism. Maybe it might not be plagiarism, it feels a bit like plagiarism to me in it’s nature.
In plagiarism, the content is the same, just with a few details changed(name, wording, etc.) With Brave, the content is the same, just the ads have been changed.
With Brave, the content is the same, just the ads have been changed.
Brave does not change the ads on your site. Brave simply blocks them, just like uBlock Origin does. Brave changes your site by removing ads (like any adblocker would), but does not change your site by swapping in anything of its own. I’m still not understanding how this part is different than any other adblocker.
Brave is not “taking your ad revenue away and returning it”. Users are protecting themselves from your attempts to subject them to trackers and malvertisers.
The money Brave is giving you has absolutely nothing to do with that. It has to do with the ads that Brave users have agreed to view. Which have nothing to do with your website. You’re being compensated by the fact that users have agreed to use software that allocates advertising revenue proportionally based on the websites they visit.
I would then very much would then like a way to block users that use Brave. But noooo, I cannot, since they are “protecting their users privacy” by spoofing their user agent with one of a legitimate browser. More like protecting their unethical source of revenue. I don’t want your shitty cryptocurrencies, and I don’t want you fooling my viewers with it.
There’s nothing wrong with a computer user spoofing their user agent in order to prevent a website admin from blocking them based on the user agent string. I don’t use Brave myself so I don’t know how much control the software gives to the end-user about spoofing the user agent string - it may be less control than I’d prefer - but I don’t think that end users have any responsibility to provide accurate information about themselves or their software stacks to the websites they visit, particularly if those websites want to use that information against the user.
Notably even SEO bots have higher morals and use user-agents representing themselves. If the website admin doesn’t want you to see the content on his website, then it is morally correct for you to agree with that.
Brave just imitates user-string of the last Chrome release by default.
Isn’t it just a matter of time until someone forks Brave as to hide the ads but keep the cryptocurrency stuff, or even faking “BATs”? Or implementing a Firefox/Chrome plugin that does the same? Better yet, a headless client for servers that just break the entire economy? I don’t think highly of the browser, but I don’t know how advertisers will either, until questions like these are settled.
Hey, was telling someone about Brave and they asked about bots. What protection does Brave have to prevent someone from pretending to view ads and generate revenue?
We use @UpholdInc to KYC anyone trying to get funds out, so the threat is DoS not theft by fraud. For DoS, we use proof-of-browsing (to be beefed up with SRA for integrity) and buffering on device and in settlement, allowing anti-fraud/sybil-attack analysis and BAT claw-back.
KYC = Know Your Customer (or Client)
DoS = Denial of Service (BAT availability)
SRA = Secure Remote Attestation
I love Brave, I use Brave and I recommend Brave to others.
To me it simply is the best install-and-use browser currently available. It integrates with torrents by default, https everywhere by default, way-back-machine by default, ad-blocks by default, do-not-track by default, auto complete addresses and credit card info by default, etc. I have 0 plugins.
The outrage about BAT is mostly people being offended by the choices of others. Brave lets you do what you want - block adds or do not block adds, enable Brave-specific adds or disable them, receive BAT or don’t receive BAT, support the sites you are using most frequently or don’t support them. You can use the above in any combination you see fit.
As for myself: I block browser adds, do not receive Brave adds, have BAT disabled, and don’t support anyone.
Oh, that scam?
They changed the way it works a while ago: unclaimed contributions are refunded, rather than claimed by Brave.
The guy I caught pulling wallet out of my pocket returned it when I caught and confronted him.
He’s trustworthy again.
To be honest, I’m not sure if I understand where these assumptions of malice come from. My own much more optimistic interpretation is that Brave is trying to figure out a new/better revenue model for the web, and in doing so it made a (now-corrected!) mistake in how it works.
Whether their new model actually is better is another discussion, but I’ve never really seen anything to justify calling it a “scam” or comparisons to pickpockets.
How on Earth is that an appropriate analogy?
