Very Gay

I use Tumblr on my phone. This stupid website thought it was a brilliant idea to replace “snooze Tumblr Live for 7 days” (when frankly, I’d rather it ‘snooze’ eternally, but this was decent for a while) with “snooze Tumblr Live on your dashboard for 30 days,” emphasis mine.

Which means that obnoxious icon placed right where I can accidentally tap it won’t go away.

Well. Looks like I finally have a reason to switch to desktop with Xkit.

Why is this useful from a 'getting rid of tumblr live' perspective? Because it means that we can use browser extensions to modify the app! To do what I'm about to show you you'll need a mobile browser which:

supports PWAs

supports the browser extension you wish to use to modify the tumblr PWA

Here, I am using Firefox for Android as the browser, and uBlock Origin to modify (uBO is most famous as an adblocking extension, which it's great at, but it also allows us to do more targeted customisation too!). I don't know much about Xkit, and Firefox for Android doesn't currently support it (though it might in the near future), but if your mobile browser does support it and you know how to use that, go ahead!

Ok, first off navigate to tumblr on your mobile browser and log in. You'll see tumblr live at the top of your dash and in the side menu so let's start by getting rid of it.

We don't want these.

Open uBlock Origin (probably in the 'add-ons' or 'extensions' section of your browser menu) and open the dashboard.

Now go to 'My filters' and type the following two lines as shown. These remove the tumblr live section from the top of your dashboard and from the side menu respectively.

Here are the two lines in text format if you want to copy and paste:

www.tumblr.com##.EiXnY.wQ2Ma > div www.tumblr.com##[title="Live"]

Hit the blue tick at the top to save your filters then reload tumblr. No more tumblr live!

See?

Now let's install the PWA. On Firefox, open your browser menu and hit 'Install'.

This should either automatically add the app to your home screen or give you an option to place it where you want - the specifics of this depend on what launcher you have on your phone.

And we're done! Hit the app icon and use it as you would any other app (this is exclusively the way I use tumblr on my phone now).

Extra stuff:

What can't the PWA do? Push notifications is the main thing, you'll have to open the app to see any activity (messages/reblogs/likes/etc.). The post editor can also be a bit temperamental, but I did write this whole thing using it so take from that what you will.

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>First, we’ve discovered that about a quarter of all the internet connection in or out of the house were ad related. In a few hours, that’s about 10,000 out of 40,000 processed.

>We also discovered that every link on Twitter was blocked. This was solved by whitelisting the https://t.co domain.

>Once out browsing the Web, everything is loading pretty much instantly. It turns out most of that Page Loading malarkey we’ve been accustomed to is related to sites running auctions to sell Ad space to show you before the page loads. All gone now.

>We then found that the Samsung TV (which I really like) is very fond of yapping all about itself to Samsung HQ. All stopped now. No sign of any breakages in its function, so I’m happy enough with that.

>The primary source of distress came from the habitual Lemmings player in the house, who found they could no longer watch ads to build up their in-app gold. A workaround is being considered for this.

>The next ambition is to advance the Ad blocking so that it seamlessly removed YouTube Ads. This is the subject of ongoing research, and tinkering continues. All in all, a very successful experiment.

>Certainly this exceeds my equivalent childhood project of disassembling and assembling our rotary dial telephone. A project whose only utility was finding out how to make the phone ring when nobody was calling.

ALT

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>Update: All4 on the telly appears not to have any ads any more. Goodbye Arnold Clarke!

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>Lemmings problem now solved.

>Can confirm, after small tests, that RTÉ Player ads are now gone and the player on the phone is now just delivering swift, ad free streams at first click.

>Some queries along the lines of “Are you not stealing the internet?” Firstly, this is my network, so I may set it up as I please (or, you know, my son can do it and I can give him a stupid thumbs up in response). But there is a wider question, based on the ads=internet model.

>I’m afraid I passed the You Wouldn’t Download A Car point back when I first installed ad-blocking plug-ins on a browser. But consider my chatty TV. Individual consumer choice is not the method of addressing pervasive commercial surveillance.

