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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

#971

Post by zdragnar »

carlosjobim wrote: post #918
zdragnar wrote: post #911

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given that they have the largest analytics platform, they should be able to fairly easily see that sites that employ adblocker blockers suffer very high bounce rates for visits coming from search. Personally, I would absolutely stop going to youtube if they tried to block me from visiting while my adblocker is active.

Exactly, they should want those people to bounce and not come back.

Funny story, my wife wanted to watch a show on Amazon Freevee, and for the first time in years we were treated to what people watching cable TV without a DVR have to go through.

Odds are, we won't watch anything else there.

I don't mind supporting content creators and distributors, but the volume and repetitive nature of watching the same ads over and over again exceeds the value I get from the content.

As for YouTube, I already have enough subscriptions, so I might just end up not using it anymore. The volume of new content for the niches I look for tends to be very low.

Re: YouTube tests blocking videos unless you disable ad blockers

#972

Post by rerx »

baby wrote: post #935

We all agree ads on Youtube are horrible. They waited until we were trapped there to turn them on. The price of Youtube prime is also insane compared to Netflix. What's the conclusion to this? Should Netflix start a Youtube competitor?

Youtube Premium is €11.99 per month here, including YouTube Music. Spotify is €9.99. The pricing seems very fair to me as long as you make use of the music offering.

Re: YouTube tests blocking videos unless you disable ad blockers

#973

Post by account42 »

fennecfoxy wrote: post #842
freehorse wrote: post #615

It is not just about youtube. The whole internet is bloated with ads right now, and the vast majority of them quite the opposite of discrete. I just cannot browse the internet without adblocker, it is too slow, but more importantly too distracting. I could count the times that I have found an internet ad interesting in my lifetime using half the fingers of one hand. Personalised or not, the vast majority is useless,…

I think the core issue is: * People don't like ads, because ads suck * Youtube offers premium, an ad-less experience Never have I seen self-entitled people so furious as when YT requests they buy premium in order to remove ads. What, should YT be hosted for free without ads and without a subscription? I get that ads suck and companies suck, but self-entitled people suck too; most of us here are devs and we get paid b…

> What, should YT be hosted for free without ads and without a subscription?

Yes, same way you don't need a subscription to walk along a road.

Re: YouTube tests blocking videos unless you disable ad blockers

#974

Post by juliangoldsmith »

kingstoned wrote: post #967
alexb_ wrote: post #937

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't use ad services that collect user data and serve personalized ads. Find someone who actually wants to advertise THEIR AD on YOUR SITE, and present it as regular content. If you are trying to subvert people's ad block, you are doing it wrong.

I don't serve ads on a website and I'm not blocking users who use adblockers. I'm trying to find a reliable way to detect usage of adblockers for legitimate analysis. Do you know a way to do it?

By their nature, adblockers need to be undetectable by websites.

If you're just looking for statistics, why not go for a survey? It'd be more reliable than trying to detect something designed to avoid detection.

Re: YouTube tests blocking videos unless you disable ad blockers

#975

Post by account42 »

tmtvl wrote: post #714
freehorse wrote: post #615

It is not just about youtube. The whole internet is bloated with ads right now, and the vast majority of them quite the opposite of discrete. I just cannot browse the internet without adblocker, it is too slow, but more importantly too distracting. I could count the times that I have found an internet ad interesting in my lifetime using half the fingers of one hand. Personalised or not, the vast majority is useless,…

> I will not, and probably cannot, pay and subscribe to any random website I am gonna visit to remove ads to make the experience tolerable, when I can just block the ads. Okay, but how do you square that with the fact that hosting content costs money? Are the people and companies which provide the content you look at not allowed to earn money to keep the servers running and the sysadmins fed?

They are not entitled to profit from having captured the public square, no.

