What's with the sudden pandemic of YouTube ads?

Factual Questions
41

I have a channel I manage for work, and it is in this category. Our videos occasionally have pre-roll ads, even though we have not monotized anything. This is not something we want, but is a decision made by YouTube. Due to YouTube’s near universal accessibility I still think it is the best platform for us to use, but there are downsides.

We have enough subscribers to qualify for partnership, or whatever they call it, but we have other funding sources (and we wouldn’t earn enough from YouTube to make a difference, anyway).

It’s my understanding that when this happens it is because the owner selected to have mid-ads, but isn’t going through the trouble of placing them. YouTube then automatically picks a place to put them.

Speaking of politics, are YouTube ads still terribly targeted? Four years ago the videos my (then) seven year old watched were full of political ads. This wasn’t videos that might interest adults, but stuff aimed at kids. I did think it was funny that lots of the ad dollars from candidates I opposed went to convincing a seven year old to vote for them.

42

I think it’s possible to overcome this (at present) by applying to the YouTube Partner scheme (as though you are trying to monetise), then making the explicit choice not to monetise the individual videos. I can still turn off ads on videos if I choose to (although there is no guarantee YouTube will continue to allow this control - they recently took away choice between skippable/non-skippable preroll ads and the system now decides which).

43

Google Chrome now prevents uBlock Origin from working:

44

This was the third post in the thread…

45

Does Chrome allow users to side load extensions?

46

Yes, you can add random extensions (or write your own) using developer mode. A common use case for this is to install the Bypass Paywalls extension from outside the official extension store, which will allow you to read news stories from a bunch of sites without a subscription.

But sideloading isn’t the issue here. Once they move to a new extension system (“manifest v3”), they will be limiting the browser features that can be controlled by extensions. The old subsystems that used to allow explicit blocking by extensions will be replaced by a list of blocking suggestions that extensions can provide, but the browser can choose to honor or ignore them as it wishes.

So even if you sideload your own extension, you won’t have access to the old-style explicit blocking anymore. Older extensions (sideloaded or not) can explicitly make the browser block X, Y, and Z. Under the new system, it’ll have to ask the browser “pretty please block X, Y, and Z”, but the browser might just decide “nah, I’ll only block X and Y because Z makes us too much money, too bad”.

The uBlock Origin team has a FAQ on the transition (though it’s more developer-focused than for end-users). TLDR ad blocking will be weaker with manifest v3, but still there. The ads you want to block may or may not still be blocked… hard to say without trying it yourself on the sites you normally visit. But the blocking capability is permanently neutered, and once Chrome starts going down this path, future versions may be even more neutered, and there’s nothing that extensions can do about it.

Fortunately, as long as the rendering engine underlying Chrome (Chromium, or Blink one level lower) remains open-source, alternative Chromium-based derivatives like Brave can continue to offer the older, more powerful blocking functionality. And of course completely different browsers like Firefox (which has its own problems) or the newer, experimental Ladybug can continue do their own things – they just have to live with incompatibilities between them and Blink/Webkit, which most real users and devices use. There’s also the Orion browser (Webkit-based so more compatible, but only for Mac & iOS); it’s made by Kagi, that upstart subscription-only Google Search competitor, meaning they are a direct competitor to Google and more likely to take your side in the ad wars. These other browsers may offer fewer ads, but they’ll sometimes have their own minor incompatibilities on certain sites.

47

Speaking of which, I just watched the latest SMN and it happened to have another good AG1 advert at 27:46, see below
(Yeah I’ve totally inverted this thread to celebrating ads :grimacing: …but I’m at least putting the link in a spoiler, because I don’t want the preview to show and potentially start people talking about the topic of the SMN video)

https://youtu.be/9IsodjUYn2I?si=hC8v0SaHGeJuTa1B&t=1667/

48

I just use AdBlock and I’ve yet to have issues with it blocking YouTube ads. All this talk about YouTube cracking down on ad blockers over the last few months hasn’t affected me at all yet.

49

I’ve basically switched almost fully away from Chrome. Was that Google’s plan? Because that was its effect. And have had general success with Brave so far, but I’m willing to jump ship if needed to another. On rare occasion something doesn’t work right in Brave or incognito mode of it, which has happened for short durations, I weather out the storm on freetube.

What browser are you using?