>Should I feel morally obliged not to mute the TV when the ads come on? No, this is a standing tension- a clash of interests. But I think my interest in my family not being under intrusive or covert surveillance at home is superior to the ad company’s wish to profile them.

ALT

View on Twitter

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View on Twitter

>Aside: 24 hours of Pi Hole stats suggests that Samsung TVs are very chatty. 14,170 chats a day.

>YouTube blocking seems difficult, as the ads usually come from the same domain as the videos. Haven’t tried it, but all of the content can also be delivered from a no-cookies version of the YouTube domain, which doesn’t have the ads. I have asked my son to poke at that idea.

ALT

ALT

View on Twitter

>First, we’ve discovered that about a quarter of all the internet connection in or out of the house were ad related. In a few hours, that’s about 10,000 out of 40,000 processed.

>We also discovered that every link on Twitter was blocked. This was solved by whitelisting the https://t.co domain.

>Once out browsing the Web, everything is loading pretty much instantly. It turns out most of that Page Loading malarkey we’ve been accustomed to is related to sites running auctions to sell Ad space to show you before the page loads. All gone now.

>We then found that the Samsung TV (which I really like) is very fond of yapping all about itself to Samsung HQ. All stopped now. No sign of any breakages in its function, so I’m happy enough with that.

>The primary source of distress came from the habitual Lemmings player in the house, who found they could no longer watch ads to build up their in-app gold. A workaround is being considered for this.

>The next ambition is to advance the Ad blocking so that it seamlessly removed YouTube Ads. This is the subject of ongoing research, and tinkering continues. All in all, a very successful experiment.

>Certainly this exceeds my equivalent childhood project of disassembling and assembling our rotary dial telephone. A project whose only utility was finding out how to make the phone ring when nobody was calling.

ALT

View on Twitter

>Update: All4 on the telly appears not to have any ads any more. Goodbye Arnold Clarke!

ALT

View on Twitter

>Lemmings problem now solved.

>Can confirm, after small tests, that RTÉ Player ads are now gone and the player on the phone is now just delivering swift, ad free streams at first click.

>Some queries along the lines of “Are you not stealing the internet?” Firstly, this is my network, so I may set it up as I please (or, you know, my son can do it and I can give him a stupid thumbs up in response). But there is a wider question, based on the ads=internet model.

>I’m afraid I passed the You Wouldn’t Download A Car point back when I first installed ad-blocking plug-ins on a browser. But consider my chatty TV. Individual consumer choice is not the method of addressing pervasive commercial surveillance.

>Should I feel morally obliged not to mute the TV when the ads come on? No, this is a standing tension- a clash of interests. But I think my interest in my family not being under intrusive or covert surveillance at home is superior to the ad company’s wish to profile them.

ALT

View on Twitter

ALT

View on Twitter

>Aside: 24 hours of Pi Hole stats suggests that Samsung TVs are very chatty. 14,170 chats a day.

>YouTube blocking seems difficult, as the ads usually come from the same domain as the videos. Haven’t tried it, but all of the content can also be delivered from a no-cookies version of the YouTube domain, which doesn’t have the ads. I have asked my son to poke at that idea.

ALT

Dick and Bruce on the other hand? Crushed by guilt. Absolutely horrified.

Tim: you wrote on the walls with my blood lmao

Jason: ya well you tried to beat me to death with a crowbar

Tim:

Because.

Well.

It’s Dick. Those flips and awful puns are REALLY distinctive, and it took one (1) crappy phone video of This Mysterious New Vigilante for Gotham to collectively go, “YOU STOLE OUR ROBIN, YOU SHITHEADS. AND YOU DON’T EVEN APPRECIATE HIM, LIKE WE DO.”

And give me a chance to draw my favorite boi? Absolutely!

It’s really been a hot minute since I’ve had a chance to draw Tim, so I extend my thanks for this request haha 🙏

I did get a shock when I had to actually look through my old Tim art to remember how to draw his hair-that really hit home that it’s been too long since I’ve drawn him 😂👏

Really had a blast with this one and super pleased with how it turned out-I hope you like it too!