Technology

It seems like we've all lost the plot. We'd probably be willing to view ads if the experience wasn't literally jarring. Try browsing for a day on a plain-no-extension browser. If you use other web enhancement tools kill those too. Straight-up internet is cancer, especially on mobile.

It's impossible to read a 250-word article without being interrupted 5-7 times. Two of those interruptions are likely a full page overlay with give me your email, and are you sure you don't want to subscribe, just give me your credit card number.

Then there are auto-play videos on the side, some with audio on by default. I mean I came here to read something, so of course we have things flashing and moving and making noise, it's the most conducive environment for thought, right?

Ad blockers and script blocking are essentially a hazmat suit that allows us to withstand a hostile environment. Remember when we said myspace pages with audio and [marching-ants] borders was a bad UX? At least we didn't have overlays back then.

Go back to basics and consider what makes a good vs bad internet experience. The reality sounds like someone with a minor case of severe brain damage. I think we've just become unashamed of greed as a society. It's clearly all just about money.

Those annoying customers/users generate content and we have to put up with them so we can monetize it. *Sadly, It's unclear if I'm talking about youtube, reddit, or nearly any other site.

Le sigh.

Wow the enshittification is at full throttle across silicon valley! Guess those investors gotta get those returns now that interest rates are spiking!

Yep, got selected for this test and I thought my network went down.

Had to do nearly 30 mins of debugging until I realized it was youtube actively withholding JUST the video. Took some effort but managed to get them to send the videos again after resetting a bunch of things.

I refuse to view ads and will go to the ends of the earth to make that happen.

Paying is most certainly an option, but only when that becomes the ONLY option.

I've been using an adblocker since ads starting becoming more intrusive and the internet has progressed so much that it's become generally unusable without one. I remember when a mobile ad popped up on my phone and it straight up startled me.

That's funny, I'm testing YouTube alternatives.

I'll say something unexpected: I pay for YouTube. With money! Why?

• I use it every day and I'm a human who likes boosting the things that I enjoy
• I think YouTube's content recommendations are a genuine value-add and not easily replaced
• A cut of my subscription fee goes directly back to the video creators that I watch
• The "premium" encoding levels are actually a substantial improvement to video bitrates
  • Important: the premium bitrate is higher than anything previously offered and probably would not have been otherwise practical to serve for free

So yeah. I personally like YouTube enough to pay for it and I have the financial means to do so. Am I a clown for expressing personal appreciation towards a faceless megacorp? Yes. Yes I am. Constantly trying to win at every transaction in life is a drag though, so I think I'll continue to enjoy getting swindled.

We'll find a way around it, if not go to hell YT. Apart from posters in the real world, I am living a 100% ad-free life and I'm super happy about it.

If you serve me Ads that lead to scams and malicious websites, you don't reserve my ad revenue.

I do understand that if companies running ad-supported models, they need to make sure users are actually watching those ads. Seems logically to me - no ads mean no money, and no money means no sustainable business model.

On the other side, as a user, I just can't browse the internet without an ad-blocker any more. They just got so annoying and sometimes even break the actual website.

But to be honest, I don't see an alternative to ad-supported models except paying money directly via subscriptions plans etc. But this also will not work in the long term. I just can't pay afford to pay a subscription for each website I visit during the day.

The comments in here are interesting to me. Ads and Premium are a way for your favorite content creators to get paid for the content that they produce. I've listened to a number of creators talk about the YouTube revenue sharing model and most of them (LTT and Hank Green) says that YouTube is actually really fair with how they share ad revenue and how Premium is actually a good alternative that meets the needs of the platform, users, and creators. And YouTube, the platform, DOES need to get paid as well otherwise your videos can't get to you.

I also hate ads, like a lot, and I do whatever I can to get them off of my screen because I think they are intrusive and we have proof of how they enable tracking across the internet at large. However, for those platforms that I find extreme value in (YouTube being the example here) I see how and why ads/Premium pump value into their system. If your favorite content creator isn't getting paid for their content, they won't be able to sustain it long term.

