Modrinth app shows non-adrinth ads.

[sacred depot]

I thought Modrinth used Adrinth, which is supposed to be privacy-friendly. But now I'm getting an ad for random (probably malware) websites. WTF RINTH???

The modrinth blog post about Modrinth+ mentions they are switching to Aditude.

Aditude provides analytics services. I don't want my launcher to track me. I don't want it to show invasive ads for questionable websites.

IT PROPOSED ADS IN FRENCH, I HAVE NEVER USED MODRINTH IN FRENCH NOR SHARED MY LOCATION TO IT. WHAT THE HELL

[lone granite]

your location can simply be determined from your IP without any tracking

[onyx spade]

Yeah i was completely fine with adrinth too but this is just not something i like in the slightest

I personally chose to just block the ads through other means

[sacred depot]

I stand corrected. But still : this is advertising very questionable content, probably malware. And is the advertiser open source? if they aren't, that makes modrinth partly closed-source, upstream. Then, modrinth shouldn't be advertised as "open source".

[onyx spade]

Thats not how open source works…?

[sacred depot]

the modrinth app is using an advertising service which doesn't show its source code (server-side). So, it's not a fully open source service. Just like youtube isn't open source for instance. If you can find the source code of the server (and host it yourself, sometimes) then THAT is open source.

[onyx spade]

The code that rinth wrote is still open source?

Using a closed source api doesn’t just magically make your code closed

You can still license and ‘open’ up your code however you want

[sacred depot]

Yes, it doesn't. But the service, the launcher service, becomes only partly open-source. The software that you run isn't just the code you can find online anymore. It's what you find + extra proprietary bits interacting alongside the app. But it's not my main concern anyway, I just find it outrageous that modrinth doesn't stick to adrinth on its own app, and lets Aditude recommend very sus websites. Why not simply advertise on the website and keep adrinth on the launcher?

[onyx spade]

Ok well then modrinth is also not fully open source since it uses windows 😂

Agree with the second part tho

[sacred depot]

wdym it uses windows? it's running IN windows but doesn't USE it for any service (and it runs on other operating systems), however it USES Aditude for adverts

Yeah I'll let go of the argument sorry, make love not war

[lone granite]

as banana points out, this is simply not how open source works, you are free to depend on proprietary pieces, the open source part applies only to code you write. as for the ads, it's unfortunately how the things are with advertising, we simply have no resources to build our advertising network at the moment and make all the ad deals, because this is an unfathomable amount of work. so we embed aditude, which are using google ads as a base, and filter the ones that are poor quality. if you find ads that are actually malware, get the url and report them to us at https://support.modrinth.com so we can block them, you can also report them to google.

we don't like those ads either, but we need them right now, otherwise there won't be any revenue for creators and not even modrinth. we tried our best to make them as non-intrusive as possible. if you don't like them, and have few dollars to spare, you can subscribe to https://modrinth.plus and then sign in to your modrinth account through the app to remove the ads

[sacred depot]

You know I was actually planning on buying modrinth +!
But I don't want to support a service that relies on Google ads. If it's planned to move away from Google advertising, for sure, I'll chip in a few bucks every darn month! But please don't make it permanent.

[feral orbit]

I keep getting ads with very questionable content and would there be any way to block these ads on the app, just for now?

[hybrid charm]

we gotta do what we gotta do. Modrinth+ is provided precisely for this reason, it gives you the choice to support us directly so we don't have to rely on ads. If enough people were willing to pay, hell ideally we'd have no ads at all, but that is simply unrealistic.

As we've stated many times, we'd love to build out Adrinth as a first party and privacy friendly ad network but we simply do not have the resources at this time

so I don't entirely see the logic in, "I would've given you money when you didn't need it, but now that you do I don't want to"

the more money we get from sources that are not ads the less we rely on them

[hybrid charm]

any malicious or offensive ads can be blocked by us, send us the link the ad is promoting and we can do so

[sacred depot]

What I want isn't really logic, you're right in seeing this inconsistency.

I am actually conflicted right now, should I chip in or refrain, considering the status quo?

I keep seeing you all want to avoid advertising as a means to fund Rinth.
But at the same time I don't have the guarantee that the money I give will go towards this: less advertising for free users, with better monetisation from other sources.

Maybe by creating exclusive services for premium (server hosting, with easy modding?). Maybe by establishing a public roadmap for people to see what's planned and have more reasons to support the platform(s).

I want my money to go against advertising. But I'm not sure it will, because it's always easier to rely on third party ads, and I worry that once in, Rinth will rely on them.

So what are your plans for the future? Is Adrinth dead? I hope not:(

[hybrid charm]

as I said in my message, we hope we can do Adrinth eventually but it's not realistic right now with a team of 2 volunteers

we'd probably need a team of at least a couple full-time people dedicated to the development of it, brand outreach, legalities, etc

we have some plans to be more transparent about our roadmap in the future, for competition-reasons we're a bit more tight-lipped about it for now

some of our competitors have already copied in-development features from our Labs server and beat us to the punch on releasing them, so we're pretty cautious about leaking our big moves so we can actually bring them to market first

[frosty swift]

Is there any possibility of not using another ad-provider? Googles' ads aren't exactly known for being very good tbh. It also seems a bit cautious to use a third party service that you know knowingly provide malicious ads to your service and the action to fix it is "just let us know, we'll block them". Seems very reactive rather than proactive. Sorry if this comes off as snippy, it's not my itention. 😔

[hybrid charm]

unfortunately there's not really any proactive ad networks that pay enough to keep us susatainable

[frosty swift]

That's a shame tbh. I don't personally (and I'm sure many others too) like the idea of googles instrusive and dodgy ads being on the app/site that cant be controlled. I do hope you can find another solution that definitely fits the needs of the service though, such as maybe server advertising which used to bring in good money many years ago etc, or as I've seen currently server hosts - hell maybe even sponsored mods idk

or at the very least not have it display almost everywhere on the app, but rather just specific pages - don't exactly like seeing an ad when just looking through my instances 😅

[hybrid charm]

me neither. I really don't like the ads which is why I have Modrinth+

[frosty swift]

Would any of the above suggestions be possible in the future, or what's your thoughts on these? Just tryna spitball ideas for y'all is all cos the service is actually quite good and definitely trendsetting compared to the options that have previously been available through the years

[hybrid charm]

we do have some other monetization ideas which should come to fruition eventually

[frosty swift]

hopefully so. I'll leave the subject there and hope all goes well and another solution can be found 🙂

[pine loom]

The way you're placing the ads is a disaster, in my opinion.

The app itself is beautifully crafted, and ads of this magnitude ruin the user experience

You can mix it into a list item. Make it more coherent and less intrusive

[lone granite]

that would actually be worse. because right now it's clearly distinguished and you know it's an ad because it just doesn't belong

but if it's in the list, it will get in your way

keep in mind too too that the reason ads look so bad is because the app's design is from time when they weren't considered at all

plus the ads are implemented in the most insane way in the app apparently

[hybrid charm]

this ^, the app has not yet been updated to the new design like the website has been

when it's updated they should fit into the UI more naturally