If only there were an affordable subscription plan people could buy to avoid the ads? I do find it funny that people who make well over $100K a year will jump through so many hoops to avoid a $20 a month subscription cost. Then, when YT finally says no more and makes the experience worse for these people, the justifications and complaints start rolling out like there’s no end!

And if you only watch YT occasionally, meaning the subscription isn’t worth it, then I think watching a couple ads for the 1-2 videos you watch a month is a great compromise! I watch YT all the time, and the ads are not excessive compared to cable, or heck, even popular streaming nowadays! The new streaming platforms make you pay a subscription, give you reduced video quality, and have the gall to slap you with a ton of ads!

One final note (that I’ve mentioned on HN before): the channels on YT have full control over whether or not ads play, and where and when the ads play. Of course the channel owners won’t publicly announce this, because it’s much easier to let YT take the PR hit for the ads. And because I know it will be asked why I’m any sort of authority on this, I have a channel with 50K subscribers and have experimented with turning ads off on particular videos to see if YT respects that decision, and they do.