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Comment by _gabe_ | Hacker News Reader

This is just so funny to me. Google has to have the absolute worst PR for any company I've ever seen to make this happen. Somehow, they've duped the general public (at least on HN) into believing they insert the ads into videos. All they need to do is run a marketing campaign about how as a content creator you get to decide when ads play, whether they're unskippable, and how many ads to place in your video. Blast that all over the internet so people realize that the ads in videos are not there because of YT (unless that channel has < 1K subs and < 4K watch hours, then that's definitely YT).

Leave angry comments on the videos you watch and tell the creators your pissed at them for how many ads they place. This is one area YT gives almost full autonomy to the creator. They can choose everything except which ads get played.

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I don't think content creators can choose not to have ads in their videos. Creators can turn off monetization, but YouTube can still play ads, they just won't pay the creator.

https://www.makeuseof.com/youtube-ads-without-paying-creator...

I do agree with your general point. Creators can choose to show less ads, and we should prefer channels that choose to monetize less.

EDIT: I'm no longer sure whether YouTube is displaying ads when you do this. The wording I found in their help pages is ambiguous. I think they reserve the right to display video ads if monetization is off, but they are not displaying ads (currently).

Well now I'm intensely curious about this. I've turned off monetization on this video https://youtu.be/liJac6RysE4 . Please let me know if you see any ads on the video, I'm curious if YT will still display them regardless of my input. (So far I'm not seeing any ads).

Edit: Also, when I click on the help icon next to the monetization bubble, the entire Google help article[0] talks about turning on ads. Which seems to imply they're off by default, but they don't mention turning off ads, so who knows if that's just "clever" writing to indicate there's no way to turn ads off.

[0]: https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/94522?hl=en

No ads on your video. I confirmed I'm not blocking them by switching to another video...instant ads.

Thanks for doing this. Maybe I was wrong. I edited my post to reflect this.

I don't think you're wrong, this change was widely advertised in 2020:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/johnkoetsier/2020/11/18/youtube...

https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/2475463?hl=en-GB

That said, I checked the parent's video, watching it all the way though... and I also didn't see any ad (and I even watched it on my Chromecast, which usually triggers a lot more ads on Youtube, which is a reason why I never use it for Youtube, but only for Netflix, Disney+, etc.)

I assume that ads might be shown, but only rarely. Probably Youtube wants to run them, to have the flexibility to recoup on some of the infra costs for videos which wouldn't otherwise earn revenue (i.e. they aim net zero for non monetized videos... but this is my speculation)

No ads from me either, at least at the beginning. Almost every other video has an ad within the first 30 sec

Partners can choose to disable all types/placements of ads ("skippable video ads", "non-skippable video ads", "pre-roll ads", "mid-roll ads", and "post-roll ads") except for "display ads" (that is, banner ads). As for whether those options actually work, I can only assume so, but the article you linked is specifically about non-partners.

https://i.imgur.com/RynaVin.png

Another point is that the algorithm (which decides what videos are shown on the homepage, sidebar recommendations, notifications, etc. and provides the majority of views to videos) essentially ceases to promote at all any video that's not monetized.

Which I think is fair -- after all, I think they're already doing non-monetized creators a favor by footing the entire bandwidth bill, they don't owe them free promotion!

But it obviously puts a limit on what a creator can do about ads if they are actually trying to make money (even if they don't want any Adsense money and only want to do their own in-video sponsors, or heck, even if they're just looking for "exposure"). If they turn off monetization, they'll drop off the face of the Earth, essentially.

Hence why creators care so much about a single demonetized video, basically it means the video goes into a black hole and earns them basically no views. It exists, but it may as well not.

Many videos feature music that is not free-to-use. Music rightsholders demand their pound of flesh on those regardless of what the creator says. "let's play" videos (where people upload and comment themselves playing) is a gray zone, if only because of the music rights, which can cause ads to show as well.

It's possible that Google has chosen to take the brunt of the complaints to shield the creators.

The Ticketmaster Tactic[tm].

Correct mostly.

But keep in mind it would kill YT business model. Youtubers disabling ads means fewer ad views and clicks, so less profit for YT. Less reach also means advertisers agree to pay less, so even less profit. And finally there is no reason to sub to premium, so even less profit.

