I use ad blockers and open source privacy focused software whenever I can but occasionally I have to use computers that don’t belong to me or an older phone where my usual applications aren’t installed and seeing all the advertisements just feels dirty and dystopian.
I think the worst ads are the text to speech ones that say “Download this app today”. The unblinking energenic people saying you can make a living at home are probably a close second.
I use a VPN which has an excellent ad & bs blocker. But occasionally some sites need me to turn it off to pay for things or whatever and I forget to turn it back on and end up browsing the internet in its normal state.
And wow… welcome to commerce central. It’s not that all the ads are obnoxious though some are, but the quantity of them is out of control on some websites.
To be fair, I’ve found it’s a good rule of thumb that the quality of a website is usually proportionate to the less amount of ads they have.
I also reviewed mobile games for a while and had to play without a VPN to get the same experience most players would get - game ads are the worst. Unrepresentative of the games they’re trying to sell, but also often sexist (veering towards misogynistic), obnoxious and with false endings.
Which VPN?
I use Surfshark but I expect most of the quality ones offer something similar. Nord and Express often get mentioned as the best VPNs but Surfshark as the best cheap VPN - I’m impressed with it, would recommend. You can even use Chrome on Android and most sites seem like normal, though I’ve switched to Firefox anyway
(If you are thinking of using a VPN just don’t use a free one because they’re probably dodgy)
Removed by mod
“inversely proportionate”