50

I know this wasn’t directed at me, but I’ve never, ever had an issue with youtube. If I didn’t see it getting mentioned here, I wouldn’t know there was anything going on. For me it’s a combination of Firefox and uBlock Origin, which I think is doing the heavy lifting and then a PiHole and SponserBlock take care of the rest.

51

Chrome ( up to date Version 130.0.6723.70). And I’m running the free version of AdBlock Plus.

52

One particularly egregious use of ads: in 8-12 hour sleep videos, when the whole point of the video is peaceful relaxing sounds like rain, electric fans, running water, etc. to help lull you to sleep.

AND THEN AT 3:00 AM IT’S INTERRUPTED BY A COMMERCIAL!!!

This completely destroys the entire purpose of viewing that video at all. I mean, this is such a no-brainer that I can’t imagine what the people at YT responsible for this are thinking. And I can’t be the first person to make this complaint. I apparently don’t have any adblockers already installed so I’m giving AdBlock360 a try.

53

FYI, you should know that this means that company will install a HTTPS root certificate on your system, making them able to monitor all of your encrypted communications – not just YouTube, but all your emails, banks, etc. too. All of your website traffic will have to pass through this app to be ad-blocked, and you have no control over where it goes after that.

It’s not the end of the world (I use something similar), but it does mean that if that company wanted to be unethical, or just got sold to another company, all of your data and logins could be compromised.

An open-source browser extension like uBlock Origin Lite might be safer, if that’s a concern, but I’m not sure how well it works on YouTube. You can also use other browsers that still support full uBlock, like Firefox or Brave.

Or of course just pay YouTube for Premium. Google doesn’t care if it wakes you from sleep or whatever; unless you pay, you’re not their customer, the advertisers are. And whoever made that sleep video only gets paid if an ad plays or if you pay.

54

I also use uBlock Origin Lite and it works pretty well. That said, I pay for YouTube Premium mainly for YouTube Music (formerly Google Play). It’s worth $14/month. I get it for $10/month through my Verizon phone plan.

55

I’ll see if Firefox works because for purposes of listening to an overnight video it doesn’t have to be my usual browser.

56

There’s also:

  • YouTube Premium (Viewers pay to not see ads, creators get a cut of that when a premium viewer watches their videos)
  • Channel Memberships (Basically Patreon, but YouTube’s in-house version of it)
  • Super Thanks (Viewers get to make donations to the channel, with their generosity being highlighted in colourful banners on their comments or livestream chats)

YouTube has recently introduced changes to midroll ads so that their algorithm will suggest additional ad play slots over and above the slots explicitly inserted by the channel owner, but (for now) these can be overridden and (for now) midroll ads as a whole are still a choice - creators can choose not to have them at all in their videos, if they want to run their channel that way.

57

Simple; to them, the purpose of those videos are as a vehicle for pushing ads on you. The only purpose. Your own desires are beside the point.

58

“Consumer serfdom” is getting ridiculous. We need either enforceable legislation or else lynch mobs.

59

Someone should just start a legislator subscription service. For $20/mo you get a tiny guaranteed share of House votes going your way. For $20k/mo you can rent a B-tier senator.

60

[General rant, not directed at you]
But having a white noise video that’s interrupted with audio ads defeats the purpose to the point that it’s going to actively drive people away from, at the very least, that channel, if not the platform. I get what you’re saying but this is the type of situation where they should offer some workarounds. For example, how about video only ads. On a video meant to run while you’re asleep, a full screen ad, even if the main video’s audio went silent while the ad was running, could work.

Can you imagine having an alarm clock app or any sort of sleep-tracking app that ran audio ads every half hour throughout the night? I mean, yes, the driving, if not the only reason those apps were even created is to run ads, but if the ads are so obtrusive as to make the app unusable, people aren’t going to use them.

It’s too bad the ads (on the internet, in general) got so out of hand so quickly. If websites used simple static images/links for ads, most people, I think, would tolerate them. But then you add in pop ups/unders, animated/looping ads, flashing banner ads, audio ads etc, and now everyone uses ad blockers to deal with it. So many sites are practically unusable without an adblocker. I put off getting one for a long time and finally gave in when a site I visited a lot started running multiple animated ads such that I wasn’t able to keep them all scrolled off the screen at once and I couldn’t read the articles with the animations going on. I was either going to get an adblocker or stop reading the site. Either way, they got greedy with the ads and lost a revenue stream.