It’s more like, someone created an economy you had no clue about (still have no clue about), and made some changes to make it more fair. You were given money by said economy, and now you’re being given money in a more fair way by that economy. Money you did not do any job for. Money you signed no contract to get. Money that someone else labored for you to have.
After taking another economy I was using
Anecdote alert. The only people I know who use Brave are the ones who would use an adblocker regardless. So any funds Brave provides from their visits are funds that the website otherwise would never receive.
Heavily disagree. They are marketing to people that do not currently use an adblocker. They are increasing the ad-blocking population, and giving them ads regardless. And regardless, I do not care if somebody blocks ads on my site with an adblocker, as it’s usually their own choice. I do care if someone changes the ads that are given to others to their own, ripping me off in the process. The difference is similar to that of someone choosing not to buy anything above essentials in a store(which are often sold at a very low profit margin, or even loss) and someone swapping a few shelves in my store with their own with a separate checkout. Would you be fine with the first one? Probably yes, as it’s a reasonable thing for someone to do. Would you be fine with the second one? I don’t think so.
As a publisher, I have the option to “Allow Brave to serve ads on my website”, which is displayed prominently on the dashboard and off by default. So as I understand it, you’re pretty much in control yourself, and Brave isn’t deciding anything for you regarding the ads on your website. AFAIK it has always worked like this.
You can disagree with someone, but that doesn’t make you right. Here’s a list of false statements you just made:
False. Ads in Brave are opt-in.
False. You’re being compensated. (Possibly even better than whatever you’re making from selling out your visitors and violating their security and privacy.)
False. Unless you are the creator of these ads, or are in the business of selling ads, your website’s content is not being changed and this analogy breaks down. Someone else’s content — a malvertiser that you’ve chosen to subject your users to without their consent, whose content you have little to no control over — is being blocked.
And I don’t care if they are opt in. People in a store can choose if they want to buy from their put in shelf.
I am not being compensated. I am being offered a compensation, that I may or may not take, or even be aware about. I know about them, but do others? Doubt so.
Excuse me, but this does not sound coherent to me. Attention to adverts is a way of payment for my content so to say. And usually it’s the content provider that dictates what choices of payment someone should be able to use. It might be ads, it might be subscription/patreon or whatever. If the client does not agrees to those terms they will not get the product(content) from me. Brave wants to force me to accept their way of payment. Now, I don’t know about you, but I doubt that if you, for example, went to your local store, wanted to buy something, and when asked for what method you’ll use to pay for it, answered “Bitcoin”, the store would accept it. They will not care if you say “but the credit cards are used for tracking spendings”. They dictate the rules here, and they don’t want bitcoin. This is what makes Brave’s detection evasion more egregious. People think they are supporting publishers, where really, they just put money in a hidden spot for publishers to take, but only if the publisher knows that it exists from somewhere else can they take it.
Oh, you think I cannot choose ad publishers that respect my clients privacy, do you?
The point is you shouldn’t make false statements. Your arguments become stronger without them.
So you are selling advertisements? Note that I did include the exception for such cases in my comment above.
I believe Brave sends out emails to domain owners informing them.
My local store does not offer to sell me items by forcing me to watch advertisements and calling that payment. Nor does my local store, as far as I know, inject me with viruses or other forms of disease, in order to pay for the products on their shelves. And if they did, I would be well within my right to sue them for doing so, or repay them with some other form of retaliation. You’re lucky your visitors haven’t sued you yet.
What stores do instead is they ask me to pay for the products with some sort of currency.
Brave is protecting users from website owners who don’t know how to monetize their content properly. You should be thanking Brave for making your work and website appear better than it is. Maybe Brendan Eich even saved you from some lawsuits.
I do.
The statement was not false, it was not entirely true. They do give them ads after blocking them, just not all the time.
