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YouTube's Ad Blocker Crackdown Spurs Record Uninstalls

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Re: YouTube's Ad Blocker Crackdown Spurs Record Uninstalls

#171

Post by thunky »

Gud wrote: post #164
thunky wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I also think that Alphabet has such an immensely negative impact on society. Care to elaborate? Good news is that none of this matters to you since you avoid Google products.

There is no way to avoid "Google products". Google are everywhere via Google Analytics.

Maybe I'm missing something but AFAIK Google can't force anyone to install Google Analytics on their website. It would make more sense to me if you were upset with those that do.

And if you're someone that knows enough to dislike GA then you're probably already blocking it.

Re: YouTube's Ad Blocker Crackdown Spurs Record Uninstalls

#172

Post by pasttense01 »

Workaccount2 wrote: post #86
pprotas wrote: post #5

I wonder if anyone in the industry has any insights in how a regular developer can help improve ad blockers? Where to get started? As a huge fan of blocking ads, this makes me feel inspired to join the fight against Google. How can I help?

By far the most effective way to end ads would be to come up with an internet business model that doesn't need ads or subscriptions to stay alive. This would be a god tier level development, and would seriously cripple Google's core business (serving ads) and youtube as well (serve ads or subscription).

Peer to peer networks. "Tim Berners-Lee's vision for the World Wide Web was close to a P2P network in that it assumed each user of the web would be an active editor and contributor, creating and linking content to form an interlinked "web" of links."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peer-to-peer

Re: YouTube's Ad Blocker Crackdown Spurs Record Uninstalls

#173

Post by appplication »

fragmede wrote: post #135
Workaccount2 wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By far the most effective way to end ads would be to come up with an internet business model that doesn't need ads or subscriptions to stay alive. This would be a god tier level development, and would seriously cripple Google's core business (serving ads) and youtube as well (serve ads or subscription).

Given that things cost money, I'm not sure how you want to accomplish that in a sustainable fashion. Somewhere, someone down the line is paying money, even if it's not you. And if it's not you, you're the product, as the popular saying goes. So paying a subscription fee really is the best solution. One can imagine a different structure, where a wealthy philanthropist or organization funds the site, but that's just sh…

Here’s your solution: YouTube, but backed by blockchain. Instead of hashing or whatever nonsense happens on blockchain, your “mining” actually does something mildly useful and serves videos. You get coins or something. Since there’s no real value in blockchain products and everything is completely fabricated, you can show people their coin value is going up, because why not. So they can continue to “invest” with their compute.

Been feeling inspired by the SBF case lately.

Jokes aside, distributing compute to users is one way to avoid having expensive servers, which tend to be powered by ads, if not direct payments. There is the fediverse. Not sure how well that would work here, but there’s probably some potential. And before that there has been e.g. torrenting communities that require certain seed ratios. Basically: the product is “free” but you need to participate in some form that adds value rather than just leeching. The distributed model is established, I just don’t think it will ever outcompete a centralized one, if for no other reason than distributed communities have strategy and cash flow problems. As in, they don’t really have any functional mechanism to build, fund, and execute on a competitive strategy like YouTube can. All they can really do is make a product and hope people like it. But competing on merit is never enough.

Re: YouTube's Ad Blocker Crackdown Spurs Record Uninstalls

#174

Post by [deleted] »

thunky wrote: post #171
Gud wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no way to avoid "Google products". Google are everywhere via Google Analytics.

Maybe I'm missing something but AFAIK Google can't force anyone to install Google Analytics on their website. It would make more sense to me if you were upset with those that do. And if you're someone that knows enough to dislike GA then you're probably already blocking it.

[deleted]

Re: YouTube's Ad Blocker Crackdown Spurs Record Uninstalls

#175

Post by AwaAwa »

stronglikedan wrote: post #150
meiraleal wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> where they provide a FREE service that allows EVERYONE to upload as much video as they want If it was a FREE service to EVERYONE, they wouldn't care about adblockers. It is paid, then.

Free, in this context, means ad supported. Context is important.

'Not Free' would be the clearest context.

Re: YouTube's Ad Blocker Crackdown Spurs Record Uninstalls

#176

Post by AwaAwa »

jauntywundrkind wrote: post #158
teeray wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Eventually it will have to become content extraction. Load the page in the background, load the ad, capture frames from the video window and use some process to detect and remove the frames that show an ad. Take the clean video feed and show it in another interface than the original page. This would also be a countermeasure against direct injection of ads into the content stream.

