[jraph]

In case you don't know about it, make sure to check out SponsorBlock, which optionally, automatically skips parts you don't want to see like for example sponsors (but not only). You can use this awesome DB for what you want to do.

And also Invidious.

And also their combination.

User of both, I'm unaffected by the recent adblocking issues on YouTube and I can still subscribe to channels, reliably. Without any Google account. (by the way, a simple regular RSS feed reader would do, since YouTube provides RSS feeds for each channel, but Invidious is a really convenient, specialized UI for this, without the notification / algorithm issues that seem to plague YouTube wrt this, but I digress)

All these issues are already solved by these projects. I guess one could consider contributing to them (financially or with code for instance). The official YouTube frontend actually don't need no love, others already achieve what we want.

Piped, NewPipe and FreeTube are also projects to look into (I loved NewPipe when I had a smartphone, Piped looks very good too and FreeTube looks interesting but I know less about them).

[Hikikomori]

Smarttube on my tv (Nvidia shield), revanced on phone and Vivaldi with ublock, no YouTube ads anywhere.

[xvector]

I just pay for Premium instead of grifting. Planetary-scale server farms and video hosting is not free.

[zeta0134]

I do not have a moral obligation to waste my time on content B, merely because it has been delivered alongside content A. The advertiser paid to make that offer to be, but I am not obligated to pay it any mind. That I've instructed my computer to automatically reject such offers is no sin.

For the record I do pay for premium, but that's because I want to support creators directly. I do that a lot actually; Patreon is great. But I block ads anyway, everywhere I go. There is no moral argument you can make that will convince me to actually watch ads. If companies want to stop making stuff available for free because advertising is not a sustainable business model, good! Cut the marketing out. Let it die.

[Sebb767]

> I do not have a moral obligation to waste my time on content B, merely because it has been delivered alongside content A.

Of course you don't. But neither does Google have the obligation to serve you if you don't pay and don't watch ads.

[BLKNSLVR]

I pay a certain fee in the effort I have to go to in order to block scam content reaching my home network.

Given that advertising platforms are one of the primary vectors of scam content these days, it's almost negligent to not block advertising.

[oaththrowaway]

They harvest everything I do online without my consent or permission without paying me. Fair is fair

[Jensson]

That has almost no value to them unless they can use that to show you ads. They use that data to target ads to you, that is the whole point. Do you think they care about what you do or who you are for any other reason?

[unclenoriega]

So if I block the ads, I guess that makes us even.

[Jensson]

No, it pits the entire relationship in your favor since they now don't receive anything of value from you while you still receive their service.

A trade can't be fair when only one part benefits. If you feel their services are worth nothing then stop using them.

[oaththrowaway]

If it has no value then why don't they stop?

[Jensson]

Because they show ads to people. Do you think they should stop collecting your data just because you block their ads? I don't see why that would make any sense, they have no reason to incentivize ad block use.

[dangus]

You consented by using the service. You don’t have to use YouTube.

[jraph]

It's more complicated than that because of the network effect. Few people host their videos elsewhere.

Google did this to themselves and they are the one imposing everybody to play by their rules. Nobody asked them to kill their competitors. Besides, I'm not really concerned for them. It's not like they are struggling.

[Sebb767]

> It's more complicated than that because of the network effect. Few people host their videos elsewhere.

Yes, but these things are far from essential. Most of YouTube is entertainment, which is as fungible as it gets, and what isn't (for example repair tutorials) can usually be solved by buying repair guides or hiring professionals. There are alternatives. You might not like them, but they exist.

> Google did this to themselves and they are the one imposing everybody to play by their rules.

This is really peak absurdity. "Google made me use their service for free".

> Nobody asked them to kill their competitors.

YouTube has competition in all of its areas. They might be the leader, but they are not the singular source.

[malnourish]

I watch maybe, maybe one YouTube video per month on average. I get along just fine.

[rockskon]

I have no sympathy for a company that operated at a loss for enough years to price out competitors to the point it was the only real game in town.

You kill competitors and now want to dictate the price (including attention) everyone pays to see user-generated content? Yeah no.

Got zero sympathy. None. You do not command my attention - a resource I am less and less willing to pay with these days.

If that results in YouTube becoming unsustainable and collapsing and something more sustainable emerging charging a price consumers are willing to pay? Well then that sounds acceptable.

[isaacremuant]

YouTube is a service that competes unethically with others and censors wildly to further its political interests.

Some of us control our computers, instead of letting every third party do it.

