[joshuamorton]

While I "technically" have a conflict of interest, when brave launched I had some concerns about how and when creators were paid, and the responses amounted to brave stealing from them unless they signed up.

Unlike patreon (or Google contributor), if the page doesn't sign up, brave still replaces the ads, but they end up keeping the money.

In those cases, their business model is much closer to a Comcast than an uBlock, and it certainly appears like strong arming creators/sites into joining, or forcing them to forgo revenue and donate it to the browser. If you can't see why that would be upsetting to content creators, idk.

[gingerlime]

That's a very interesting point.

I think there are some subtle, but important, differences though.

Brave users by default block all ads. So those users won't see the ads on content creators sites anyway. Content creators shouldn't feel outraged towards those more than they can feel outraged about any other ad-blocking users.

Some of those Brave users might opt-in for ads that are promised not to compromise their privacy.

So I totally understand that some creators might feel strong-armed if they already use ads. But they shouldn't feel any worse than when faced with ad-blocking users. They do have the chance to opt-in and rely on privacy-respecting ads and get some revenue that they otherwise wouldn't get.

I guess if there was an alternative ad model that was less intrusive, and content creators relied on it, they might have a much stronger reason to be upset. I'm not aware of many creators that use privacy-friendly ads, and it seems like Brave is at least attempting to create this model?

No affiliation with Brave whatsoever. Only found out about it a couple of weeks ago.

[joshuamorton]

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15730294

See this comment and the surrounding chain.

Assuming I'm a creator, the ussue is that brave is monetizing my content and I get nothing unless I opt in to brave, instead of the system that I already have set up to monetize myself.

Ad blockers don't make money by replacing the ads. Brave does. That's why it's more similar to an isp hijacking ads than ad blocking, it's just happening in the browser instead of in the network.

[gingerlime]

Brave isn't making money if its users choose to block ads.

Users now have the choice to make money from opting-in to ads. But only ads that protect their privacy. Brave enables this, and takes a smaller cut than the user.

Sites choosing to monetize themselves are doing so at the expense of the user, whose privacy is compromised in the process.

I don't think Brave or the User is hijacking things here more than you can say that monetizing sites are hijacking user privacy.

Monetizing sites don't give the user the option to pay for content via other means, or ads that protect their privacy (or even the awareness of what transaction takes place). At least Brave and its users are giving sites the option to get revenue here (revenue that otherwise would be lost if users opt for ad-blocking instead).

N.B. Looking at [0], Brendan Eich stated that "We don't replace ads on publisher sites without that publisher as partner; they get 70% of the gross revenue, user gets 15%.".

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18155869

[joshuamorton]

>Brave isn't making money if its users choose to block ads.

Correct. I don't disagree at all with this statement. In the context of just blocking ads, Brave is doing approximately the same thing as any number of other browsers or ad blockers which aren't really objectionable.

>Sites choosing to monetize themselves are doing so at the expense of the user, whose privacy is compromised in the process.

Sure, ok.

>Sites choosing to monetize themselves are doing so at the expense of the user, whose privacy is compromised in the process.

If as Eich claims, they have permission from all publishers, than this is more ok. But if not, the difference is that in one case, the reader, the ad company, and the publisher all get something of value (an article, money & data, money respectively). But if Brave is actually replacing ads without publisher consent, then the user and brave get something of value, and the publisher gets nothing.

>Monetizing sites don't give the user the option to pay for content via other means, or ads that protect their privacy (or even the awareness of what transaction takes place). At least Brave and its users are giving sites the option to get revenue here (revenue that otherwise would be lost if users opt for ad-blocking instead).

Depends, Brave actually explored an option to monetize in a patreon like fashion [0]. Which sounds great, but there's a huge caveat that makes me less inclined to believe Eich elsewhere. Specifically, The "Payments" tool allows any user to donate to any creator or site. Then Brave sends an email to the webmaster address for that internet site (which often doesn't match the publisher: think subdomains). Then, if people continue donating and the site owner never registers, brave will eventually just keep any money donated to the site[1].

In other words, if I run a popular hosted blog (yes these exist, and are probably some of the best candidates for patreon-like funding), I can't actually get verified because I don't control the DNS records for my site, and I will have to sit back and watch as people unknowingly donate money to Brave instead of me.

They then market this as

>Brave even lets you contribute to your favorite creators automatically

So color me suspicious.

[0]: https://brave.com/publishers/#getverified

[1]: https://brave.com/faq-payments/#unclaimed-funds