One last thought about video streaming and the content we all love that is hosted by YouTube: if we were to say that we would rather our money go directly to our favorite content creators, we would end up with a very fragmented ecosystem akin to the Streaming Service MESS we are in with TV/Movies. I would LOVE to pay LTT directly through Floatplane, but then where would I be with being able to watch other content creators?

oh look, another web service who wants to strangle its users for money and ad views :D when's a peertube instance going to get some big creators on it supported by viewers? that'll do it, i bet

and I'm testing Youtube Revanced on my phone for unlimited ad-free background play for nothing!

Honestly, others do have point when they say we are basically leeching off of the platform. I honestly don't think I'd mind paying for youtube, I currently don't because it kind of just got ingrained in me that youtube was "free". I think the ad supported model is fundamentally flawed though.

Platforms will always want to make it worth it for advertisers to work for them. With the huge trove of user data that sites like Youtube, Twitter, Facebook etc. have they will use that to leverage personalized ads that will feed your brain with garbage all day and coax you into buying shit you don't need or sometimes even falling for scams.

I'd honestly like it better if these sites just straight up charged you right out of the gate. Maybe on top of that we could have sites be interoperable, like the fediverse, so it's not necessarily what the site offers but how they offer it to you. Making you want to pay for an experience that you truly can't get anywhere else.

This will lead to an increase of ad-blocker-blocker-blocker development.

If they really block adblockers, I will subscribe. To Nebula. It's got everything I want, adfree (including sponsored segments), extra content and is cheaper. And the content creators get a bigger share of the money.

I just stood up a selfhosted Invidious instance the other day, and I replaced YouTube ReVanced with Clipious (an Invidious client for Android) on my phone. No ads, SponsorBlock built-in, no need for a YouTube/Google account to create subscriptions, playlists, etc. And it's highly performant since I run it behind a reverse proxy with some custom caching configuration for things like thumbnail images, static assets, etc.

Clipious can also be installed on an Android TV (has an actual Android TV interface). I'm going to end up installing it on mine, but I'm also using SmartTubeNext at the moment, which does require a YouTube/Google account for subscriptions, playlists, etc, but does have no ads, built-in SponsorBlock, and a slew of other great features. I'll be keeping both around, since I do sometimes like to cast to my TV, and SmartTubeNext allows for that (Clipious does not, at least at this time).

Unless YouTube somehow starts dynamically splicing in ads as part of the actual video stream, there's always going to be a way to block ads, unless they do something pretty elaborate. But that's probably not worth the effort on their end to go that far, since the vast, vast majority of people won't know what to do to get around that, nor will they probably care enough to try. But I think it's clear that DNS blocking using services such as AdGuard Home, PiHole, etc, are going to become less effective over time.

This should go quite well for YouTube. popcorn gif

Just get an adblocker-blocker-blocker. Easy

I imagine folks wouldn't have a problem with this if the ads weren't already so aggressive. Numerous ads before and during the content break it up too much. And if the content is extremely short form, it completely ruins the experience.

The number of ads and their length should be proportional to the length of the video. And any creator doing built-in ads should also not be able to inject a bunch of other ads. Burying content is an easy way to get avoided.

Print media had limits for advertisements, heck, in magazines they were premium real estate for the finest graphic designers to put together incredible imagery to get your attention. This level of care (not necessarily images or what have you) has yet to translate to the web.

There's always the Revanced Project on Android. Honestly though, I've cut way back on YouTube after their algorithm started shoveling crap at me. Now it's hard to find genuinely informative videos. It's all "This guy got PERMANENT ORGASM FACE DISORDER Tears of the Kingdom" type videos, instead of ones on science, technology, and news.

I pay for Prenium. But that's only because I also use YouTube Music. Otherwise, I wouldn't pay for it and I would do everything that I can to get rid of the ads. YouTube with ads is just hell now. There are so many of them now, it's ridiculous.

