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this post was submitted on 09 Oct 2023
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Technology
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I haven't had to deal with video ads for years simply because I don't use the website and use patched APKs to block ads. I'm thinking it was/is the right choice due to gøøgl€'s ongoing war against ad blocking in general. Don't know a solution to the browser problem outside of using alternative frontends like libretube or invidious or whatever if you don't mind not logging in.
Another option is paying a couple bucks and not having to worry about it. Might even make you feel good knowing you’re supporting the platform.
I don’t fault you for tinkering and finding ways around it - that’s fun. But in the end, you’re leeching off a service you enjoy.
I don't think that's a fair or true statement.
For one thing, the "service" here has risen to a point of ubiquity that it's a de facto public space. Everything is on YouTube – legacy media channels, individual enthusiasts, alternative media outlets, the worlds of tech, fashion, politics, sports – you name it. If you were deprived of all access to it, you would have a qualitatively poorer access of what is going on in society. So it's not equivalent to a traditional service like a trade.
For another, blocking ads is not merely refusal to pay a fee of some kind. Advertisements are cognitively intrusive, designed to affect your willpower and decision-making, used to track and control your behaviour, compromise your digital safety, and turn you into a product for companies to whom you do not give your consent for the opportunity to be exploited. Blocking that system of "payment" is not simply prudent but right, and the choice between paying a monetary fee or being so exploited is not a fair choice at all.
So mediums with advertising should not be allowed to seek monetary payment? Only mediums without advertising should do so?
I’m not understanding your logic here.
For me it’s pretty simple. There is a product - would you like to pay for it?
I feel that all the scary words you can add to a paragraph about advertising based revenue for digital mediums is just your tool to justify your behavior of sticking it to the man.
Not quite sure how you got to the point you did there. There are different ways to advertise – billboards and TV/radio adverts, e.g., while often odious, are something you can more easily divert your attention from and which are not tracking devices or the product of turning you personally into an item for sale. I dislike them and would prefer a world without them but I don't think their being attached to organisations in and of itself ought to deprive those organisations of income.
That is apparent.
This is called "begging the question" as a response to me – I've called into question exactly both your premise and conclusion, for reasons you've not actually engaged with, and then you've re-asserted them. You have assumed what you've set out to prove.
(1) it is not simply a product (or service – you've changed tune there), for the reasons I've already outlined. Its use and availability is not analogous to something you can pick off the shelf or pay a tradesperson to do for you. (2) therefore, the question of paying for it (and how) demands different kinds of answer. In the country I'm from, e.g., healthcare is a right and not paid for, neither is early-years education up to 18, and so on. Both are "products" or "services" in some sense of the term, but to speak of payment here is complex and the answer doesn't simply carry over from thinking about normal products/services.
This can only be a disingenuous response, surely? Rather than engage with the criticism of the nature of modern internet advertising and how corporations use it to affect people, you'll just summarise it as "scary words".
I’m being completely serious and I’m interested to understand more about what you mean. You are saying that YouTube is not merely a service and then you’re equating it to something like healthcare and education. Now I must ask are you the one that is being serious?
It doesn't strike me that way when you also write things like this:
"equating" sets up a straw man. Such a tactic gives me the impression you think of this as some sort of battle that you want to win rather than a good-faith discussion.
What I had written was not an equating – and I think you should have or indeed did see that – only a comparison to show that something's being describable as a product or service "in some sense" does not mean it is the sort of thing we pay for in a traditional way. This contradicts the central inference of your argument.
The answer to how I would actually characterise the "service" of YouTube is already in the first comment, so I'll just quote it again:
I stand by that; YouTube has a near monopoly over that media form, and if you require access to information and essentially a key plank of the online public square, then you need to go through it. I regard it as a (positive rather than negative) right that we do all have – not to use YouTube specifically but for information, opinion, discourse, politics and more to be available to us all. As it happens, YouTube is a key platform for the arrangement of all these things. Twitter also is/was, which is why Musk's buyout was in principle concerning, and then in practice very shit once he created a two tier system of access to and impact on that public space.
I’m open to having this discussion but every single response from you begins with you telling me that I’m not interested in having this discussion. If you could just leave that part out so we can have the discussion, it would be much easier. I believe that’s referred to as ad hominem. If you don’t think it is - ok, it’s not. But please stop allowing that to distract from a discussion if you could.
These “near monopolistic public spaces” such as Twitter and YouTube have costs associated with them. How do you feel that we as users/consumers/citizens of the public space support it’s existence?
yeah google really needs more money, poor guys
I know this isn’t YouTube’s fault but one thing that bugs me about yet premium is when creators dump baked in ads.
As a user you have 3 options:
Now the one exception to this is nebula where like YouTube you pay an all access fee but no baked in ads (I pay for this currently).
I do wonder if creators had the option to make videos available via YouTube premium only (say early access and no baked in ads). Would more people pay and would creators use this system? (They wouldn’t have to worry about demonetization).
Curious on your thoughts
@Deemo @locuester About the first option, if you're talking about sponsor sections, you can autoskip them using #sponsorblock. It's an addon which does... well... what the name says.
I do use sponsorblock 😅
Only gripe is your stuck to the web version of youtube (especially on ios).
If you want sponsorblock in the native youtube app you have to side load a mod which means either dealing with apple's 7 day limit refresh or paying for a apple dev acount/ signing service subscription.
Android there is revanced (no sideloading subscriptions needed).
On a final note I am considering trying https://grayjay.app/
It bundles odessy, nebula, youtube and a few other platforms in one app (it also includes sponsorblock and return dislikes for youtube).
https://beehaw.org/comment/1359450