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Comment by jansan | Hacker News Reader

So hosting an ad is now illegitimate? How about embedding a video? And why should you not embed stuff from a CDN?

Ads (particularly ads served by third parties) have never been legitimate, that's why most users who know what they're about use an adblocker to stop them. Videos should only be embedded once the user consents to that (which could be implemented using a first-party button that the user clicks to affirm their consent and which then loads the third party video component.

> Ads (particularly ads served by third parties) have never been legitimate

That's a very extreme take. They're how many services actually exist.

Also, consent to an embedded video? My brother in Christ, your browser requested the video.

> Also, consent to an embedded video? My brother in Christ, your browser requested the video.

This kind of attitude is why I block JS and cross-origin requests by default. Unfortunately this is not a reasonable option for the less technically inclined who deserve protection too.

It's not an extreme take, it's the way most people with a technical clue feel, evidenced by widespread use of adblockers by anybody who actually knows how to use their computer.

Videos can easily be embedded and loaded from local resources, too. No need to shove the whole of YouTube down somebody's throat, if a simple <video>-element with an mp4 file does the same. You want the comfort and features of YouTube? Ok, then let the user decide if they want that too, ask for their consent.

Have you ever heard of the concept of copyright?

Taking (kind of) care of that is part of the featureset and "comfort" of YouTube, yes. Nevertheless, a page can work wonderfully without that.

It is not a problem to load a static (not changing based on user data) ad from your own server. Using a CDN is likely legitimate interest when it is not using private data for other reasons than serving the content.

(I'm not a lawyer.)

THat would require small companies having to implement their own Ad business. Sorry, your idea is cute, but completely unrealistic.

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