Does uBlock Origin bypass the latest YouTube anti-adblock script? • Hacker News Board

Re: Does uBlock Origin bypass the latest YouTube anti-adblock script?

#391

Post by CubsFan1060 » Wed, Dec 06, 2023, 4:40 PM UTC

ath3nd wrote: post #389

CubsFan1060 wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm curious -- what do you want to happen in this situation? What is your best desired outcome? It sounds like you are arguing that video sharing sites are a utility?

Video sharing sites of the size/impact of Youtube, similarly to social platforms like Facebook/Instagram/Twitter whatever, and platforms like Google Search/Maps, etc have a tremendous impact on society. They have become a major way of how people communicate, make daily choices, purchasing decisions, vacation plans, etc. When a company is that big and that impactful (despite being a for-profit company), it is in inter…

So what, specifically, do you want to see different about Youtube?

Re: Does uBlock Origin bypass the latest YouTube anti-adblock script?

#392

Post by nijave » Wed, Dec 06, 2023, 4:47 PM UTC

miki123211 wrote: post #138

CrzyLngPwd wrote: post #57

Youtube seems to me to be a bullshit test platform. They will work around ad blockers and continue to pile on repetitive and banal adverts that have nothing to do with the user until they reach breaking point (where people flee and seek alternatives), and then they will relax their system to show marginally less bullshit. The confusing part of this battle is the app users, who do not agree with the avalanche of adver…

Video hosting is expensive and needs to be paid for somehow. Any competitor will have the same problems as Youtube does. You can go the Nebula route and require users to pay (which means far fewer users) or require creators to pay (which means far fewer creators). You could also require creators to host the videos themselves, but that also requires money, expertise and causes downtime when a video goes viral. There's…

>Any competitor will have the same problems as Youtube does

I think there's still plenty of room for innovation in the ad serving front. YouTube is far worse than it used to be. It currently has multiple ads in a 10 minute video many of which have one 5-10 second mandatory clip followed by a much longer clip that can be skipped after 5-10 seconds.

The "you have to have the remote in hand to prevent even more ads" is pretty user hostile.

To make matters worse, on Android TV/Roku, many ads require HDCP so it's pretty normal for the device to require a reboot when ads start playing if the HDCP negotiation fails.

Youtube Premium is pretty expensive for a casual user ($144/yr).

The cost of servers/bandwidth isn't lost on me and Google gets the best rates in the industry, nonetheless. They're sufficiently big they can stick cache devices all over the place directly inside ISP networks (I assume they don't pay power/bandwidth on these since ISPs end up saving money)

Re: Does uBlock Origin bypass the latest YouTube anti-adblock script?

#393

Post by bko » Wed, Dec 06, 2023, 4:50 PM UTC

jacquesm wrote: post #342

bko wrote: post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

YouTube is incredibly expensive to run which explains why there's such little competition. Think about it, anyone can host gigs of videos perpetually indexed for free. What percentage of videos have fewer than 100 views? Google has killed off profitable projects. If you think they'll dump tens of billions every year hosting videos that no one watches, you're kidding yourself. And what we noticed with paying is that p…

I think I have a pretty good idea of what it costs to run a video site. Check my bio if you think you have something to explain to me on that front.

Great so you know how expensive running a video hosting site is.

So explain to me why Google will continue footing the bill when more and more people prevent them to run ads on the site.

Re: Does uBlock Origin bypass the latest YouTube anti-adblock script?

#394

Post by hunter2_ » Wed, Dec 06, 2023, 5:02 PM UTC

drexlspivey wrote: post #230

hunter2_ wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The number has climbed by almost 100 in the past couple of minutes. Interesting to see if the HN effect temporarily ruins your rule of thumb...

We are going to break ublock origin if that continues

If what continues? People following a link from HN to Reddit? People updating uBlock when the reddit counter is >1000? I'm confused.

Re: Does uBlock Origin bypass the latest YouTube anti-adblock script?

