Brave is essentially just Chrome with an adblocker, a bunch of bloatware, and a bunch of controversies.

Brave took BAT donations in YouTuber’s names without their consent, with them keeping the money if the YouTubers didn’t claim it. https://davidgerard.co.uk/blockchain/2019/01/13/brave-web-browser-no-longer-claims-to-fundraise-on-behalf-of-others-so-thats-nice/

Brave’s search engine crawler hides itself from websites by pretending to be Googlebot, and Meta (Facebook) buys API access from them to train their AI. https://stackdiary.com/brave-selling-copyrighted-data-for-ai-training/

The business model of Brave rewards as a whole is to block all other ad networks to replace them with their own, which is unfair as only YouTubers and websites that have joined can make money from most Brave users.

If Brave actually cared, they would create an acceptable ads style feature which was free for everyone and allowed simple contextual banners while blocking ads which track you, take up most of the page, or have NSFW content.

Their approach is monopolistic as they have full control and can strangle YouTubers and websites by dropping pay at any time.

And Brenden Eich has said on Twitter that he plans to release “Brave Origin”, which is a paid version of Brave without the bloatware. That name is ironic as he is admitting that his browser is commercialised and bloated, which is similar to when gorhill gave uBlock way to Chris Aljoudi who commercialised it, which led him to create uBlock Origin.

If you use Brave, ditch it and look at using Librewolf or Helium instead, which both include no ads nor tracking and don’t have Brave News, Rewards, Wallet, Talk etc bloatware.

  • observes_depths@aussie.zone
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    6 days ago

    Honestly what do people have against Firefox that can’t be fixed with plugins? It’s the only decent browser that isn’t chrome based, and I think that deserves support. And with plugins and sync it’s a great experience.

    • steeznson@lemmy.world
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      3 days ago

      Provided I can still use about:config to clear out all the Mozilla crap then I’m happy with Firefox. The only add-on I use is ublock-origin on my phone and also NoScript on desktop.

    • zeb420@lemmy.world
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      For me it’s a combination of Mozilla making strange business decisions (removing of the “we never sell your data” policy) and the fact that a lot of websites take forever to load on Firefox.

      I’ve tried forks, LibreWolf pisses me off. Too many settings to change just to still have a broken browsing experience in the sake of privacy. If I need that level of privacy, I’ll use I2P/Tor.

      I hate the fact that chromium has won, but it’s getting difficult to avoid the fact that web developers don’t give a rats ass if the website doesn’t work well on Firefox.

      Brave was my primary for a while, but I switched to Vivaldi after reading about some of the BAT bait and switch.

    • d-RLY?@lemmy.ml
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      6 days ago

      My main browsers are FF or Zen (a fork of FF), but I think a lot of sites aren’t able to work with just a plug-in due to how deeply they are coded for Chromium. Some of them being Amazon sites like Luna, Amazon Music, and Audible (pretty sure their other media sites/services also refuse to work if any hint of non-Chromium browsers are detected. I have run into non-Amazon sites with media or similar tell me to “update your browser” or “use a supported browser” (which is at least more honest than telling me that my FF is “out of date”).

      While there are likely elements in some sites that actually can work with FF (I have had really random moments where I got part of a song to play on Amazon Music but then gives the “browser is out of date” message). The Chromium focused coding is IE all over again. Just a self-fulfilling cycle of making it look like FF is not as capable. And I hate that in the instances where changing the User Agent to be Chrome works, that it just keeps stats looking like Chrome and forks are what people are using (and might lead to seeming like FF is used less than it actually is).

      • observes_depths@aussie.zone
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        6 days ago

        I haven’t encountered anything like that, but maybe that’s because I wouldn’t touch anything Amazon with a 2 metre stick

        • d-RLY?@lemmy.ml
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          5 days ago

          Not a bad stance. But they are a major provider of media that regular users might use. They also tend to be the people that would rather not bother with FF if they see it as “not as capable” and never leave Chrome. Which further feeds the goals of Google to be the default just like MS did with IE (but much more cleaver by providing the base for endless forks).

          MS fucked up by caring that IE was the “only” option and didn’t push creating such a good base to have forks to keep their versions of “standards.” Google did an amazing job at pouring money into getting Chrome past the early years of lack of mature features (and while they still had good will of helping to get people away from IE).

          • gwl [he/him]@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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            6 days ago

            No.

            It’s very simple: if someone is alive and holds detestable views, then giving them money gives them a chance to then use that money to lobby for their views. And in many many many many many cases, they do exactly that.

