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YouTube tests blocking videos unless you disable ad blockers

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Re: YouTube tests blocking videos unless you disable ad blockers

#321

Post by dharmab »

latexr wrote: post #311

Question for anyone who bought YouTube Premium and tried to cancel later: how did it go? Years ago I bought a Chromecast for a family member but ended up sending it back because it was subpar. The return process was so frustrating (not to mention the difficulty in deleting the mandatory Google Wallet account) that I vowed to never trust Google with any money again. I feel I’d rather stop watching YouTube entirely. I’…

I canceled mine recently when I switched from Youtube Music to Apple Music when Classical released. It was painless.

Re: YouTube tests blocking videos unless you disable ad blockers

#322

Post by ehsankia »

ThaDood wrote: post #273
climb_stealth wrote: post #221

It's incredible how many people go "I was almost ready to give them money" whilst using Youtube all the time with an ad blocker. I know it, I was one of them for years. Just buy the subscription. You get the free trial for a month. Nothing changes, the money is not missed, but you actually pay for something you use a lot. The biggest benefit is not being subjected to ads anymore just by being next to family members w…

IIRC YouTube Premium also comes with YouTube Music, which coming from a former Google Music user, the plan was a no-brainer. If YT Music great? Well, no but it's fine. It has my music, podcasts and decent recommendation algorithm. Paired that with commerical free YT and it's a stellar offer.

It was definitely nowhere ready when the transition happened, but they've been constantly working on it for the past few years, unlike GPM which was mostly stuck for years. While it still has a few issues, there's a ton of cool features GPM never had either.

Re: YouTube tests blocking videos unless you disable ad blockers

#323

Post by pb7 »

knowledge-clay wrote: post #284
pb7 wrote: post #205

[flagged]

> Cheapskates will do the wildest of mental gymnastics to justify why they won't pay for the premium option. You're the reason why the internet sucks. Ads make the internet suck

Ads exist because people are cheap and won't pay an equivalent amount of revenue in cash. All the complaints about ads and tracking will fall on deaf ears until that changes.

Re: YouTube tests blocking videos unless you disable ad blockers

#324

Post by alwayslikethis »

LeoPanthera wrote: post #200
Nextgrid wrote: post #82

Invidious is a third-party frontend (you can self-host) that solves this problem: https://github.com/iv-org/invidious As a bonus, it is super fast because it doesn't have to justify the salaries of dozens (hundreds?) of frontend developers and can get away with server-side-rendered HTML and minimal amounts of Javascript.

I think you can be pretty sure that if Google doubles down on this, third party clients (as well as downloaders like yt-dlp) will stop working.

Not so fast, at least. IIRC youtube have contracts to keep API stable for a number of years for TV applications.

Re: YouTube tests blocking videos unless you disable ad blockers

#326

Post by colordrops »

crop_rotation wrote: post #126

YouTube premium perfectly showcases why ads dominate the internet, because even when there is a paid option for a service much cheaper than any alternative, people do not want to pay (And I am not talking about too broke to pay cases). Serving an infinite video catalog is very expensive in terms of all resources (And yes Netflix is not comparable, unlike YouTube, Netflix can highly leverage cache boxes at ISPs). Vime…

I want a paid for video streaming service with the following:

* No attachment to Google

* Enough network effect / traction to be interesting

* No predatory data collection and recommendation algorithms

YouTube premium isn't that. So for now I use Newpipe and ad blockers. If they lock it down, hopefully there will be enough traction somewhere else to pick up where they left off.

Re: YouTube tests blocking videos unless you disable ad blockers

#327

Post by vba616 »

crop_rotation wrote: post #310
vba616 wrote: post #293

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>people do not want to pay People don't want to pay for subscriptions because everything has become a bait and switch with infinite tiers! Whether it's the local newspaper, or a mega-tech company's corporate offerings. I tried subscribing (online) to my hometown newspaper within the last year. And a major national news publication. You know how people say (or used to) that the garbage on the internet is the fault of…

YouTube premium has just one tier. And before you raise the hypothetical question of additional tiers in future, by that kind of logic people shouldn't make any recurring purchase of anything since in future terms might change.

If there's just one tier, but it doesn't include what I'd expect, then I'd be even less happy than if there are more tiers - but they probably will get around to adding them.

Re: YouTube tests blocking videos unless you disable ad blockers

#328

Post by pb7 »

vehemenz wrote: post #308
pb7 wrote: post #205

[flagged]

I'd argue that non-technical normies that ruined the Internet because they lacked the ethos and the knowhow to push back against ads and just use an adblocker. It's only because of these people that YouTube was ever an ad-supported service in the first place.

There wouldn't be a YouTube without "normies" watching ads because people like you won't pay for a subscription. How can you not understand that?

Re: YouTube tests blocking videos unless you disable ad blockers

#329

Post by knowledge-clay »

lumenwrites wrote: post #292
knowledge-clay wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Cheapskates will do the wildest of mental gymnastics to justify why they won't pay for the premium option. You're the reason why the internet sucks. Ads make the internet suck

Ads pay for all the content we're enjoying. Something has to.

- Direct patronage

- Nonprofits

- Public funding

Re: YouTube tests blocking videos unless you disable ad blockers

#330

Post by crop_rotation »

colordrops wrote: post #326
crop_rotation wrote: post #126

YouTube premium perfectly showcases why ads dominate the internet, because even when there is a paid option for a service much cheaper than any alternative, people do not want to pay (And I am not talking about too broke to pay cases). Serving an infinite video catalog is very expensive in terms of all resources (And yes Netflix is not comparable, unlike YouTube, Netflix can highly leverage cache boxes at ISPs). Vime…

I want a paid for video streaming service with the following: * No attachment to Google * Enough network effect / traction to be interesting * No predatory data collection and recommendation algorithms YouTube premium isn't that. So for now I use Newpipe and ad blockers. If they lock it down, hopefully there will be enough traction somewhere else to pick up where they left off.

What you want kinda exists in other hosting providers like Vimeo, but the economics is not pretty and most people don't want such a service (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28547578). What you missed in your requirement list is how much will you be willing to pay for the service you desire.
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