YouTube's ad blocker crackdown escalates, aggravating users
arstechnica.com
arstechnica.com
Yt-dlp can also make use of it.
They have all sorts of rules that content creators must follow or it hurts the creator's bottom line - I don't see how this would be different.
Content creators negotiate privately with companies and put relevant ads into their content. YouTube does not force content creators to do this and many do not. This has nothing to do with YouTube or YouTube Premium. I like that YouTube does not illegally suppress the right for content creators to negotiate these private contracts.
It is true they don't seem to even attempt to prevent video creators from adding ads within the video itself (explicit or implicit product endorsements especially). These ads aren't as objectionable because the incentive is there for the video creator to ensure the ad doesn't drive you away from the video, and often they try their best to make the ad entertaining in the same way their video is. This would be impractical for YT to enforce since the line is blurry between ad and content, so I don't get too grumpy about it, but I would love to pay an additional amount of money to be totally free of the ads.
You also have never been required to watch them! I just right arrow a couple of times but if you want it automated you can just use SponsorBlock and feel content that in exchange the creator is getting extra revenue from your Premium subscription.
if you pay for YouTube Red or whatever then YouTube doesn't (aside from some illadvised fuckups) show ads.
Same thing with the web. My computer, my rules.
But google of course is unhappy about it, and will try to frustrate as many users as it can until they can push their "web integrity" crap down users' throats.
Technical curiosity: Can you still roll your own DVR? I know Plex has some functionality there, and CableCARDs are/were a thing but cable providers were trying to put an end to those. And I saw DRM for over-the-air is coming down the pipe with ATSC 3.0
yes it is not 100% tracking free, so are most if not all Internet services, all bad but YouTube does not stand out
Weird - have you filed a bug?
Anecdotally, the setting was thorough enough for me that it completely broke Youtube Music's recommendation engine. Every single source of recommended content would give the exact same songs in the exact same order no matter how many times I would listen.
Breaking privacy regulation is literally Facebook's business model and they've been very successful at that. It's dumb to think Google isn't doing the same.
Personally, I think my chance of having my history tracked and abused is lower logged in + history off versus being logged out where I don't have the option and Google can still fingerprint me 17 different ways. There are obviously many more options for the more privacy conscious but that's where I'm at.
This also makes it completely opaque who gets my money at the end of the month, assuming I only use the video part: Only video creators? Or am I just paying into a global pot that is divided proportionally, i.e. would I end up paying x% for music despite neither wanting nor using that on YouTube?
Imagine Steam making you buy a movie download with every game you purchase, or Amazon requiring you to buy a box of cupcakes with every Kindle book. (Actually Amazon requiring me to pay for a video streaming service for expedited deliveries isn't too far off... Not that I'm too thrilled about that.)
My internet provider doesn't tell me the breakdown of infrastructure/profit/uplink costs. My Netflix bill doesn't tell me the breakdown of new content creation, content licensing, video game development/licensing, infrastructure costs, profits, etc. Should I complain about Netflix making a multi-movie contract with Adam Sandler because he happens to not be my taste? You're complaining about a fantasy you invented not existing.
The fact that there are other bundle-only deals available in the world, some of which are worth it for me and others which aren’t, has no bearing on the fact that I dislike this particular one, and Google is losing my business as a direct result of their bundling.
> My internet provider doesn't tell me the breakdown of infrastructure/profit/uplink costs.
A more appropriate comparison would be an ISP that also forces a Netflix or cable TV subscription onto you.
In fact, my ISP offers both TV+internet bundles and internet only. If they would only offer the former, I’d switch to the competition unless it was somehow the same price as an internet-only competitor.
So yeah, adblock for me all day long.
People are going to find excuses forever rather than just pay $10 or whatever for a service they use for multiple hours every day. The same people who wouldn't think twice about spending that much on two cups of coffee which will last them 5 minutes. This is exactly why we will never have ethical monetization on the internet, and will be stuck with ads and tracking forever.
cough absolute pure fantasy unadulterated premium bullshit.
I subscribed for YT Premium at one point. I watched one video on a subject and magically started seeing adds for it across the internet.
Go re-read the terms of service carefully.
Disabling watch history and recommendations isn't a premium feature, its just a privacy setting anyone can enable. If you had the same experience after disabling watch history then that would be very interesting.
That's my excuse.
I haven't seen a paid promotion label in a while, and I watch a lot of videos with sponsored segments.
> lets you skip ahead
How gracious. A seek bar is not a meaningful feature here.
> YouTube adds option to turn off all tracking and recommendations.
You can turn off watch history. Do they claim that turns off tracking? Where do they say that?
> Nope, I don't trust Google
That's a valid stance to have. Some people would pay other companies but not Google in particular.
> The same people who wouldn't think twice about spending that much on two cups of coffee which will last them 5 minutes.
Don't forget to complain about avocado toast.
I also don't believe that they make $14/month from that ads that I would have to endure to watch content otherwise. It strongly feels like a premium to not be assaulted with ads to enjoy content.
where can I see an example of this sort of thing, using ads you approve of, that scales to generating tens of billions of USD a year (to cover the costs of running YouTube)?
Check out r/youtube, for example.
Sounds very reasonable and easy to enforce and uncontroversial, good point.
