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Tell HN: "Ad blockers are not allowed on YouTube”

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Re: Tell HN: "Ad blockers are not allowed on YouTube”

#91

Post by avalys »

Hizonner wrote: post #82
avalys wrote: post #36

[flagged]

I'm happy to pay for content, as soon as sites provide me with a remotely reasonable way of doing that. Advertising is not a reasonable way. A separate subscription, with a credit card interaction, for every site I happen to hit once a year, is not a reasonable way. Demanding a bunch of personal information is not a reasonable way. Trying to lock me into an "ecosystem of partners" is not a reasonable way. Globally ac…

Give me a break.

You don't want advertising, you don't want to subscribe, and you don't want a network of sites using the same subscription. What possible solution exists that satisfies your criteria, which are way more demanding than "remotely reasonable"?

This is just an excuse you've fabricated to justify your own convenience, stinginess and/or laziness.

Re: Tell HN: "Ad blockers are not allowed on YouTube”

#93

Post by wombat-man »

lcnPylGDnU4H9OF wrote: post #85
wombat-man wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you're mad they didn't start charging and pushing ads earlier?

Actually, yeah, that's a reasonable thing to be upset about. They used the lack of forced ads to ensure that competitors also could not force ads. Now that they've captured the market, they force ads.

Well if they forced ads earlier than whatever competitor they had that didn't would be doing the same thing but with a smaller runway.

If all free video sites had ads, I think just on pure speed and scale youtube probably had higher costs overall anyway.

Re: Tell HN: "Ad blockers are not allowed on YouTube”

#94

Post by Hizonner »

vertis wrote: post #53
3seashells wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Calculate what a creator earns per view. Donate or buy merch with that money.

This is a nice idea, but it's like all those open source projects out there that you use that could use donations, but few remember to actually donate (or buy merch). Long-term subscriptions of one form or another (e.g. Patreon) are really the only way to ensure sustainability.

My approach to that is not to try to donate a few bucks to every project I use, but to randomly choose a few about quarterly, especially among the ones I use the most, and make larger donations to those. Otherwise it is too hard to remember to donate, and just plain too much work.

If a lot of people do that, it'll even out.

I'd like to have an automated way to make my choices more random, and to weight the probabilities better toward the projects that give me the most value, or are the most generally underfunded compared to the global value they produce. At the moment, I do that more or less by guessing. Unfortunately it sounds Hard(TM) to do it right.

It'd also be nice if you didn't have to go searching for how to donate to every project.

Re: Tell HN: "Ad blockers are not allowed on YouTube”

#95

Post by squeaky-clean »

simonbarker87 wrote: post #17
nickthegreek wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The creators get more money per view from a premium member than an ad-supported viewer. So not only does being a paying member give you a better experience, it puts more cash in the pocket of those you watch.

Not arguing for the sake of it but is that confirmed? I assume the more I watch the less each creator gets? No idea what the algorithm is they use to share the money out

I don't think there's any explicit youtube rule that guarantees they will make more money from premium viewers, but it's confirmed by creators who have showed their income reports, or at least talked about their income breakdown. And Premium views always pay better.

Another anecdote I've heard from several creators is that much longer videos (like a 5 hour livestream recording) are now much more profitable because of premium viewers. With ads they either need to include an ad every 10 minutes, which means 30 ads in one video and turns people away. Or they only include a few ads in which case people do watch it, but it's far less profitable than a 10 minute video with a midroll ad.

Re: Tell HN: "Ad blockers are not allowed on YouTube”

#96

Post by toastercat »

simonbarker87 wrote: post #10

This is where I get conflicted with ad blockers, on the one hand most website ads are trash, on the other hand there is great content on YT and I want those creators to make enough to carry on to get to the level where they proper sponsors. But, YT is so egregious with its ad insertions at times that it drives me mad and I don’t trust the creators will get fairly compensated if I go to premium.

> there is great content on YT and I want those creators to make enough to carry on to get to the level where they proper sponsors

Just donate to their Patreon/Kofi or click the big "Thanks" button under their video.

Re: Tell HN: "Ad blockers are not allowed on YouTube”

#97

Post by hot_gril »

kmeisthax wrote: post #80
hot_gril wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where did it say or imply they'd be accessible without ads? YouTube has had ads since the early days (2008 specifically).

It used to be the case that you had to be a YouTube partner to monetize your videos. They changed it so that you now have to be a partner in order to de monetize your videos. So anyone who just uploaded a video in the ~12 years between YouTube having monetization and monetization being mandated got ads put on their work retroactively and without permission.

There's a difference between being monetized (i.e. creator gets money) and YT running ads. So are you saying that YT used to only run ads on monetized videos, and recently they started running ads on non-monetized videos too? Because I remember starting to see ads on clearly non-monetized videos quite a long time ago, like 2014.

And it doesn't seem like a big deal; they didn't promise to host your video without ads forever, nor is that a reasonable expectation.

Re: Tell HN: "Ad blockers are not allowed on YouTube”

#98

Post by allanwind »

jefftk wrote: post #54
Etheryte wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is, in my opinion, shortsighted. It's straightforward to create ads that you can't block on the client so long as you are the server of the ads yourself, as Google is. I'm not going to detail how since I don't want anyone on HN to get any ideas and build a business of it, but I'm sure it will happen eventually. For the time being I suspect it's cheaper to keep the current tech running since it brings in enough r…

I used to work in ads, and I agree this is an arms race that the advertisers could win, at least in cases like YouTube where they control the whole stack. I don't think it would be trivial, but YouTube could do it if they decided to.

Are there any workarounds for smart tv apps (browser, player)? They probably already "won" there and the user experience is horrible.

Re: Tell HN: "Ad blockers are not allowed on YouTube”

#99

Post by avalys »

transcriptase wrote: post #78
avalys wrote: post #36

[flagged]

I don’t mind ads in principal but I use an adblocker. Because there’s a big difference between placing a tasteful ad or two on a page, and forcing me to watch 2 or 3 obnoxious irrelevant commercials while still placing ads all over the screen and making me click annoyance-optimized [X]s or skip options. And I’m already paying for two multi-user GSuites and Nest, despite their constant efforts to make those services s…

I don't use an adblocker. I agree that sites with obnoxious irrelevant ads are quite frustrating. I simply don't visit those sites, they're usually garbage in the first place.

What's an example of a site where:

1. There is no option to pay to remove the ads.

2. The ads are obnoxious and intrusive.

3. The content is worth consuming in the first place.

Re: Tell HN: "Ad blockers are not allowed on YouTube”

#100

Post by Hizonner »

avalys wrote: post #86
Hizonner wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm happy to pay for content, as soon as sites provide me with a remotely reasonable way of doing that. Advertising is not a reasonable way. A separate subscription, with a credit card interaction, for every site I happen to hit once a year, is not a reasonable way. Demanding a bunch of personal information is not a reasonable way. Trying to lock me into an "ecosystem of partners" is not a reasonable way. Globally ac…

As I said, “narcissistic self-entitlement”. You use YouTube once a year? Please.

No, I actually use YouTube enough to subscribe to it. Which I've tried to do, but they don't offer their premium service where I live yet.

Actually my usage is falling off now, so it may get too low before they get around to making it possible.

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