In response to the first article: The whole point of brave was privacy-respecting ads, which is something I can get behind. The article doesn’t mention much in terms of how they are selling data that is connected to you. Adding affiliate links to the url–not a great idea but also not a huge offense to me. I see very little substance to critique this part of Brave in the article.
The rest of the article is about associations Brave has with other “bad” people and “bad” things. These are not real arguments for why the actual software is not good. Saying Brave promoted FTX doesn’t really mean that Brave is evil. Not everyone knew what was going on there. Again, I don’t see much substantive critique of Brave on this front.
For the second article: I very much don’t like it when software decides to install other software that I’m not aware of. Big mistake for Brave.
None of my friends in the United States would say such things either. Must be some really whack friends.