About 8 months ago I got pretty tired of seeing billionaire spam online. I could not bear to read about yet another rich guy who launched themselves (or their $200,000 car) into outer space 🚀 . I did not care about their expert opinion on the latest meme coin back then. I do not care about their expert opinion on the dangers of AI today.

So… I developed a tiny, free, and open source Firefox browser add-on called “Block the Rich”. It is completely local and private. No data is tracked. No data is phoned home.

The concept is pretty simple: whenever I load a web page, the extension quickly analyzes the content and intelligently blurs out any references to the Forbes Top 10 Billionaires. Some former and wannabe billionaires are blurred out of courtesy as well (I’m looking at you Trump and Kanye 🙄).

This project is a very early prototype that I built in the span of a few days. I have so many awesome ideas for enhancements but the truth is that the wind got completely knocked out of my sails when I put myself out there on Reddit many moons ago. There was absolutely zero public interest. To this day my wife and I are the only ones using the original prototype.

People of Lemmy, do you think there is a place on the internet for such a project, or is it time that I let it go?

Edit: I am blown away by the support from you all. Thank you! I am so excited to start polishing this baby up!

  • rtxn@lemmy.worldEnglish
    2·
    1 year ago

    My only request would be to have a version that not just blurs the parts but completely removes the DOM elements where they are mentioned.

    • aCosmicWave@lemm.eeOPEnglish
      1·
      1 year ago

      This is a great suggestion and is pretty similar to what some of the other commenters also requested. I am thinking to support multiple modes:

      • Blur The Rich (current prototype)
      • Block The Rich (your request)
      • Mock The Rich (replace the names of these billionaires with less flattering nicknames e.g. “Space Karen”, etc)
  • vd1n@lemmy.mlEnglish
    1·
    1 year ago

    Great idea. Could be cool to blacklist people. Say you’re reading an article and think to yourself “damn, that man or woman is a muthafucka!” Then you just highlight their name, right click, and bam! The summaremoved ain’t to be seen agin.

    • aCosmicWave@lemm.eeOPEnglish
      1·
      1 year ago

      I laughed out loud at this suggestion. Love it. I can imagine this could lead to some confusion if a user blocks a common name, like John Smith… but let me give it some more thought!

  • Hazdaz@lemmy.worldEnglish
    1·
    1 year ago

    KNOW THY ENEMY

    I think this project is a terrible idea (no offense OP, since I can see this comes from a level of frustration). Simply burying your head in the sand does not make these people go away. It doesn’t stop their abuses of power. It doesn’t make them any less of a bunch of douchebags. We the public need to know what they do.

    • fing3r@feddit.deEnglish
      1·
      1 year ago

      I can see a (theoretically) positive outcome in media realizing that these articles don’t get the clicks they used to (if, i dunno, 30% of users use this extension).

      • KonQuesting@lemmy.sdf.orgEnglish
        1·
        1 year ago

        “The clicks” don’t matter when these individuals own the media outlets and the social media platforms.