Just buy Premium, no ads and creators actually get paid unlike when you block ads.
It's like going into a discussion about building your own custom PC from scratch and posting "Just buy it from Dell!" I mean, no shit!
Everyone obviously knows paying is an option. These articles/discussions aren't about the obvious, short, straightforward path.
No, its like stepping into a discussion about how 6 flags has made it harder to jump their fence to get in and saying "just buy a ticket"
Which, by the way, is the only defensible position.
I go into a store and they offer to give me a free cupcake if I'm willing to take their branded bumper sticker and put it on my car. I say sure, take the cupcake and the bumper sticker, and toss the sticker in the trash before I reach my car. Now they're following me out to my car to make sure I put it on. Fine. I'll do it, and then once I turn the corner, I'll pull it off and toss it. And the cat and mouse game continues, which is why nobody tries the "free cupcake for a bumper sticker" business model.
This thread starts, and someone says "You could always just pay for the cupcake, or keep the bumper sticker on your car..." Wow, no shit, Sherlock! That's obvious and adds nothing to the conversation.
To extend your analogy, it’s like your favorite cafe decided to offer free cupcakes, and not for a quick promotion, but for ten years, and then after all other bakers in town gave up on cupcakes, and there was only one provider of cupcakes that was very popular because they were completely free, the cafe put bumper stickers on the table next to the cupcakes for a few years and noticed people don’t like bumper stickers, and then one day they said these cupcakes weren’t free before, you were supposed to be putting stickers on your car, and the other patrons started accusing you of grift for not having adorned the bumper sticker, despite the fact that the cupcakes had been offered for free.
I’d say there are a bunch of acceptable analogies, such as the free time-share vacation if you listen to the real-estate pitch, or almost any sweepstakes scheme, or the old 10 cds for a penny - if you subscribe to the monthly plan - thing. TV advertising is exactly what YouTube is doing, and they’re trying to exert more control over viewers than TVs ever did, because they can.
The analogy that doesn’t work is comparing YouTube to any strictly paid product, and equating it to stealing. That’s false and bogus, but I’m preaching to the choir there, you already know that. :) I don’t mind the reminders that it’s available as a paid service. I might mind if YouTube does what movies and other paid streaming services have done and start showing ads during the paid content anyway.
There is value in reminding people that blocking ads when there is a paid ad free option is scummy behavior.
If they don't like it, they should eliminate the "free" version of the service straight up. If they send us ads, we'll delete them. Nothing they can do about it. We won't lose a second of sleep over it either.
Our attention is ours. It's not currency to pay for services with.
That's a fine stance, just don't use youtube.
A lot of these "moral" arguments for not paying or watching the ads fall apart because they seem ignore that option entirely.
Nah. I think I'll keep using it. After all, it's free.
The article you're commenting on is all about something they're doing about it.
https://drhyperion451.github.io/does-uBO-bypass-yt/
Nothing they can do about it. We own the computer their code is running on. We decide if it runs.
However, I imagine the hard part, if it comes to that, will be determining which code is which. Imagine the UI presented in a canvas, updated by a proprietary VM. You can see server connections of course, but their purpose is opaque. Perhaps ad/non-ad content is mixed into the same response. The ad-blockers may make some breakthroughs, but Google's under no obligation to keep it as easy as it is now. I suspect they've barely begun to try.
One day someone much smarter than me will invent an AI ad blocker which will do stuff like that automatically. Just imagine it. An AI that automatically filters ads, brands and other forms of noise in real time. It'd even work on audio and video. Hell, it'd work on real life through augmented reality glasses or something. If I can imagine it, then it must be possible.
> Google's under no obligation to keep it as easy as it is now
Actually they kind of are due to accessibility laws. Everything you proposed means rolling back literally every single one of the hard won advances in web accessibility. Everything that enables assistive technology also enables bots, scripts, automated access. I bet they really hate those users because of that.
> I suspect they've barely begun to try.
