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Ask HN: Is it just me or has YouTube gone fanatical on ads?

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Re: Ask HN: Is it just me or has YouTube gone fanatical on ads?

#31

Post by _nvs »

Amadou wrote: post #19

The net is soooo ripe for a distributed replacement of Youtube, Facebook, Gmail, etc. Once upon a time those sorts of sites provided real value in hosting files, pictures, video and providing a well-known endpoint like gmail. But now we have phones with 64GB of flash for canonical storing of files, p2p protocols for efficient transfer of files and distributed hash tables for finding files. Someone is going to come al…

I agree - think WebRTC and take a look at what PeerCDN is doing about it (https://peercdn.com).

Re: Ask HN: Is it just me or has YouTube gone fanatical on ads?

#32

Post by fierycatnet »

Glad I am not the only one. In the last week or so I've noticed increase in ads as well. It's really annoying now, I frequently just skip watching video all together, I have a short attention span for this nonsense. 30 second ad so I can watch 1 minute video, no thank you.

Re: Ask HN: Is it just me or has YouTube gone fanatical on ads?

#33

Post by gcb0 »

alanctgardner2 wrote: post #8

I don't know why it did't happen sooner. I started pre-roll seeing ads on mobile as well, which I don't remember until recently. I don't get why it's disgusting. This is how video creators and Google are supposed to get paid. It's annoying to me that people want free content, and they keep pushing companies to "get traction first, then monetize". This is what has to happen, or else Google has to keep subsidizing prog…

It's pretty obvious why it didn't happen before... There were still competition.

Google is following Microsoft 90s playbook for a decade now.

Re: Ask HN: Is it just me or has YouTube gone fanatical on ads?

#34

Post by socillion »

graeme wrote: post #27
alanctgardner2 wrote: post #8

I don't know why it did't happen sooner. I started pre-roll seeing ads on mobile as well, which I don't remember until recently. I don't get why it's disgusting. This is how video creators and Google are supposed to get paid. It's annoying to me that people want free content, and they keep pushing companies to "get traction first, then monetize". This is what has to happen, or else Google has to keep subsidizing prog…

Here's one example use case where the ads are horrible: playlists. Youtube has these "top tracks" playlists. When I discover a new artist, I'll often put that on and go do something else. If a rollover ad comes on, I have to come back to the computer, and click the "skip" button, since I'm not sitting down. One thing I was wondering: does the content creator make money when I skip the ad, or only when I take some kin…

Advertisers do not pay for skipped ads.

Re: Ask HN: Is it just me or has YouTube gone fanatical on ads?

#35

Post by brc »

alanctgardner2 wrote: post #8

I don't know why it did't happen sooner. I started pre-roll seeing ads on mobile as well, which I don't remember until recently. I don't get why it's disgusting. This is how video creators and Google are supposed to get paid. It's annoying to me that people want free content, and they keep pushing companies to "get traction first, then monetize". This is what has to happen, or else Google has to keep subsidizing prog…

I personally have no problem with including ads with YouTube content- it was always going to end that way.

The problem is the fact you have to 'pay' before you get to play. When a FTA tv puts on a movie, they give you 10-15 minutes of content to hook you into he movie, then ramp up the ads toward the end, knowing hor going to stick around to see the end.

YouTube != TV movies, but it feels like you have to watch all the superbowl ads upfront before a player takes the field. When you're speculatively flicking through YouTube videos looking for the right one, it degrades the experience when you have to go through the ad process before even committing to watching even 10% of the video.

So to me it would be better if the ad cut in during the frat x seconds of the video. The video owner could pick a break-point when editing so the more pro channels could properly cut to an ad-break, and the viewers could could set through the dross to find the one without the cheesy music and graphic overlays or terrible quality.

Re: Ask HN: Is it just me or has YouTube gone fanatical on ads?

#36

Post by GauntletWizard »

graeme wrote: post #27
alanctgardner2 wrote: post #8

I don't know why it did't happen sooner. I started pre-roll seeing ads on mobile as well, which I don't remember until recently. I don't get why it's disgusting. This is how video creators and Google are supposed to get paid. It's annoying to me that people want free content, and they keep pushing companies to "get traction first, then monetize". This is what has to happen, or else Google has to keep subsidizing prog…

Here's one example use case where the ads are horrible: playlists. Youtube has these "top tracks" playlists. When I discover a new artist, I'll often put that on and go do something else. If a rollover ad comes on, I have to come back to the computer, and click the "skip" button, since I'm not sitting down. One thing I was wondering: does the content creator make money when I skip the ad, or only when I take some kin…

The content creator might get paid when you click, or might get paid per impression. The the creator is absolutely not paid is when you click Skip. Click skip when you don't like the ad; It drives up the price for a successful watch, because ads that get skipped don't get played. There's an ecosystem, it can be played, but it has the proper knobs and controls to combat the playing.

Re: Ask HN: Is it just me or has YouTube gone fanatical on ads?

#37

Post by gizmo686 »

cclogg wrote: post #14
alanctgardner2 wrote: post #8

I don't know why it did't happen sooner. I started pre-roll seeing ads on mobile as well, which I don't remember until recently. I don't get why it's disgusting. This is how video creators and Google are supposed to get paid. It's annoying to me that people want free content, and they keep pushing companies to "get traction first, then monetize". This is what has to happen, or else Google has to keep subsidizing prog…

I guess it's just annoying that it's practically on everything now... like everyone is trying to make that 4 cents in ad revenue off of their kitten rolling around or whatever lol > I've personally stopped watching several videos just because an ad started (as in I closed the browser tab after seeing I had to wait 15s or 30s). Youtube still has dominance now but if you keep getting in the way of people, something bet…

Youtube has 2 types of users it needs to worry about: viewers, and uploaders. One of its major offerings to uploaders is the ability to monotize. It is difficult to see how a competitor can offer this without advertisements.

Re: Ask HN: Is it just me or has YouTube gone fanatical on ads?

#38

Post by tjmc »

Frustrating yes. Disgusting no. YouTube is provided to you as a free service and advertisers pickup the tab.

Google paid over $1B for YouTube and people upload over 10 new hours of video every minute. Did you honestly expect they'd wear that kind of expense for ever?

Re: Ask HN: Is it just me or has YouTube gone fanatical on ads?

#40

Post by gizmo686 »

dredmorbius wrote: post #30
HaEB4zcjbp wrote: post #4

https://adblockplus.org/ https://github.com/rg3/youtube-dl

For people who are missing your second link: youtube-dl is a video downloader, and it works on far, far more than just YouTube. The benefits: you download videos at your discretion and preference. You can archive them if you want (I do this largely for documentary / lecture videos), and play them back locally using the video player of your preference. I generally prefer either mplayer or xine, both offer keyboard con…

Also, using clive, I noticed that I get much more consistent download speed.
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