According to the tracking scanner Exodus (can be found on F-Droid), which keeps an updated database on trackers and runs your installed app against its register, you can track what apps are tracking you and clues of how. Saw that Boost is tracking me and uninstalled it and went straight to Jerboa. Jerboa is pretty similar to good ole’ RedditIsFun-app and easy to use, so I am personally recommending it.
From F-Droid:
Exodus (Exodus show you trackers and permissions in apps installed on your device.) https://f-droid.org/packages/org.eu.exodus_privacy.exodusprivacy/
This is a rather sensationalist headline.
Every so often software developers need to eat food and live beneath shelter.
The developer of Boost @rmayayo@lemmy.world provides a free version that’s supported by ads, or you can purchase an ad free experience for a one time cost. That’s been a standard business since forever.
There isn’t any grand conspiracy here.
I paid for the product, I encourage and support products i like instead of seeing ads, whenever i can.
Developer’s needs are pretty simple, however. Keep clean straw for bedding, fresh coffee, and unimpeded access to an Ethernet jack. Your developer can have gummy worms or beer in small quantities, as a treat. Of course, the bulk of their diet should be ramen/developer chow. A simple correction, such as deleting system32 or not properly shutting down Linux, is usually all that is needed. They’ll provide you with years of faithful service.
Adopt a developer today!
Yup, the dev commented on this a while back here:
https://lemmy.ca/post/6072534/3382664
Dev here.
The dialog and its content is not created by me, it is a standard solution from Google to comply with GDPR and other laws. More info here: https://support.google.com/admob/answer/10114014?hl=en
The consent dialog is also required by Google AdMob to show ads, and it is shown when the ad network is initialized.
When the app launches, first it checks for the remove ads purchase, and if it is not present, it will initialize the ads sdk. The ad network is not initialized if the remove ads purchase is detected.
Boost for Reddit was using the very same ad networks and consent dialog.
(In fact they’ve commented on this a few times)
I personally liked Boost, and paid for the ad free version to support the development. For what it’s worth, I’ve also donated to / bought a few others for similar reasons, and I keep a few Lemmy apps installed so I can test things out on the admin side.
Without recommending any particular app, I’d recommend this site, which lets you compare and filter by the factors that are important to you: https://lemmyapps.com/
If you want a guide for new users, we have one here (tldr it links to the site above): https://fedecan.ca/en/guide/lemmy/for-users/mobile-apps
As long as there is transparency, users can choose. Personally, I would rather not use a service at all than have ads or tracking.
It is an excellent app, I just paid for the version without ads, that’s all you have to do.
As the other comments are saying, this is made very clear when you launch the app for the first time that it is ad supported, and you can donate a small amount to get all tracking and ads removed.
Love the app and I want the dev to continue development so I paid for the ad free. Devs are people and need money to live too, you know this post was just sensationalized for your own clicks.
Yeah there is a dialogue on first launch telling you it’s ad supported software and that you can pay a small fee to remove all ads. Your post here is old news about an old strategy and throughout the comments here you claim it’s secretive which is false.
It’s a charitable reading to say you’re uninformed. I would lean more toward you wanting people to be misinformed about Boost, because as others point out, its ad support is called out in multiple ways before you use it, but you don’t care. Instead, you choose to call this completely common and standard way of supporting an app “predatory” and “secret”, neither of which near truth. Op, is your account the alt of the Sync dev or something?
Op, is your account the alt of the Sync dev or something?
I wish that was the case. @ljdawson@lemmy.world - the Sync dev - has been MIA for over half a year now. Which sucks, because Sync currently has a breaking bug causing it to not show posts as read, making it mostly unusable. I had to cancel my subscription for it that I was happily paying for before to support his work.
wow… subscription and also MIA that long!
It was pretty common for him to disappear for a while and then pop up with a whole bunch of new features. I didn’t mind that before and gladly paid the $1.50/month subscription to support his work and make Lemmy more accessible. But yeah, can’t justify it now that the app shows all links as unread.
Yeah, I remember seeing complaints about that from time to time. Sounds like it’s gotten worse.