Yawn. Trillion dollar copyright industry has been playing this exact same cat and mouse game with copyright infringement for literally decades now. You're telling me Google's gonna win this?
Everyone who has any respect for the word "hacker" and what it stands for better hope they give up. There's only one way for them to win and that's by owning our computers. Devices must be literally physically cryptographically unable to run software that hurts their bottom line for them to win.
I don't care as much about Google losing money because of ad-blockers, they have plenty of money going around. The real people losing here are the ones who are creating the content. As it is they need to amass a large number of views to earn few dollars from a video. Depending on the type of content, a lot of time, money and effort goes into creating each of those videos.
i don't need to justify my actions. I know adblocking is denying revenue to the platform. i don't care.
The "just buy premium" crowd is assuming that people are rich enough to afford premium. May be they should consider how priviledged they are for having the spare money to dump on premium.
Until I see a report of exactly how much my monthly fee directly goes to each of my subscribed channels, I'm never going to believe that.
Suppose a $14 subscription to YouTube Premium is typically split in half, $7 for the platform and $7 for content creators. If someone signs up for YouTube Premium but doesn't watch any videos at all, do creators split that $7 (in a proportion that roughly mirrors the existing amount creators were already getting paid: a bigger share of the $7 for those with a bigger share of views generally) or does the platform keep both halves?
I don't know that anyone here can say what does happen with that $7, but what should happen with it? Did creators earn it? If they earned it regardless of no plays from that user, it follows that in another universe where the Premium user only ever watched one single creator, that creator doesn't earn more of that particular $7 than they otherwise would.
Ads are supposed to incidental, you run ads and if too many people block them because they suck then congrats sucks for you. If no one sees them then sucks for you. Most people put up with TV ads when they're not even hard to skip. And for some reason IG ads are well liked. Forcing them harder I think has to make us confront what we're really doing here and what we're gaining by all this. Just pay for premium sounds nice when you don't think about it. If there's no universe where someone might actually prefer the ads if they were the same price then we're kinda admitting they have literally zero value to the viewer.
And that paints a very different picture of advertising than "the grease of the economic wheel" ya know? And clearly all advertising isn't like this, like I paid to see the Lego movie, Barbie was fantastic. I watched a YT video of a woman showing her design process for a product she's selling and it was fascinating but it was also just an ad. But if YT are there to suck just so you'll pay for it to suck less than that's not mutually beneficial trade that's extortion.
Absolutely. There is absolutely nothing to be ashamed of. Nothing. Not a single thing.
I make it a point to recite this mantra in every single ad blocking thread I see:
Our attention is ours.
It's not theirs to sell to the highest bidder.
It's not currency to pay for services with.
It's part of our cognitive functions and it's absolutely inalienable.
They are not entitled to our attention.
Our minds are sacred ground. They do not get to violate it for profit.
They do not get to insert brands and products into our minds without our consent.
To do so is mind rape.
Advertising is therefore a form of violence.
Ad blockers are therefore legitimate self-defense against this violence.
Are you going to claim people's minds aren't sacred ground? That they're the corporation's market battle ground where they compete for brand awareness? That they're the government's blank slate to fill with propaganda at will? Ridiculous.
I know it's crazy but what I actually want is an ad model where I don't feel the need to make it go away and might actually enjoy. An ad model where it doesn't have to interrupt me and force itself upon my eyes because it's actually content I would watch on my own.
Like take for example Fly.io's blog. It's is some of the best advertising for the service and is definitely why I use them today. Raymond Hettenger's python YT series is a fantastic ad for his consultancy. Wendy's Twitter was/is hilarious. But its a weird dynamic because if the content is good you don't have to pay for it which seems silly because it's an ad all the same.
Of course that will never happen because these crooks are addicted to our data - and even more so if I am a paying customer.
Fool me once, …
The first cable-only station to do ads was USA in 1977. But since cable always carried local stations, cable always had channels where ads were run.