Don't get me wrong, I recognise the value that YouTube provides. Most things I watch and listen to are on YouTube. It's the website I use the most and I'll be glad to pay for it. I understand that it costs money to run and I want to support the creators that I watch.

HOWEVER.

I refuse to be strong armed into paying for it. Music brings me the value that I want and comparing with other prices, such as Spotify and so on, the actual "YouTube" part of the package just cost me 1€ per month which is one hell of a deal if you ask me.

But if you don't care for YouTube Music, 11€ a month (worst in the US apparently), just to get rid of ads is... ridiculous. I'd happily pay 5€ a month. It's not much and for the thing that I use the most? Yeah, I'm willing to! And I know that there is YouTube Prenium Lite. However, it's not available everywhere and it comes with a giant "fuck you" to the costumer.

You see, YouTube Prenium Lite is YouTube without ads. And that's it. So, no Background Play (which I use ALL THE TIME), no downloading of videos, none of that. You want that, well, you have to pay full price. Even though these are basic features.

Paying for getting rid of ads is one thing, and maybe accessing special features is one thing. But paying for artificial limitations that are put into place? Absolutely not. And I know the line between what's a prenium feature and what's an artifical limit is blurry. But for me it's basically this: If I can do something for free on desktop, but can't on mobile without paying. Such as background play.

I am convinced YouTube Prenium would be way more appealing if YouTube weren't being such dicks about it.

It's simple:

• Get your prices back to normal (I hear that in the US, prices have been going up for... no reason).
• Roll out YouTube Prenium Lite to everyone and rename it YouTube Prenium. So it has all the features of current Prenium except YouTube Music (put ads and disable background play only on music videos?).
• Make it at like 5 bucks a month.
• Make a variety of plans based around that. So a Prenium Family and also, a Prenium Duo, just like Spotify, for just two people. Reasonably priced.
• And you make a YouTube Prenium Music plan, which includes YouTube Music as well. So on top of all of that, for 11 bucks a month, you now have a really compelling offer because you can go, Hey, for just 5 more bucks a month, you get all of the features of YouTube Prenium AND you get a complete music streaming services.
• Oh and also: STOP DOING THIS SHIT.

Bam. All of the sudden you have compelling options. Some people will say: "Uuuh, jUsT uSe an AdbLocKeR!" and whatever. Those people are not the majority, so many people watch YouTube from their phones and their TVs now, they will be much more inclined to buy it...

...I think.

That last part is important. I recognise I'm just playing armchair business developper here and that I don't know shit, but still. I'm convinced this could work. The real issue comes down to YouTube being a monopoly and thinking that they can do whatever the hell they want, which... they likely can, due to the position they're in. It's an issue but this comment is already long enough and that is another discussion entirely, but basically: Monopolies sucks.

At least with my subscriptions I've been noticing an increase in sponsored segments. And you know what? I don't mind. It's much less jarring when the "host" is also doing the ad and pretty much just works it into the video. People have to make money, and this old-school approach works for me. Reminds me of ads in old TV/radio shows. And it doesn't suddenly change the scene and quadruple the volume along with seizure-inducing backgrounds.

I use YouTube a lot, both on my phone via ReVanced and my smart TV via SmartTubeNext, completely ad free. If Youtube manage to block videos unless the users deactivate their adblockers, even if I enjoy Youtube a lot, I'll just stop watching videos. The quantity of ad per video is just insane. No way I can stand watching all those ads.

Fuck youtube anyway. Absolute sesspit of influencers, ads and stolen content.

Translation: YT tests randomly pissing off users until they get fed up and leave for another site. if a site tells me I can't partake of their content with my adblocker engaged, I simply find my fix elsewhere.

Fuck youtube and fuck their ads, this shit is getting out of hand

Oh, cool; more reason to use Piped and Invidious lmao

Honestly if I worked at YouTube and they asked me to implement this I'd quit.

So soon we will need an adblocker blocker blocker to use YouTube?

Yet another platform to boycott? Excellent!

Alternate headline: Users test using only YouTube ReVanced to bypass this new system