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Block YouTube ads on AppleTV by decrypting and stripping ads from Profobuf

ericdraken.com

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Re: Block YouTube ads on AppleTV by decrypting and stripping ads from Profobuf

#431

Post by slacka »

userbinator wrote: post #12

I've been MITM'ing my traffic to, among other things, strip ads and rewrite pages with things like custom CSS, ever since I discovered The Proxomitron over 2 decades ago. It does tend to get me profiled as a "bot" by CloudFlare and such, but there are not-so-trivial ways around that too. It also shows why things like remote attestation are hazardous for user freedom.

Network level ad-blocking like Privoxy and pi-hole have so many downsides like they can't handle inline adverts. My pi4 pi-hole is unplugged right now because it just didn't work well. After hours wasted trying to make it work with all the services, I've thrown in the towel. The time involved is just not worth it for a home network.

What works are browser based ad-blockers and app patchers like ReVanced. As my savings have gone up, I've relied more and more on just paying for ad-free services like YouTube Premium, Hulu, Netfix, and Max for the cases those 2 can't handle.

Re: Block YouTube ads on AppleTV by decrypting and stripping ads from Profobuf

#432

Post by layer8 »

zo1 wrote: post #330
dewey wrote: post #131

Easier solution: You can get YouTube Premium for $2 a month if you just happen to be in Argentinia while you sign up, even if you are using a US credit card to pay.

You're not just paying $2 or 5$. You're paying by the fact that you have to "login" to remove those ads with that measly $2.

You can use a separate Google account with a separate email address for that. Using Apple Pay or similar, your payment also remains anonymous. And if you don’t care about history etc., you can switch to a new account every year or so.

Re: Block YouTube ads on AppleTV by decrypting and stripping ads from Profobuf

#433

Post by CamperBob2 »

musictubes wrote: post #400
CamperBob2 wrote: post #351

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Any sufficiently-dominant corporation is indistinguishable from a government.

That is insane. No corporation has the ability to incarcerate you or kill you. No corporation can round up your family. What, precisely, is the “threat” that Google presents that does not rely on a government to be the muscle. Are they going to cancel your Gmail account? Cut you off from YouTube? Surely if they actually are as powerful and dangerous as you think they are you wouldn’t use their stuff at all. But then…

(Shrug) Insane, whatever. All I know is, when I call the IRS, I can get a human on the phone who actively wants to help.

Try that with Google, PayPal, Amazon, Apple, or any number of other companies when an error they've made but refuse to even explain, much less fix, threatens to wreck your livelihood.

To redress grievances with my government, I don't need to make the front page of HN or go viral on Twitter. We don't go a week around here without another front-page lamentation to appeal for noblesse oblige from one of these intentionally-faceless megacorps. That's not how you should have to deal with a company you're doing business with... but it is how you deal with a dictator who leaves you no other choice.

Re: Block YouTube ads on AppleTV by decrypting and stripping ads from Profobuf

#434

Post by ojagodzinski »

elif wrote: post #265

[flagged]

> If you don't want ads on youtube, just pay the $10 premium fee.

YT premium doesn't actually block the ads that creators put in their videos, SponsorBlock+AdBlock does. Give me the same functionality for 10$ in YT Premium and I will pay.

Re: Block YouTube ads on AppleTV by decrypting and stripping ads from Profobuf

#436

Post by mwidell »

neurostimulant wrote: post #192
jjallen wrote: post #122

I just subscribe to YouTube premium to support my favorite application out there. I learn so much from the people who spend hours and hours making videos every month that I am more than happy to pay a measly $13 or whatever it is every month to YouTube.

I understand the sentiment, but the creators actually only got peanuts (most don't even see any money) out of your $13 while the rest go to Google. You are paying Google for youtube, and Google pay (some) content creators with a tiny fraction of your subscription money.

This is bullshit. I'm a full time youtuber, and creators get 55% of that money, and we really appreciate that income stream.

Youtube is actually one of the good companies out there when it comes to paying creators a fair share. No other company that I know of pay creators this well, and it is probably a big reason for their continued success.

Re: Block YouTube ads on AppleTV by decrypting and stripping ads from Profobuf

#437

Post by hombre_fatal »

DrBazza wrote: post #268
jjallen wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm giving them money to view fewer ads. Isn't this an inherently "anti-ad" consumer standpoint? I am telling YT/Google that I as a consumer am willing to pay money to not see ads. Am I not telling them with my wallet to develop other ad-free solutions that I will pay them and the content creators money for? > They pay the creators per impression even if you block the ads. Blocking ads harms Google, not the content p…

You're giving them money because they're serving you ads in the first place. I appreciate advertising money pays the salaries of people in such companies, but there are other less intrusive ways. Since I've grown up with the evolution of internet advertising, my brain is wired to just ignore it. I can't saying I've knowingly be influence by any form of internet advertising, ever. A better solution for all concerned w…

You’re paying because you want the product, but there’s incidentally a free ad-supported tier.

The way you phrase it makes it seem like you think they slapped ads on something that would have otherwise been a free gift.

Re: Block YouTube ads on AppleTV by decrypting and stripping ads from Profobuf

#438

Post by spiderice »

db48x wrote: post #380
dawnerd wrote: post #321

Earlier quoted context omitted.

SponsorBlock effectively does this without the creators help. Even directly subscribing to creators these days isn’t enough, they want you to buy their merch and they almost never consider that a sponsorship. Need to stop acting like these big players are barely making any money.

I second the recommendation for SponsorBlock! You've saved people from 10,945 segments ( 2d 17h 9.6 minutes of their lives ) You've skipped 4,006 segments ( 1d 9h 11.8 minutes )

It doesn’t help on TV/mobile though, right?

I do appreciate that a lot of creators have been putting the “progress bar” during the sponsored segment that make them easier to skip

Re: Block YouTube ads on AppleTV by decrypting and stripping ads from Profobuf

#440

Post by peter422 »

ohgodplsno wrote: post #410
montroser wrote: post #333

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And it's just a convenient consequence of doing the "morally right" thing, that you happen to get your content for free? And content creators be damned?

No, I just happened to always have it for free. They are the ones that decided that it was a good deal in exchange for tracking me throughout the internet, stalking me. They are the ones that decided to make my watching experience miserable by putting unskippable ads. They are the ones that decided to make the videos I watch crap, because if they're not 10 minutes long with a perfectly engineered cover image, they wo…

So you are vehemently anti-youtube, yet it still sounds like you get tons of content from it.

Why not get your content from ad-free platforms?

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