As a publisher, most of us do not care about Firefox either. They have done us no good. So we don't even bother to test on it.
Their so called "Tracking Protection" is nothing more then a gimmick. It can be bypassed easily using methods other then cookies. All it did was reduce the revenue from ads because of no cookies (the legitimate way to track id's). It did an insignificant harm to Google. But it reduced the revenue from Firefox users by a huge percentage for publishers.
Firefox is losing because it favors the wrong demographics. Firefox offers nothing much exclusive to users and neither to developers. Most people using ad blockers, use Firefox on mobile.
Sad to see it the way it is. Safari did the same. But the market share is still relevant, but it is declining as well. Once it reaches a certain point, no one will bother to test for it either.
DNT was a shit show. DNT should have always required manual user intervention to be respected.
Google's interests apart from their AMP project aligns with the publishers. If we win, they win.
Businesses that make their money on ads have no reason to ensure their product works on a segment of the browser market that almost entirely blocks ads.
> DNT was a shit show. DNT should have always required manual user intervention to be respected. It doesn't mater if it's on by default or not.
Sorry but that is nonsense. You should respect the DNT just because you're are receiving it and so being asked not to track.
It's perfectly possible to serve content aware adverts using BATs[1] without the creepy surveillance. You don't need to track so if you're asked to stop, just stop.
The tracking protection using DNT and the like is indeed a gimmick.
It is an ineffectual and passive way to hinder tracking.
Better ways are to be more active: to reject third-party cookies, disallow sites from storing anything, uninstall Flash and such, run AdBlock Plus, run uBlock Origin and so on.
I mean, if I visit a random site which is full of non-original content and/or simple regurgitation of press releases, why should I care about its business model and ability to monetize through tracking me? Sorry, show me value from the get-go and I might come back and let you "monetize" through whitelisting or something.
The purpose of DNT is not to stop tracking. It's to tell websites explicitly that you don't want to be tracked.
No one receiving a DNT header can say we didn't know people coming to the site didn't want to be tracked because they hadn't logged in.
It doesn't mater if it's on by default. It should still be respected.
That's different job to blocking trackers or ads.
That a site is ignoring DNT is just a sign that they are run by bad actors. It's no different to logging in to a site, opting out of tracking and the site ignoring that and tracking you secretly anyway.
...or putting some dark pattern UI in front of that option so that it's hard to tell if you've opted out or not.
But there is very little left to innovate. Almost all kinds of apps are there. AGI is only possible by large corps because of the massive compute requirement.
The next Google/Facebook will be made when either of the following criteria are met:
1. They mess up hard, causing a critical mass to boycott it (highly unlikely)
2. New world changing communication technology is invented, similar to the internet. With similar applications AND government regulations delaying them from developing on the new technology
3. Processing chips become so fast that the average person is able to afford and run a 1 petaflop computer just like the cost of buying and running a PC's today.
Amazon was possible because of the internet. Facebook will remain the King until some communication related world changing technology arrives.
Too many small publishers are not good. The small publishers which gain revenue because of Google are too dependent on it. Hence they cannot criticize Google else indirectly their SEO is affected. Larger independent publishers have to compete with smaller clickbaity non professional publishers and also have to serve clickbait. Because Ad revenue is mostly a zero sum game. The smaller publishers who do not have many journalists just make clickbait titles eat into professionals who are also dependent on Ads.
It is in Google's interest to have multiple small publishers instead of few large publishers, because Google can blackmail the smaller ones more easily and multiple publisher speaking against something is more difficult then few grouped publishers.
If the publishers and Google's interest clash, it is a good thing for the readers. If they align, it is a very good thing for Google, a little good for publishers and bad for readers.
every publisher is "small" at first. This is about not rocking the boat for larger publishers by better, maybe more professional, upstarts.
The argument about click-baity titles is relevant to whether a publisher is small or large. Every large publisher now has a yellow press sub-brand that just pushes out trash with click-baits.
Larger ad dependent publishers have to push out click bait because smaller publishers push it out. If larger publishers would not do clickbait if smaller publishers do, they go out of business, because smaller ones steal the share of money.
Do you have any source for that? According to the EFF even the pretty URL itself is enough:
> The Directive is extremely vague on what defines a "link" or a "news story" and implies that an "excerpt" consists of more than one single word from a news-story (many URLs contain more than a single word from the headline).
No. This means less click bait. Ad revenue is a zero sum game mostly. The shit news site are no longer able to clickbait in Google news. More share of money goes to publishers despite less traffic. Clicbaiters lose.