[oaththrowaway]

I don't consent on every other site that uses google analytics? And last time I checked, consent isn't implied.

[Sebb767]

You are free to use an adblocker. But it's completely fair for Google to refuse their services if you do.

[dangus]

Google analytics isn’t relevant to this subject.

[recursive]

Disable third party cookies.

[scotty79]

No, I did not. The fact that somebody somewhere wrote "You consent to ...." doesn't mean I actually consented.

[dangus]

If you went to the site and continued to use it, you consented. That’s how EULAs work.

Your consent was given by the fact that you directed your browser to interact with the service continually, if that’s something that you did.

You can’t say you didn’t consent to be searched if you walked into an airport. You can’t say you didn’t consent to be splashed with water if you got on the log flume ride. Your own ignorance or disagreement with the fact that you can get searched at an airport or wet on a lot flume ride isn’t really an excuse.

[rchaud]

I prefer to think of myself as grandfathered into the free plan.

[Hikikomori]

I happily paid for YouTube lite until they cancelled it.

[crimsontech]

I used to pay for premium but I stopped just incase they thought ramming shorts and ‘people also watched” videos on me was the reason I was paying.

[Boogie_Man]

Required default response to all of these comments calling me a criminal (that is the implication of grift, intended or not): I have and will never ever pay one red cent to any company to watch videos for the purpose of entertainment outside of specific creators making high quality content that I personally enjoy. You can not make me. I have zero (0) moral compunction on the subject. I will explore every legal avenue. Weep and gnash your teeth. If every other legal avenue is exhausted I will imagine new Top Cat episodes in my head. You cannot stop me.

[Jensson]

It being junk doesn't matter, if you like to watch it then it should be fair to pay for it. If you don't like to watch it then why do you even care what YouTube does, just don't watch.

[koolba]

They’re free to provide the service over a different channel than HTTP which restricts my ability to restrict their ads.

My user agent works for me.

[crummy]

Do you sneak into movie theaters?

[Boogie_Man]

As a kid I used to sit across from the drive in and watch. I also used to watch other people's TV's through their windows before I knew it was creepy.

[crummy]

sometimes I watch the movie in the person's seat diagonally in front of me while I'm on a plane :(

[aftbit]

I pay for Premium and use it on one PC, but I browse logged out (with ublock) on another PC. This gives me two (slightly) different views into what the Youtube algorithm wants me to see, based on what I happen to watch on each machine. I occasionally reset cookies on the logged out machine.

I definitely avoid watching ads, except the non-national spots on local TV where I kinda like the local city flavor of the ads. Is that grifting? I dunno. The ads are still there in aggregate, I just won't give them my brain space. Give me a way to pay without being tracked and having my content streams tied to a single account, and I'm all over it instead of adblock.

[sys_64738]

Maybe not but I don’t watch ads from ad companies like GOOG.

[oska]

Conversely, 'grifting' is exactly what you should be doing if you want to undermine the current server farm supported by advertising business model.

Videos don't need to be hosted on a server, they can be shared through peer to peer networks, which cost nothing.

[ffgjgf1]

Which is not something that could scale to Youtube’s levels.

> nothing

Except huge amounts of drive space and upload bandwidth. Considering most (to an overwhelming degree) people consume videos on phones, tablets or laptops with relatively tiny drives it’s not realistic.

Maybe some decentralized system with content providers hosting themselves might work.

However all that is irrelevant even if it were technically feasible because it doesn’t align with the incentives many/most content creators have (they actually want to be paid either through ads or subscriptions..)

[rainyMammoth]

following your logic, people should actively engaged with ads if not they are grifting. Please tell me you work for google?

[Jensson]

They pay to display the ad. Think of a highway ad. If you sell a highway ad placement and then cover it with a big blanket (with maybe another ad on it) so nobody sees it, that would be a serious case of fraud.

So if you tell them the ad has been displayed so you get the video, but no ad was displayed for you, then that is a form of fraud. I don't think that would hold in court since it is such a petty crime, but it is still fraud. You lie to their server so that you can see the video without ads, that is fraud.

[LegibleCrimson]

And if I simply mute the ad and do something else until it's over? It's that still fraud?

How about if I download the ad but don't watch it?

Since when is watching an advertisement a moral imperative?

[Jensson]

> Since when is watching an advertisement a moral imperative?

Since you got paid for it. Youtube pays you by serving you content for those ads.

Note that I also block ads. However, unlike you I don't try to tell myself that I am morally right when I do so, I know that it isn't a nice thing to do and that the content I consume when doing it is paid for by all the users who doesn't block ads.

