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Comment by stillpointlab | Hacker News Reader

I don't think it is fair to pin this on Google - I get the worst ads on X. But something about how the X ad network works means that even when I report the ad, block the ad poster, etc. there is this army of alternate ad accounts that all show the same ad.

I was feeling very guilty last night as I was watching YouTube and getting 30s+ unskippable ad blocks every 10 minutes in some video. And the repetition and low quality were grating on me. I thought: being rich is never having to watch another ad. Why am I letting these ads own spaced repetition slots in my brain that could be filled with knowledge? Instead of learning, my mental energy is being taken up by psychological manipulation to purchase? The relentless repetition of the mind-numbing ad interspersed throughout otherwise educational content.

Being rich is owning the real-estate of my own mind. I sometimes feel like a digital serf in my own head.

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Why are you subjecting yourself to that instead of downloading Firefox + uBlock origin?

See the headline of this article for Exhibit (I've actually run out of letters in the alphabet) why adblocking is a moral imperative.

As much I love a good old "Why don't you just ..." response that terrifically misses the point - in this particular case I was watching YouTube through their Apple TV app.

Now, there may be another "why don't you just ..." or "well, actually ..." response you have queued up, maybe some ramblings about a pi hole, or some anti-Apple hate, or some other solutioneering. Go ahead, tell me.

But it is the structure of incentive that forces this. The YouTube creators that make the content do need to get paid. And Google offers an option: Youtube Premium. That give both me and the creator what we want and (for the time being) removes the ads.

So either one is rich in time (doing whatever "why don't you just ..." hoop you expect me to jump through) or rich in money.

If you want creators to get paid, pay them (channel memberships, patreon, click on their sponsor links and buy something). No need to subject yourself to ads.

Ads don't just steal your time either, they invade your head. You are influenced by them and you have no choice as long as you watch them.

Sounds like you've made a choice to watch ads. Which is fine, but then maybe don't complain about it.

That is wrong on both accounts. I have little choice other than to watch ads since the structure of incentive that creates a marketplace like YouTube forces it on me.

I think about libraries and how the world would be if instead of a free public resource, you had to watch ads before you were allowed to take out a book.

It is just the case that in this modern social media world, if you want your ideas to spread you have to put them onto social media. And if I want access to those ideas I have to consume them through social media. There is nothing about that environment that is my choice, it is the environment that I find myself in.

And I have few choices to get around it. I can twist up into a pretzel trying to block the onslaught with more "why don't you just..." advice. Or I could pay to make it go away. Or I could just go off-grid and forego access.

And when you look close at the options, it becomes clear that sovereignty of my own mind has a price. Freedom of mind is not free in this modern world, if it ever really was.

You made the choice to use Apple TV, whatever that is. I just use... YouTube. In my browser. Do you not have a browser? It doesn't cost money.

You also have no obligation to watch ads for creators to get paid. They can also set up things like Patreon if they would like. The ads are very lucrative, and that's their choice. But you are free to make choices too, if you would like to.

They wanted a whinge, and not a solution. A position that I truly do not understand, but is not uncommon.

> I was watching YouTube through their Apple TV app.

That is an active choice, not forced in any way.

> The YouTube creators that make the content do need to get paid.

There are better ways, and we would all be better off except for the small group of greedheads benefiting from the chaos

The ad supported internet is dying. Good riddance

>The YouTube creators that make the content do need to get paid.

The world would honestly be better if they didnt.

> The YouTube creators that make the content do need to get paid

Nope.

They may get paid, they may not. That's the risk they've chosen. They may also get their Google account banned with no recourse for something minor or even non-existent.

> So either one is rich in time (doing whatever "why don't you just ..." hoop you expect me to jump through) or rich in money.

That's what they want you to think, you've been watching too many ads.

X has been the most shameless, after all brand name advertisers left. Here is one state-level actor campaign that has been going on for months:

https://imgur.com/a/HZwfyNH

It's not advertising anything, it's just a straight up scam exploit site. It uses exclusively stolen or fake accounts. The links are shown as "amazon.de" or similar but of course do not go there, no doubt just a bug X haven't gotten around to fixing just yet.

This is on the kind of level where if we had actual law enforcement for tech companies, the next time some X executive lands in Europe they would be in cuffs.

I think it is fair to pin this on Google, Meta, X, and any other ad networks that seem to have no control over their own platforms.

They're like Dr. Frankenstein, creating a monster and then just letting it roam the countryside. But worse, because they profit (immensely) from the chaos their monster wreaks.

Pin it on Google, Meta, X, etc, and also on the sites that display malware ads to clients. They're all culpable.

Somehow I would never assume that X would act "moral". Google on the other hands even few years back was generally acknowledged as a good actor which was once again corporate charade people would fall for. Including myself.

You don't have to be rich to avoid getting those ads. You can make them go away for ~$15 a month. If you can't afford that, you have bigger problems in your life than YouTube ads, and your first step towards fixing them is to spend less time watching YouTube.

Yeah, but that also says to Google that their methods are successful. That makes my skin crawl.

(Shrug) The creators need to get paid one way or another. Do you want them to start running their own commercials, as if sponsored segments aren't bad enough?

Would that be worse than what we've got now?

Yes, because I couldn't pay $15 to make those commercials go away.

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