Improving Ad Collection

[mneunomne]

Testing shows we are collecting fewer ads now because:

• Too many blocks occurring (and therefore, too many individual allow rules are needed in filters/adnauseam.txt)
• Cosmetic rules on parent divs of iframes cause them not to render, and ads inside are then uncollectable
• Links not present in the HTML: script-based link to page on-click on ad (?)
• Lack of specific filters being updated on major websites
• Google Ads have many variations of layout, we lack selectors for many of them
• Background-images are not inline in html, thus aren't triggered via querySelector on divs with background-image
• HTML animation Ads
• Video Ads

What we can do about it

• Do more ADN-allow rules (allowing blocks from fewer lists, focusing on the badware filter lists)
• Change change cosmetic filters so that there are less display: none cases (perhaps replace with opacity: 0;?)
• Modfiy our "active" state to allow more ads to appear to users, but more will then be clicked (?)
• Collect video ads as lists (need to think how to display it on the vault) ?
• Remove blocking rules from adnauseam that were made simply to hide ads

[mneunomne]

Current non adn-allow lists:

  // allow blocks only from this set of lists (recheck this)
  const enabledBlockLists = ['EasyPrivacy',
    'uBlock filters – Badware risks', 'uBlock filters – Unbreak',
    'uBlock filters – Privacy', 'Malware domains', 'Malware Domain List',
    'Anti-ThirdpartySocial', 'AdNauseam filters', 'Fanboy’s Annoyance List',
    'CHN: CJX\'s Annoyance List', 'Spam404', 'Anti-Adblock Killer | Reek',
    'Fanboy’s Social Blocking List', 'Malware domains (long-lived)',
    'Adblock Warning Removal List', 'Malware filter list by Disconnect',
    'Basic tracking list by Disconnect', 'EFF DNT Policy Whitelist',
    'AdGuard Annoyances', 'AdGuard Tracking Protection'
  ];

suggested change:

  // allow blocks only from this set of lists (recheck this)
  const enabledBlockLists = [
    'uBlock filters – Badware risks', 'uBlock filters – Unbreak', 
    'Malware domains', 'Malware Domain List','Anti-ThirdpartySocial', 
    'AdNauseam filters', 'Spam404', 'Anti-Adblock Killer | Reek',
    'Fanboy’s Social Blocking List', 'Malware domains (long-lived)',
    'Adblock Warning Removal List', 'Malware filter list by Disconnect',
    'Basic tracking list by Disconnect', 'EFF DNT Policy Whitelist',
  ];

[mneunomne]

So I made some changes in the #2751 branch:

• removed some of the enabledBlockLists filters so there are more adn-allows
• made some improvements in the collection of background images on children divs
• added some more querySelectors to find children images on ads
• changed the styling in the "showDebugAds" parameter, so that its easier to debug ad collection
• Added some more filters related to the google ads
• changed the styling of hiding ads from display: none to opacity: 0; height: 1px

this seems to improve the ad collection on big websites, while retaining blocking, including on youtube because those are more reliant on scriptlets. But probably more ads will end up going through on "active" mode. Strict would become more recomended if the user priority is ad-hiding and clicking/collecting comes second.

[mneunomne]

@dhowe let me know your thought and if we should go through with this method to improve ad collection. Maybe we need some extra messaging for the users regarding this approach? I'm not sure

[dhowe]

yes, this sounds like a good plan - as we've discussed, ad collection needs to be the primary concern going forward