Mute - An AdBlock Filter

Who hasn't innocently started to read the user comments on a newspaper article, blog post, or YouTube video only to deeply regret it? And haven't we all gotten into a time-wasting argument simply because we accidentally noticed someone on the Internet was wrong? We make a mental vow to never read comments again, but alas, we fail.

Mute is an AdBlock Plus filter for user comments. In the same way that AdBlock hides ads, AdBlock can use this filter to hide user-generated comments, allowing you to browse the Internet with less stupidity clawing at your eyeballs.

Mute removes comments from web pages where they aren't the primary focus, such as YouTube, blogs, and newspapers, but it leaves comments that are the focus, such as user reviews on Amazon and comments on Facebook, reddit, or forums. In short, the goal is to filter out the noise.

Install

Mute is an AdBlock Plus add-on filter, so you must first have the AdBlock Plus addon installed in your web browser.

Add the Mute filter to AdBlock using this auto-add link. Alternatively, use these manual steps, summarized here:

1. Click AdBlock and select "Filter Preferences".
2. Under the "Filter subscriptions" tab click "Add filter subscription" then "add different subscription".
3. At the bottom, choose a subscription title like "Mute Comments" and enter the following into the filter list location: http://mute.bradconte.com/mute.txt

What if I want to view blocked comments?

Disabling AdBlock will disable this filter as well. You can disable AdBlock a specific page or an entire site.

You can also remove this filter at any time by going into AdBlock and selecting "Filter Preferences > Mute > Actions > Delete".

Contribute

The filter isn't perfect. Short-comings are tracked through the project's GitHub issue tracker. Everyone is encouraged to use it to report problems. Create an issue there if:

• something isn't blocked when it should be
• something is blocked when it shouldn't be

and we'll investigate it. When submitting an issue, you only need to specify the URL with the problem (not just the site name or domain, the full URL) and preferably which browser you were using.

Direct contributions to the filter's rule set are welcome. See the GitHub repository.

Disclaimer

In concept, Mute is a list of heuristics for hiding content. Due to this, bugs in Mute may cause problems such as, but not limited to, improperly rendered web pages and improperly hidden content on web pages. Mute does not claim to be 100% accurate. Use Mute at your own risk.