I don’t know about the rest of you, but I really don’t care to hear (or trust) what Marko says.

I just looked up the initial release, it was in August 2001. I don’t remember the first time I used it, but it was probably 20 years ago. Still remains my favourite for the reasons you mentioned.

I use “Feeds”. Click on the menu, then select Feeds, and then Friends. You will still get ads, but it is much better than the default feed.