Sorry if somebody have already written this but I can't read all the comments now.
I think this whole topic is flawed by huge disinformation. It is not about "blocking ads". The point is since the very beginning Web pages were a sort of "recommendation" and the browser, the "client agent", could decide how to manipulate them.
The user was in control of the browser and this is or should be the very concept of Vivaldi, BTW. Being in control of the browser, IF the browser is designed to allow the user to be in control, you can decide what and how about EVERYTHING, not just "ads".
When somebody publishes a Web page, whatever content it includes, the content is "shared" and from that point on, it gets "owned" by everybody who gets it. Once you "own" a content, you can manipulate it as you prefer. Yes, licensing and right management features, pretty much pointless from a technical point of view, since any input becomes an output, whatever you place in between.
The shift Google is promoting, besides the technical details, moves from the idea that the "user" MUST be confined, limited, restricted by the tools. The "user agent" must become "Google agent" and you must do only what Google allows you, in the way Google planned for you.
Speaking of Vivaldi, whatever big change Google makes on Chromium, the alternative is to cope with it or to fork. Everybody knows forking is a dangerous slope because it becomes increasingly difficult to keep the codebase in sync with updates. The "Vivaldi store" thing is the last issue to worry about.
Google counts on this, otherwise they would be much more careful with changes. First, they don't fear the competition, since there isn't any. Then they do know nobody has got the power to seriously fork their browser and keep it running. Here we are again with a big corporation abusing of its dominant position over the "market". Maybe in the next 20 years some EU commission would give them a fine.