You once again misunderstood. In that metaphor, I am selling things to look at. Content, that people come for, is sold at a loss, while ads, is the things that bring me the profits. And Brave swaps several shelves of my items that bring me money, and swaps it with their own. And it’s not their stuff that brings people to the store, it’s my content.
After them earning 100$ in 90 days if I recall correctly. A lot of sites don’t bring that kind of money.
That’s a strawman. I did not said that the local store would force you to watch advertisements. In my argument, they offer payment methods that can be tracked, credit card to be exact. Surprise surprise, some people using consider credit cards as invading their privacy, and want to use cryptocurrencies instead. The business that does not want to deal with cryptocurrencies looses out on some potential customers, but the share is small enough, that they don’t really care. In my websites case, those potential customers are Brave users. I don’t want them and their stupid cryptocurrencies. Sadly, they really want to disguise themselves as legitimate credit card users.
And also, “force”? No one is forcing to buy at that store, nor to visit my website. If you don’t want to, you can just not look at the content that I’m presenting, thus not looking at the ads, and not giving me profit. It’s a free choice.
You’re out of your mind. I would enjoy seeing you try to come up with actual legal reasons for it. You might as well try, because if you do, you could make one of the biggest class action lawsuits ever.
And the currency I ask for is attention to ads.
No thanks, how do I disable it. Oh wait, I cannot, since its their profit.
Ok, I don’t understand why are you bringing lawsuits anymore. Please just stop ridiculing yourself.
Well, the publishers I choose trust me with their ad delivery. Brave doesn’t.
Yes, Brave does remove ads from your website. But Brave does not swap these ads with anything, “of their own” or otherwise. (Well, unless you count whitespace.)
Huh, must have misread that part somewhere. I still do think the practice is equivalent, as it is presented as a way support the content creators you watch, which traditional ads already do.
Brave revamped rewards at least once (see comment about them no longer keeping unclaimed rewards), so maybe had considered replacing ads at some point. Currently:
“Brave Ads are presented as native system notifications or background images in a new tab, separate from the web content being viewed.” https://brave.com/brave-rewards/
So the user must first opt-in, and then only sees Brave’s ads on a separate tab or notification.
Yes, ads are a way to support content creators. But for users who would block ads regardless, any funds Brave provides from their visits are funds that the website otherwise would never receive.
An analogy might be a taxi that gives a cut of the fare to any store the rider visits.
Correction:
Apparently Brave has recently started testing an “Allow Brave to serve ads on my website” option for creators. (Thanks to arp242 for the heads up!)
This would indeed make it possible for Brave to block existing ads on a website and effectively swap them out for Brave’s ads – but only with the permission of the site owner.
I’d rather not get into all of this, but I’m curious about your last sentence.
How did you/how does one choose ad publishers that respect your clients’ privacy?
Like how Troy Hunt does it. Serve the ads yourself with the publisher trusting your numbers.
Verfassungsblog also does that, and found advertisers among its readers (AIUI it’s now one of the most important fora for European constitutional law, and carries job offers etc).
How did you find some advertisers willing to do along with that?
The linked site cannot be reached. Misspelled domain?
Sorry. Sleepless typist syndrome.
Verfassungsblog is great BTW, it often has the bestest coverage of constitutional principles and background questions. Recommended for those who like long text more than up-to-the-minute headlines.
Except for the ads that make it past the built-in ad block, I was unaware that Brave had ever shown any user an ad regardless of the user’s choices. Do you have a link where I can read up on this?
Sorry I don’t follow. What other economy has Brave taken that you were using?
The ads that were supporting me. To put it the analogy again:
Brave was caught taking my ad revenue away, and returns it when I caught that and asked for it. Literally.
Are you saying that you claimed and received ad revenue, and Brave then took it out of your account before you could transfer it elsewhere, then returned it? What happened, could you give any details?
I was gaining ad revenue, then Brave came and took some of it away, and I can only get it back if I ask them for it. That is not how it should be. Simply said, I find it unethical from Brave(which really take pride on being ethical) to swap my way of supporting myself. I chose that I want support myself with ads, and now they are changing that choice without asking me.