I am not sure why you try to argue that you are morally good when you block ads. Does that really matter to you? That is the most interesting part of this discussion to me, all the people who want to see themselves as good people even though they leech off others.

[ffgjgf1]

> that is fraud.

I don’t think that true. Users have no have signed no contract and/or have any obligations to watch those ads.

Of course it would still be fraud if ad buyers were paying for ads which were never displaying it, except Google would be committing it. In most cases on a significant scale to warrant legal action.

[hypertele-Xii]

> Think of a highway ad.

Equally annoying, I'd block those too if I could.

[rainyMammoth]

bad analogy. An Adblock would be similar to blocking part of my windshield so I don't see the highway ads. No fraud there.

[gustavus]

> In case you don't know about it, make sure to check out SponsorBlock

So I don't love ads but mostly because of the privacy invasion they represent, but sponsorships I have a lot less of a problem with. Oftentimes sponsorships will have at least marginal connection with what in watch (most of the time looking at you NordVPN and Raid Shadow Legends) but to me sponsorships are the happy middle ground that allows creators to get some recompense for their labors without turning everything into an adscape dystopia.

Really I don't have a problem with ads on websites back in the day as long as they were somewhat tasteful, which they often were because the creator worked to integrate them into their work, but the constant user surveillance and spamming random nonsensical ads are what bugged me.

I mean some channels that I frequent have even turned the sponsorships into additional entertaining content (check out Ryan George's the Adstronaut or Viva La Dirt League).

[bee_rider]

Ad based businesses also have an incentive to maximize attention and interaction rather than enjoyment, education, or user happiness.

We’ve played a few rounds of this game, we’re dumber, sadder, and more politically polarized for it.

[jraph]

Yeah, I personally hate sponsor segments but strongly sympathize with your view. I'm currently looking for a way to donate to the stuff I watch instead.

[saturn8601]

Any open source player client for iOS? Does not seem like any of the listed ones are compatible with iOS.

[Manuel_D]

Unless you're willing to root your phone, or use a developer certificate to run an unofficial app, I don't think there's any chance of getting an 3rd party youtube client on iOS. They're breaking youtube's TOS which is why they have to be side loaded on android.

[saturn8601]

I am willing to use a developer certificate to run unofficial apps...if there is code available i'd be happy to compile and load it onto my phone. I don't think there is though.

I just cannot go back to Android after years of dealing with garbage(I owned all the Nexus phones and gave up after Nexus 5) so my options have been to limit phone usage in favor of Desktop + start working on as many homemade/ open source versions of iPhone apps that I use as possible. Luckily most apps i'd be likely to have installed are just some downloaded data(text, audio, video) and some buttons. How hard can it be to scrape and rip the content and make my own container to serve that data?

For other apps like Youtube alternatives I am in search of an app.

[jraph]

Invidious and Piped should actually work quite well. Not apps, but work fine in a browser. That's what I'm using on the PinePhone and on regular computers. Though I don't know if Safari still has limitations that make it a pain to use. Invidious is a pain on the iPad 2 because of some dumb design decisions in Safari but I expect it to have improved since then. And maybe third party browsers will at last be allowed on iOS through third party stores, maybe also allowing SponsorBlock to be used on this platform.

I'm missing some features like being able to select a play next video easily, so I may look into writing an Invidious-based client of some sort for this, but they are so many things to do for a strongly limited time.

Maybe Piped has the features I'd like to have, I should check it out.

[doawoo]

You can use an app currently in the App Store called "yattee" -- you can add an Invidious source in the settings, and viola you're good to go. I self-host mine, but you can totally point it at a community hosted one.

[saturn8601]

This is really cool, thanks!

[eiiot]

uYou+ is good, I use it regularly. Especially with a developer certificate.

[saturn8601]

Thanks, will check it out!

[Lamad1234]

I don't mind sponsor ads..

[nullandvoid]

Do you not get bored of spending ~10% of the total time you watch videos being spent on largely brainrot gambling / predatory game advertisements?

[true_religion]

I don’t know what you watch, but the videos I watch just have sponsorships for jewelry and other luxury products.

It’s not really worth it for me to block fashion sponsors who tell me what is popular, when I would otherwise have to go research to find the same information.

[nullandvoid]

Fair, I have never seen a single jewellery / luxury sponsor (It's more Raycon, Raid shadow legends etc for me), however I wouldn't ever purchase them even if I did.

My experience is that most sponsors are overpriced, largely garbage products, that they must pay YouTube to promote in order to sell.