            If someone is dead and holds detestable views, they’re unable to do anything about it (cause they’re dead)

  • PieMePlenty@lemmy.world
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    6 days ago

    I dislike any browser which blocks content (such as ads) by default. It may sound silly, but Imo, that’s not what a browser should be doing. It’s job is to act as an HTTP client, render HTML and do caching, storage and all the management which goes with it and offer any tools to tinker with it.
    The meaning of the content displayed should be of no concern to the browser as it is subjective.
    I will install an addon to deal with unwanted content as I see fit. Firefox is getting kinda bloated with all the things which come with it (pocket, accounts, default bookmarks…), but I can live with that.

    • wabasso@lemmy.ca
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      6 days ago

      What if we start from the premise of a browser being judged by its most popular use case?

      I’m happy to change some default settings to customize for my use case, knowing that most users that don’t know/care about such things are getting ads blocked by default (let’s be honest, I like crawling through settings each time I install new software regardless :P )

  • MrSulu@lemmy.ml
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    7 days ago

    Desktop = Librewolf, Mullvad and hardened firefox browsers. Strictly separating uses. Mobile (Android) = Cromite, Brave, Firefox and Tor. Again, separating uses.

  • brucethemoose@lemmy.world
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    7 days ago

    To those asking “which browser other than Firefox”

    https://helium.computer/

    It’s fantastic. It’s Chrome, stripped of junk, with full (not lite) Ublock Origin natively supported and shipped. What more could you want?

    And it can coexist alongside Firefox.

    Cromite is also great, but its antifingerprinting is so hardcore it breaks some sites. That’s perfect for shopping/private browsing, but a bit much for daily driving unless tracking resistance is your #1 priority.

    On iOS and OSX, Orion (from Kagi) is sublime. It’s Safari based (which you want for Apple stuff), but heavily modified with a native blocker, and supports extensions if you really need them. There aren’t many Safari “forks” like it.


    I say this because I’ve been through a gauntlet of trying a bunch. Bromite, ungoogled chromium, waterfox, pale moon, Thorium, Vivaldi, all sorts of iOS apps and Firefox/Chromium forks. And these feel like endgame to me. Helium is just about perfect (as long as its development isn’t dropped), and Orion is close aside from some UI quirks.

      • brucethemoose@lemmy.world
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        6 days ago

        Eh. Firefox is fine.

        The only FF fork I’ve ever used for some time is Cachy Browser, as it shipped with my distro and was ostensibly amore optimized. But even they depreciated it in lieu of vanilla Firefox.

        And Firefox gets faster security patches anyway.

        I’m more interested in Chrome forks because it’s Google spyware. And, as much as I don’t like it, I find Chromium-based browser to be faster. That doesn’t matter so much on desktop, but the difference is pretty dramatic on Android.

    • typhoon@lemmy.world
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      6 days ago

      If you used Ungoogled Chromium why did you switch and recommend Helium? Can’t you achieve Helium settings and tweaks on Ungoogled Chromium? Why add an additional party to potentially delay security updates?

      • brucethemoose@lemmy.world
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        6 days ago

        Ungoogled Chromium does not support full uBlock Origin. Last I checked, it wont auto-update itself on Windows without a 3rd party tool, and I remember it having some other “quirks” from the stuff it strips out. The delay for security updates seems pretty minimal, too.

        And personally, I like the bangs feature, now that I’m using Orion on iOS anyway.


        But its based on ungoogled-chromium, so if you prefer to use upstream, that makes a lot of sense. Helium’s main pitch seems to be an “easier to install” ungoogled chromium anyway.

  • mfed1122@discuss.tchncs.de
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    6 days ago

    Am I the only person who uses mobile tab grouping and sees it as a must-have? Its ridiculous that Firefox is over 5 years behind on this incredible QoL feature. To me it’s almost as bad as if a browser didn’t support bookmarks. It’s just ridiculous at this point.

  • ColdWater@lemmy.ca
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    7 days ago

    I’m waiting for Servo to able to play YouTube videos then I’ll stop using Firefox (Floorp)

  • LiamBox@lemmy.ml
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    7 days ago

    Ah yes let me use Helium

    Whoop it uses google’s browser monopoly

    Firefox then

    Whoo it is chained by googles search engine deal

    • Credibly_Human@lemmy.world
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      7 days ago

      Firefox then

      Whoo it is chained by googles search engine deal

      This is some serious self eating idealist talk here.

      In life you must realize there are many situations where you think about the context and consequences of your choices, and you choose the closest to viable option.

