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OSX Sequoia : Hide ...
 

OSX Sequoia : Hide Distracting Items

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(having installed this morning) Following a link to the Manchester Evening News from a thread I thought I'd have a go at OSX / Safari's new 'hide distracting items' feature for web pages. Annoying pops up and floating ads on the page become a fun game of whack-a-mole and they pop into a little shower of stars and disappear when you click on them.

Would I be right to assume, unlike an adblocker, from the site's point of view the ads are still being served?

Anyway something to amuse the free members for a while I guess 🙂

Perhaps in 15.0.2 that can add a totaliser and forumites can post their high scores.

 
Posted : 18/10/2024 3:17 pm
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had heard about it but not used it yet. Just tried it on that **** saracen ad on the front page which apparently is not an ad. kaboooooom!! awesome 🙂

it's kind of like a 90s techno-thriller film where a computer gets a virus and stuff just starts vaporising off the screen :):):)

 
Posted : 18/10/2024 3:31 pm
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I was going to say that I can do it on my phone too, but it seems to have disappeared with the 18.0.1 update?
There’s now just an option to turn off content blockers.

 
Posted : 18/10/2024 4:00 pm
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Oh, it’s still there on other sites but not on here?

 
Posted : 18/10/2024 4:02 pm
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Oh, it’s still there on other sites but not on here?

works for me on here but I'm running 18.1b6 at the moment!

 
Posted : 18/10/2024 4:15 pm
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I was going to say that I can do it on my phone too

Ah - im still on 17 something-or-other

 
Posted : 18/10/2024 4:18 pm
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Would I be right to assume, unlike an adblocker, from the site’s point of view the ads are still being served?

Is it a built in feature of the Safari browser, not an extension or third party app?  If so, I can't see the issue.  Especially as a feature to hide "distracting items" isn't necessarily focused solely on adverts, It sounds great if it works, can I run Safari on a Chromebook and Android phone?

 
Posted : 18/10/2024 4:22 pm
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I'd really like to zap these half rendered psychedelic side banners!  The very definition of "distracting items"!

Screenshot 2024-10-18 16.24.01

 
Posted : 18/10/2024 4:26 pm
kelvin reacted

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There's a plugin for Chrome called consent-o-matic which does something similar.  You tell it what you do and don't agree to, then it does all the cookie consent clicking for you.  I've been using it for a couple of months and it's showing nearly 3,000 clicks saved.  It's my new favourite thing.

 
Posted : 18/10/2024 4:34 pm
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can I run Safari on a Chromebook and Android phone?

You can but Opera is a better mobile browser as it has proper text reflow, and it comes with a built in ad-blocker which is mostly quite effective.

 
Posted : 18/10/2024 4:49 pm
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Thanks both.  Cougar, that sounds like a great option.  I'll take a look.

 
Posted : 18/10/2024 4:51 pm
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Topic starter
 

There’s a plugin for Chrome called consent-o-matic which does something similar

yes but does it make things burst into stars?

im a recent convert to Wordiply so seeing a little star burst makes me feel incredibly clever.

 
Posted : 19/10/2024 9:15 am
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Was curious about this - including a ad blocker with the built in browser on macos/iOS would surely be a bit counter intuitive given apple make money through ads.

And sure enough, it's only designed for static content so not really suitable for ads.

 
Posted : 19/10/2024 10:06 am
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works well and on iOS as well. doesn't make anything here load quicker. this is the slowest loading website I visit by a large margin...

 
Posted : 19/10/2024 10:22 am
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yes but does it make things burst into stars?

You can have it show a mini-animation of what it's doing, which is oddly satisfying.

 
Posted : 19/10/2024 12:19 pm
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I love it. I haven't used it for ads, but it works for pop-ups.

I am finally getting rid of those 'sign in with google..' boxes, and I can read The Guardian without getting the 'While you're here ...' rubbish.

I just went to try it on MSN, which I believe has more distractions than anywhere else I've looked. I clicked 'Hide distracting items', moved the cursor over the page, and the entire page was suggested as a distraction! Apple are wiser than we realise.

 
Posted : 19/10/2024 1:43 pm

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apple make money through ads.

only on the App Store not really on web. That’s why they turn off 3rd party cookies and introduced app tracking transparency - good for privacy plus mostly hurts meta and Google.

 
Posted : 19/10/2024 5:43 pm
Free Member
 

There’s a plugin for Chrome called consent-o-matic which does something similar.  You tell it what you do and don’t agree to, then it does all the cookie consent clicking for you.

There’s a similar utility for iOS and MacOS called superagent. Costs a couple of quid but well worth it for those cookie consents that take the pee with hidden ‘reject all’ functions.

 
Posted : 20/10/2024 5:59 am
phil5556 reacted

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