Understandable.
Regarding ads, e.g. uBlock origin removes your option to support yourself with ads. Do you find uBlock origin less/more/equally unethical?
No, I don’t find uBlock origin unethical, since some people need it(ADHD, etc.) and it is more akin with stealing, when Brave is more similar to paying someone else for my content, which is basically plagiarism. Maybe it might not be plagiarism, it feels a bit like plagiarism to me in it’s nature.
I understand the analogy between uBlock origin and stealing. It also seems to match up with your example of a customer who only buys the essentials and/or loss leaders.
I’m not understanding the analogy between Brave and plagiarism. Can you expound on that a bit more?
In plagiarism, the content is the same, just with a few details changed(name, wording, etc.) With Brave, the content is the same, just the ads have been changed.
Brave does not change the ads on your site. Brave simply blocks them, just like uBlock Origin does. Brave changes your site by removing ads (like any adblocker would), but does not change your site by swapping in anything of its own. I’m still not understanding how this part is different than any other adblocker.
Brave is not “taking your ad revenue away and returning it”. Users are protecting themselves from your attempts to subject them to trackers and malvertisers.
The money Brave is giving you has absolutely nothing to do with that. It has to do with the ads that Brave users have agreed to view. Which have nothing to do with your website. You’re being compensated by the fact that users have agreed to use software that allocates advertising revenue proportionally based on the websites they visit.
I would then very much would then like a way to block users that use Brave. But noooo, I cannot, since they are “protecting their users privacy” by spoofing their user agent with one of a legitimate browser. More like protecting their unethical source of revenue. I don’t want your shitty cryptocurrencies, and I don’t want you fooling my viewers with it.
There’s nothing wrong with a computer user spoofing their user agent in order to prevent a website admin from blocking them based on the user agent string. I don’t use Brave myself so I don’t know how much control the software gives to the end-user about spoofing the user agent string - it may be less control than I’d prefer - but I don’t think that end users have any responsibility to provide accurate information about themselves or their software stacks to the websites they visit, particularly if those websites want to use that information against the user.
Notably even SEO bots have higher morals and use user-agents representing themselves. If the website admin doesn’t want you to see the content on his website, then it is morally correct for you to agree with that.
Brave just imitates user-string of the last Chrome release by default.
It block ads that fund many sites, no?
You mean the ads, malware, and privacy-violating trackers that users hate and never consented to receiving? Yes, it blocks those.
AIUI it blocks the trackers that feed the ads, rather.
I was quite amazed at the effect when I configured Ghostery to block all trackers and let the rest through. I didn’t see an ad for weeks.
Airline miles and hotel points, right?
But with blockchain!
Isn’t it just a matter of time until someone forks Brave as to hide the ads but keep the cryptocurrency stuff, or even faking “BATs”? Or implementing a Firefox/Chrome plugin that does the same? Better yet, a headless client for servers that just break the entire economy? I don’t think highly of the browser, but I don’t know how advertisers will either, until questions like these are settled.
This is concerning so I did a bit of research (read: I searched “botting brave bat”). Here’s a copy of the 2018 tweet linked from the first search result:
I love Brave, I use Brave and I recommend Brave to others.
To me it simply is the best install-and-use browser currently available. It integrates with torrents by default, https everywhere by default, way-back-machine by default, ad-blocks by default, do-not-track by default, auto complete addresses and credit card info by default, etc. I have 0 plugins.
The outrage about BAT is mostly people being offended by the choices of others. Brave lets you do what you want - block adds or do not block adds, enable Brave-specific adds or disable them, receive BAT or don’t receive BAT, support the sites you are using most frequently or don’t support them. You can use the above in any combination you see fit.
As for myself: I block browser adds, do not receive Brave adds, have BAT disabled, and don’t support anyone.
And I am a happy user.