YT doesn't want to be just a free hosting because transcoding and serving petabytes is expensive I guess, and it does not want to be a paid hosting because it would make YT a commodity and no one wants to be a commodity.

Part of their value is insulating creators from this. It's like Ticketmaster protects artists from pricing concerns.

Haven't a substantial number of creators turned towards sponsorships and embedded advertising because they felt like YouTube was being too capricious with their monetization policies?

yes, but those creators typically don't turn off youtube monetization. they just decided they wanted even more money than they were getting from youtube ads.

They effectively can't turn off monetization and get any benefit from the platform. YT doesn't promote non-monetized videos so they may as well be unlisted, cuz that's how many views they'll get. Which I think is fair -- it's a free service, if Youtubers want free promotion it's fair for YouTube to get their beak wet with some of the profits from the video.

A non-monetised video gets recommended though, albeit fewer times than monetised ones (even to premium users!!).

and the downvotes on this comment prove it's working. nobody wants to believe that their favourite youtubers are actually the ones who want all these ads, it's much more comfortable to blame the big evil company instead.

> "Leave angry comments on the videos you watch and tell the creators your pissed at them for how many ads they place."

This will get your account shadowbanned, i.e. you'll be able to see your comments and votes but nobody else will be.

What if you post something innocuous at first and then edit it later after the mod queue has bumped it down and no one is likely to review it?

Uhm... Youtube still puts in ads for those videos, regardless of whether or not the creator wants to.

Do you not think YouTube will penalize channels for choosing to present less ads? I know that I go with their suggested defaults, on the assumption that I will be punished if I depart from that. I assume that people will run adblockers if they've got any sense: my demographic is probably more likely to do that.

I'm on desktop, adblocking the entire internet to the best of my ability. I daresay if YouTube got pushy with me as a video watcher, I would watch less and would be the better for it. Go ahead, make my day ;)

> Do you not think YouTube will penalize channels for choosing to present less ads? I know that I go with their suggested defaults, on the assumption that I will be punished if I depart from that.

Sounds like grounds for an investigation that could develop into a lawsuit.

A lawsuit based on what law?

I don't know why it would be illegal for YouTube to use its recommendation algorithm to favor videos with ads.

It's a for-profit business after all.

Yes, it would fall under the category of 'dark patterns'.

If you're not allowed to block ads, you sure as hell don't have a right to be promoted while refusing to RUN ads. I've assumed the worst for years now.

There isn't a law against "dark patterns", and selective/weighted recommendations aren't even generally considered an example of a dark pattern.

The FTC has brought lawsuits against deceptive practices, like tricking people into signing up for something they didn't mean to -- that might be what you're referring to?

But I don't see any deceptive practice here. YouTube favoring more profitable videos is no different from grocery stores putting candy next to you while you wait to check out. Companies are trying to manipulate you into selecting the most profitable thing all the time, that's the norm. But you still get to choose which video to click on, the same as it's your choice whether or not to buy the candy at checkout.

The court current hold that growing a plant on your own land to feed to your own animals is "interstate commerce"[0]. Lawyers can squeeze some kind of case out of this. You might not win in the courts, but such a lawsuit can also build political support for things like anti-trust enforcement, data protection laws, advertising regulation, etc.

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wickard_v._Filburn

Also, I believe that the algorithm prioritises monetized videos over non-monetized ones. I wouldn't be surprised if videos choosing more ads are also prioritised.

No. I don't think they do that. Creators will naturally want to turn on ads because the return is amazing. YouTube just recommends videos that it thinks individual users will enjoy the most.

If people though of ads as something the creator controls, I suspect many creators would turn off ads, or maybe do a single pre-roll ad, and double down on sponsorships instead. It places the creator much more in control over the exact ad content that plays, and if you manage to get a good match between channel and sponsor can be much less jarring than youtube ads.

Of course youtube wouldn't want that, because they don't get any money out of that deal. And judging by how things are going at Twitch, the platform trying to get a cut by forcing sponsorship deals to happen via their platform just gets people up in arms.

Then you'd protect youtube by pitting creators vs viewers and giving creators incentive to decrease youtube's income.. the total effect of this might not be so great.

Taking flak for ads is part of the service they provide. It'd be pretty stupid of them to throw their content partners under the bus in this way.

Sounds like an absolutely terrible business strategy for YouTube. You can't fix this problem through product decisions when the problem is that they are an advertising company with a profit motive.

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