If you're unhappy with the content of videos then complain to the people that made the video? Or don't watch it?
that seems like a completely different and unrelated service to what YouTube does.
Also, I can skip through a video that's doing a "word from their sponsor." I can't skip through I YouTube ad - YouTube determines how much I'm going to watch before I skip through.
I don't agree with you about "most of the web". There are MANY places that will not allow you to pay them to not be bombarded by ads. Even then, to be able to not have to be bombarded with ads everywhere gets rather expensive, and in many cases not possible. I wish there were a simple way to be able to pay content creators (and by extension somehow the platform they are hosting their content on) for just the content.
I know I'm in a VERY privileged position to be able to do so. I support a few creators on Patreon (which doesn't make up for using an ad blocker on YouTube, because YouTube still needs to get paid for hosting and providing the content). But many Patreon subscriptions feel ridiculously expensive for what they provide. I'm happy to send $1 to a creator once a month (in bulk through a single charge, to minimize the $0.25 + 2.#% cost that credit card processor extort), but some of these creators that create some content want $10/month for some of their exclusive content. Which is nearly what a Netflix or other streaming platform would cost, and have a significantly larger catalog of content to consume.
Why lol
To me, that's like wanting to support the Kremlin. (Where Twitch is North Korea.)
The app is also dog slow.
They're going to have to screw over creators bad enough for creators to move elsewhere before there's any remotely significant change in critical mass
(Or VPN in from South Africa until it also rolls out over there.)
It’s been 25 years, but it’s nice to see that fundamental economic principles still hold even on the internet. I expect that we will be seeing much more of this in the near future.
Sorry Google, but how my computer operates is not part of your Service.
As a consequence of it’s “default-ness”, there’s a lot of content that isn’t available anywhere else. Sometimes I can’t find a specific lecture, hardware installation video, or - yes - that funny video a friend sent me anywhere else. And it sucks, because I don’t want the tendrils from Google’s evil empire squirming into me like nematodes, but if I want to access that specific piece of content I need to take a big slurp from the cursed chalice.
A big part of me hopes that this ends with more people putting their content somewhere else. Will “somewhere else” be any better? I have no idea. Would a video hosting diaspora even be desirable? Also no idea - it might be a terrible idea that ends with a lot of content being lost forever when a service goes belly up. I just feel like there’s got to be a better way.
on a more on-topic thought, this is a no-win situation for content providers. active reform of the advertisement model in Youtube is long overdue as twelve ads per video and a boilerplate ad from a content sponsor in the actual content is utterly unsustainable.
people are motivated to stop adblock at google by a paycheck. this motivation pales in comparison to the white-hot rage most users experience at the current situation, combined with the open source model of most adblock projects. at best, the current effort from Meta is like pouring gasoline on a bonfire. People will join these projects even if its just to provide rapid debug data.
I pay for YT Premium because right now it's worth it- it and Twitch (I use Turbo) are both essentially my only video entertainment (instead of paying far more for cable or something- I don't watch regular TV shows or movies anyway).
I would rather a service cease to exist, require a subscription, than view ads. My attention is not for sale to the lowest bidder.
Yes, I understand that some of what survives on the web today is because it has been ad supported- and that it's one way we have democratized / made content available to the masses, including those that can't afford to pay- I just think we'd find another way if ads went away and it's sad that advertising ever was allowed to have the foothold it has today and become the industry it is. Its very existence is repugnant.
I'm also very happy to see youtube implode, hopefully it does and spawns something new. Remember reddit? Whatever happened to that ...
Do only logged in users get the popup warnings? Or maybe uBlock Origin isn't effected yet?
It seems fair game to me that YouTube would block ad blockers. Video hosting is relatively expensive and creators rely on the ad income. Am I missing something from the argument as to why people are aggravated?
I already watch enough ads when I watch some Youtube on my TV.
This is like when game companies thought that killing piracy would increase their sales.
how is it like that at all?
YouTube says: hey guys, it costs a bunch of money to host exabytes of video and a video CDN, so we either need to show ads or charge you the price of two pints a month.
what secret third option would you like them to offer?
Google is already making a lot of money from me and it doesn't stop there. They spy on me. They process every bit of data they can find of me even if I don't want to and I don't see a cent.
I think YouTube doesn't realize the size of the beast they're provoking if they intentionally break downloaders, adblockers, and alternate clients.
If this is a cat and mouse game of technical prowess between hackers and Google engineers to consume content without ads, Google will either lose or use the government to do violence on open source developers.
If that game begins in earnest, then people will fear for the long term existence of YouTube, and it will become self-fulfilling as people mirror content on other sites until the cat-and-mouse game becomes pointless -- investing ever more money into ever smaller returns.
New video sites will gain massive number of users and over-inflate in value if there's a YouTube exodus and the process can begin anew.
I also use Brave on my Android and wife's iPhone, which has the option to block YT ads. And I use NewPipe on my Android.
Just in case anyone wants to copy my setup, because it works well.
So if you are poor, access to content should be denied to you?
Most of the people on the internet are poor accessing youtube with $40 smartphones.
They cannot pay premium, why send them ads? What's the point? Make them waste their precious time and bandwidth?
... yt-dlp does still work for now, right? Or have I waited too long?