Re: YouTube tests blocking videos unless you disable ad blockers

#976

Post by npteljes »

aww_dang wrote: post #590
Veserv wrote: post #514

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it perfectly showcases that people do not want to pay 1000% more money for the privilege of paying a monthly subscription. Youtube Premium costs $12/month [1]. Ads average something like $2 per 1000 views to the creators (in some of the most common categories) [2]. Youtube takes a ~45% cut, so Youtube makes ~$4 per 1000 views from ads. So, to reach $12/month, you would need to average 3000 views per month. At a a…

Giving them my card data feels more expensive than $12/month. The model of paying to remove ads always felt like hostage taking. "Is this ad annoying enough for you? No? You think you're a tough guy? Here's an advert of me slicing off your toes. Now tell me your home address so I can mail them to you. Read me the CVV2 numbers from the back of the card to make it stop!"

Nah, come on. The price is well worth it just for the hosting and internet traffic costs.

Re: YouTube tests blocking videos unless you disable ad blockers

#977

Post by account42 »

AnIdiotOnTheNet wrote: post #795
freehorse wrote: post #615

It is not just about youtube. The whole internet is bloated with ads right now, and the vast majority of them quite the opposite of discrete. I just cannot browse the internet without adblocker, it is too slow, but more importantly too distracting. I could count the times that I have found an internet ad interesting in my lifetime using half the fingers of one hand. Personalised or not, the vast majority is useless,…

> The whole internet is bloated with ads right now Internet? I think you mean everything . The whole everything is bloated with ads right now. Look around you, I bet you can see at least a dozen brand names without even leaving your chair. People who work in marketing and ads should quit their jobs if they care at all about society, but of course they don't or they wouldn't be in marketing and advertising. Alternativ…

And guess what, people pay extra for having some of these brand names on their shit. What a clown world.

Re: YouTube tests blocking videos unless you disable ad blockers

#978

Post by stOneskull »

iLoveOncall wrote: post #922
john___matrix wrote: post #905

To be fair, YT Premium is one of the few subscriptions I think is a no-brainer and good value for money. Sometimes when I've forgotten to log in and see what it's like without, it's amazing anyone can watch videos on there. Like a lot of people I've generally been OK to watch ads in exchange for free content but it seems over the years instead of ads getting better and/or more relevant to my interests (even broadly),…

> To be fair, YT Premium is one of the few subscriptions I think is a no-brainer and good value for money. I cannot think of any subscription that offers literally no upside beside what a free browser extension that you install in 1 click already provides. Youtube Premium is literally the worst value for money that I can think of, because I can get effortlessly the same for 0 cost.

you do get youtube music included which is a decent alternative to spotify.

Re: YouTube tests blocking videos unless you disable ad blockers

#979

Post by spacebanana7 »

Veserv wrote: post #514
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…

No, it perfectly showcases that people do not want to pay 1000% more money for the privilege of paying a monthly subscription. Youtube Premium costs $12/month [1]. Ads average something like $2 per 1000 views to the creators (in some of the most common categories) [2]. Youtube takes a ~45% cut, so Youtube makes ~$4 per 1000 views from ads. So, to reach $12/month, you would need to average 3000 views per month. At a a…

YouTube premium also includes a music service with near peer features to Spotify/Apple music. On its own that’s worth $5-$10 a month. There’s also other features like offline downloads and background audio for podcasts.

Ad removal is just one feature amongst many with YouTube premium. So it’s not fair to compare the subscription price entirely against the CPM of the adverts you don’t have to watch.

Re: YouTube tests blocking videos unless you disable ad blockers

#980

Post by spacebanana7 »

dmbche wrote: post #219
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…

Isn't it Youtube's problem to make their business profitable? It's not a binary - they could offer a different deal with Premium, market it differently. Customers aren't rational - just like humans. They are a massive multinational - if anyone can figure it out, it's them. Maybe the ad model doesn't work, and people are not clear on what they are actually paying for, since it's effortless to get the same service for…

YouTube’s unit economics are fairly unique in that monetisation rates put a ceiling on video quality.

Even with the best networks and infrastructure in the world, they would struggle to break even on 4K video with say $2 CPM. Obviously they exceed that threshold at the moment for 4K, but maybe not for 8K or 16k.

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