Agreed. Computers are slowly being maimed to the point where we are going to go back to using DVR (digital video recorder, a time shifting device like tivo) but for computers. Also note that so far, most streaming services have succeeded in protecting their high res codecs. KodiTV can play a big variety of services but usually only at 540p (widevine L2?). Tim Berners-Lee overriding the standards bodies and approving…

The maiming of computers is the logical outcome of allowing walled gardens to become acceptable, thanks to the halo of Apple. The rest is numbers and history.

Re: YouTube's Ad Blocker Crackdown Spurs Record Uninstalls

#177

Post by [deleted] »

jauntywundrkind wrote: post #155
beej71 wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> YouTube is imo one of the best sites on the internet. This is true. > I am 100% happy to pay for YouTube. Just remember that you're giving money to the company that backs things like FLoC, Manifest v3, and WEI (recently in the news), things that threaten interoperability on the Internet. It's not friendly. If you pay them, do it with your eyes open.

They also built an incredible browser full of amazing capabilities that I do love. And have an enormous commitment to standards and standards processes, that they have supported & helped tirelessly. https://www.chromium.org/blink/launching-features/

[deleted]

Re: YouTube's Ad Blocker Crackdown Spurs Record Uninstalls

#178

Post by sdrinf »

appplication wrote: post #173
fragmede wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given that things cost money, I'm not sure how you want to accomplish that in a sustainable fashion. Somewhere, someone down the line is paying money, even if it's not you. And if it's not you, you're the product, as the popular saying goes. So paying a subscription fee really is the best solution. One can imagine a different structure, where a wealthy philanthropist or organization funds the site, but that's just sh…

Here’s your solution: YouTube, but backed by blockchain. Instead of hashing or whatever nonsense happens on blockchain, your “mining” actually does something mildly useful and serves videos. You get coins or something. Since there’s no real value in blockchain products and everything is completely fabricated, you can show people their coin value is going up, because why not. So they can continue to “invest” with thei…

This is called peertube, and the topmost viewed video on peertube.tv sorted by "Global views" had 57K views in total.

Youtube, OTOH, used, and currently uses a number of marketing strategies to drive traffic to their site, and paid out ~$10B++ annually for content creators. GP's comment on "Given that things cost money" is not governed by compute, rather, cost of customer acquisition for the platform, and cost of content creation by creatives. Somebody, somewhere, has to pay for these. That is the merit of this battleground.

Re: YouTube's Ad Blocker Crackdown Spurs Record Uninstalls

#179

Post by nonbirithm »

qntmfred wrote: post #36

I've been a paying YouTube user since 2016 when it was YouTube Red. YouTube is imo one of the best sites on the internet. Both in terms of content that I personally enjoy and improves my life, as well as its role on the internet overall, where they provide a FREE service that allows EVERYONE to upload as much video as they want, and see what kind of response it gets from a global audience, and even to get paid for th…

Even though it is true YouTube is a hugely valuable resource, if it takes YouTube going as far as blocking adblockers for me to pay for premium at this point, I don't think I could bring myself to do it. In a word - and I know it sounds like a cop-out to say this - it feels like capitulation. Letting up on blocking ads on YouTube would not make me give up uBlock Origin for all other websites, and I think that would cause me to have a lot of cognitive dissonance in my decision. It's an issue of conflicting mental signals and the mood that results from the resulting implication - it's like saying "ads are not okay under any circumstance - until they start locking the doors."

I feel like it could be the same for a lot of people who can afford the cost. Ability to pay may not always be the issue. Paying the price could become a symbolic indicator of Google finally triumphing over even the most obstinate anti-timewasting user, and mentally it's not a good feeling to give that up that fight after years and years of holding on to the adblocking creed, regardless of the resulting betterment of the service from paying.

At the same time, it doesn't result in a justification for being set in one's ways, only a possible explanation of why people would decide not to use premium. This strategy only works so long as uBlock Origin's team of volunteers holds more patience than Google's salaried employees.

Re: YouTube's Ad Blocker Crackdown Spurs Record Uninstalls

#180

Post by bitcharmer »

qntmfred wrote: post #36

I've been a paying YouTube user since 2016 when it was YouTube Red. YouTube is imo one of the best sites on the internet. Both in terms of content that I personally enjoy and improves my life, as well as its role on the internet overall, where they provide a FREE service that allows EVERYONE to upload as much video as they want, and see what kind of response it gets from a global audience, and even to get paid for th…

Just a friendly reminder that you're promoting a platform that happily demonetizes people reporting on important events (like Tiffany Fong) and supports doxxing (as long as the doxxer is a cash cow like SSSniperWolf).
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