      Firefox is that.

      It sucks that there is that google deal, but ultimately the world effects of firefox dying are wide reaching despite its diminishing numbers and so much greater than so many casually Mozilla doomer takes realize.

  • VoxAliorum@lemmy.ml
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    7 days ago

    Name a solution for a mobile phone webbrowser without ads including youtube ads that allows playing youtube while the screen is turned off and I am ready to switch.

    • BigPotato@lemmy.world
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      7 days ago

      Firefox… I mean, regular old from the app store Firefox… Not even Waterfox or anything, just Firefox.

      How did you end up at Brave without knowing Firefox could do all that?

    • Credibly_Human@lemmy.world
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      7 days ago

      Literally Firefox.

      I feel like the reasons are obvious and I am constantly amazed at people who choose offshoots that end up having problems jsut as bad or worse than Chrome.

      • Firefox actually uses an engine independent of Chromium

      • Firefox keeps developer documentation for the actual open web in a a clear fashion better than anyone else with MDN.

      • Firefox is responsible for all of the heavy lifting for any of the browsers downstream of it that people seem to want to switch to so that Mozilla is less supported and the browsers they are on also break (which is bizzare footgun behaviour in my opinion, and exactly why the people who are idealists inherently can’t win. They shoot themselves in the foot with idealism so hard that companeis don’t even have to care about their opinions).

      • Firefox has more resistant than the engine makers of any other browser to anti autonomy web changes like Chromes manifest 3, tvarious new tracking mechanisms and more.

      Excuse a little bit of snark at hypothetical responses below, but Im just so frustrated Ill let off a little steam here:

      bUt Ai.

      So they have a few AI features you have to purposefully find or stumble into, and that means you are going to do everything in your power to make sure your last actual chance to avoid completely Google domination dies too?

      You are basically begging for the even more intense enshitification that will come if Firefox actually dies.

      bUt SoMeOnE eLsE cAn CoNtInUe DeVeLoPmEnT

      Oh yeah? Someone else is going to take on this project with a massive amount of legacy code, inside knowledge and hundreds of people working on it constantly to keep it completely up to date??

      You must have been confused when I mentioned above Mozilla does the heavy lifting for the browsers down stream. Just because someone makes a fork that removes features doesnt mean they are equipped to handle the level of work done in the code they are downstream of.


      Anyways, the bottom line is, for now, if you actually value open source, the answer is Firefox.

      • scala@lemmy.ml
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        7 days ago

        Or one of Firefox forks. I like waterwolf due having a mobile app

    • Zerush@lemmy.ml
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      7 days ago

      Vivaldi, the only decent Chromium and from the EU (Norway), green energy server in Iceland (Geothermic energy)

    • Aussiemandeus@aussie.zone
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      7 days ago

      That’s all I use on my phone and I think it’s great.

      The search is kinda average and never returns results that matter when I’m searching businesses since I don’t allow location access but I still like it.

      I use brave on my pc but might need to change now

      • mic_check_one_two@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        7 days ago

        DuckDuckGo just proxies Bing search results, FWIW. It doesn’t run its own crawlers/indexers. So if you’re getting bad results, it’s just because Bing fucking sucks.

    • texture@lemmy.world
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      6 days ago

      ive been on lemmy for 23 days. this is easily the worst comment ive seen yet.

      “all companies do shady stuff like google and apple” is a wild thing to say in an opensource community.

  • bigmamoth@lemmy.world
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    7 days ago

    so it s bad bc of some opt in feature ? tbf it work great and suit my use case i dont see any argument that will make me ditch it

    • locahosr443@lemmy.world
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      7 days ago

      It’s bad because it’s a Peter thiel funded MAGA browser run by someone who hates people for their sexual orientation

      • bigmamoth@lemmy.world
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        7 days ago

        And ? Wont you find me ridiculous if i said i didnt want to use software coded by trans ppl ? what do i care about the opinion of the guys or what he does with his money ?

        • TheGrandNagus@lemmy.world
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          7 days ago

          Are you serious? Of course people should care if people are using their power and influence to strip certain people of their rights.

              • bigmamoth@lemmy.world
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                7 days ago

                it s a never ending argument that s only based on vibes. We can literally make dozen of similar one with any brand or product. I mean it s a choice to place trans right uper than child labor, and you r free to do so but lecturing other on the principle you do it isnt fair.

                • TheGrandNagus@lemmy.world
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                  7 days ago

                  Nobody mentioned child labour.

                  Thinking gay and trans people should have human rights does not mean you must be fine with child labour.