#395

Post by kazinator » Wed, Dec 06, 2023, 5:02 PM UTC

SushiHippie wrote: post #376

kazinator wrote: post #7

Forget browsers; I could use an ad-free Youtube app for Android TV that has voice search.

https://smarttubenext.com/

I looked at that before. It doesn't have voice search out of the box. You have to uninstall Youtube, root the device and fiddle with adb, to install some bridge application or something.

It could be a good reason to switch to Google's Android box device (Chromecast with Google TV) where this is supposedly simpler.

Re: Does uBlock Origin bypass the latest YouTube anti-adblock script?

#396

Post by mardifoufs » Wed, Dec 06, 2023, 5:06 PM UTC

amanzi wrote: post #65

Or you could just pay for YouTube Premium and never see another ad again. As a bonus, you get YouTube Music thrown in for free.

Since when does YouTube premium remove sponsored segments? Theres no price you can pay to remove all YouTube ads.

Re: Does uBlock Origin bypass the latest YouTube anti-adblock script?

#397

Post by hunter2_ » Wed, Dec 06, 2023, 5:07 PM UTC

guerrilla wrote: post #295

brookst wrote: post #239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure it’s a lot of money. Probably just an algorithm to generate variations of the anti Adblock code. At most, polymorphic code inspired by malware.

> At most, polymorphic code inspired by malware. If it quacks like a duck...

Adware has always been a type of malware, even without polymorphic code or other evasion.

Re: Does uBlock Origin bypass the latest YouTube anti-adblock script?

#398

Post by hunter2_ » Wed, Dec 06, 2023, 5:09 PM UTC

Ekaros wrote: post #298

SiempreViernes wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think they are just updating their measures frequently, so not really anything technical. In other words: Youtube is continuously spending a lot of money to put out new patches block the latest circumventions.

I actually wonder what is the balance between maybe a small team of software engineers finding way to block adblock vs generate revenue for periods when they are successful. In the end it really is question that when they manage to block adblock do they make more money than they spend in effort.

This effort is confined to YouTube, but the return of someone uninstalling an ad blocker (the user's response could be more targeted, but some will fully uninstall) reaches Google more broadly.

Re: Does uBlock Origin bypass the latest YouTube anti-adblock script?

#399

Post by SiempreViernes » Wed, Dec 06, 2023, 5:12 PM UTC

account42 wrote: post #324

SiempreViernes wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, ad revenue is an important method of funding media, but that is a very different claim from saying that YouTube's implementation of ad delivery is anything close to good. The simple fact is that the ad ecosystem YouTube directs has produced lots of low effort "content" farming, enterprises focused on raw output at the expense of quality, truth, and frequently the intellectual property of others.

> Sure, ad revenue is an important method of funding media No it isn't. It's a horrible method of funding media because as you correctly realized it ends up lowering the quality of that media. This isn't just a problem with YouTube's implementation, it is an inherent aspect of ad-based funding.

I didn't say it is a desirable method, but look at any (mass) media and you will find ads and sponsorships there: clearly they are important to the production of (mass) media.

Re: Does uBlock Origin bypass the latest YouTube anti-adblock script?

#400

Post by ehaliewicz2 » Wed, Dec 06, 2023, 5:33 PM UTC

crazygringo wrote: post #262

ehaliewicz2 wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does google really have the right to block my control over what is shown or not shown on my computer? They may have the ability to do so, but that is not necessarily equivalent to a right. For example, what if I had a robot that detected when an ad was being played on youtube, and automatically turned off my monitor and headphones momentarily, turning them back on once the ad was over. Would that violate google's "ri…

> Does google really have the right to block my control over what is shown or not shown on my computer? In general? Of course not. On a webpage they serve to you? Of course they have the right to, to the extent JavaScript makes it possible. What possible legal basis could there be for them not to have that right? With limited exceptions, they have the right to do wherever they want with their webpage code. And there…

You didn't answer my hypothetical. Do they have the right to ensure that I am looking at their ads?

I don't see how they could, I can always look away. In that case, what is the effective difference between that and ad blockers that control what code/images run/display on my computer?