[yugioh3]

people deserve to get paid for the work they put into creating content and building platforms, no? books, movies, tv shows, news, etc, are all distributed in some way or another that costs the consumer either money or their time viewing advertising. if you don't want to watch ads, pay YouTube for a subscription.

[mitthrowaway2]

YouTube spent about a decade and a half running unintrusive banner ads. Until they secured enough of the market that network effects locked content creators and consumers together in a two-sided market where it's hard for either group to leave unilaterally. Then they ramped up the length and intrusiveness of their ads while flouting content regulations on what they're even allowed to advertise.

Why should I reward that by paying them?

[hombre_fatal]

You can keep bringing up Google, but you're still glossing over the part where you're not paying the people creating the content you're watching.

Seems awfully convenient.

[mitthrowaway2]

No I'm not blocking the ads, I'm just avoiding YouTube as much as possible and desperate for someone to break their stranglehold.

If I were blocking the ads, I wouldn't be aware of how bad it's gotten.

[Workaccount2]

Vid.me broke the stranglehold back in 2016-2017.

Their story reveals that all these people hating on YouTube are actually just selfish children doing mental gymnastics.

Their savior came, disrupted YouTube pretty deeply, then went bankrupt.

[mitthrowaway2]

That's a needlessly hostile remark. This is part of my point. A content platform is a two-sided market, and you can't unilaterally defect from a Nash equilibrium. Back in 2017, YouTube wasn't running unskippable investment-scam and tobacco ads. They were doing their best to attract content viewers and producers away from competitors by offering a good experience. Once they'd driven the alternatives to the ground and achieved network lock-in, they began twisting the screws, gradually running ever more intrusive and distasteful ads.

Nebula might have a shot at breaking the stranglehold, and I support them, but it remains to be seen if they can do it. A lot of content creators would have to move there, and there's a lot of random stuff (recorded lectures, video instructions, music, etc) that probably never will because it doesn't fit their premium original content model.

[charlie0]

I used to pay Nebula precisely because they had premium original content, however they let in a lot of other creators to widen the (see the tyranny of the marginal user) type of content. I've since canceled my subscription because it's gotten bloated with too much lower quality content.

The whole point of Nebula is NOT to become another YT, it's meant to be curated source of media.

[Workaccount2]

Vid.me.was loved and celebrated as an escape from YouTube. I'm not sure what makes you think YT wasn't hated in 2017 too, premium had already been out for 2 years and any casual glance at comments from back then make it clear people were not happy.

Nebula has no shot. It has a <1% conversion rate. Creators make almost nothing from it compared to their yt channel.

My point is that the fundamental problem with the Internet and Internet services is the users entitlement to free things. The Internet would be a dramatically better place if it worked for users and not for advertisers. Vid.me was dramatically better, but it died learning that 99% of people in threads like this is full of shit and actually just entitled.

[efdee]

I'm very much willing to pay for their content, but not in the way of watching ads during the videos.

[hombre_fatal]

Youtube Premium has existed for 10 years and creators get paid from it.

[lokar]

Do you happen to know if they get the same amount per view?

[ta1243]

> YouTube channels earn revenue from viewers with YouTube Premium. Throughout this month (August 2018), I earned approximately 55p per 1000 regular views and 94p per 1000 Premium views, so it appears that if 75% of your viewers went Premium, that would actually be beneficial.

https://www.reddit.com/r/youtube/comments/9agg5f/how_does_yo...

> Per user, creators usually get a LOT more from premium than ads. If I divide my monthly views by my monthly unique viewers, I get about 1.9 cents per viewer.

> The way premium works is, first youtube takes a cut--I believe it's 45%. The remaining amount is divided among all the creators you watch based on how much you watch them. I believe that's based on view time.

> So if the YT premium price is $13.99, the creators get 55% or $7.69. You would have to watch 405 different creators for each one to get 1.9 cents.

https://www.reddit.com/r/youtube/comments/16c80eb/how_do_you...

[aprilthird2021]

So you do pay for YouTube Premium then? Or are we not going to hear back from you?

[efdee]

I used to, but I don't consume enough YouTube videos anymore to make it worthwhile. Give me a top-up plan that I can use to pay for individual videos and I will definitely do it.

But what's with the weirdly aggressive second part of your message?

[chii]

Your individual willingness is irrelevant.

There are not enough people with your willingness to make this mechanism work by itself.

So the choice is either to have the content exist, but rely on ads, or not have the content exist. And it's not your choice - it's the content creator's choice.

[notpushkin]

If it’s not my choice, then there’s no problem if I block the ads, right?

[efdee]

Weird. I'm pretty sure that deciding whether or not to watch ads is entirely my choice.

[lxgr]

You can pay for Youtube Premium right now and the ads go away.

For a long time, my criticism was that Youtube Premium is needlessly bundled with Youtube Music, which is redundant for me as a Spotify user and which I refused to pay for accordingly.

Now, in at least a few countries, there's "Youtube Premium Lite", which is basically regular Youtube but without ads. If you live in one of these, in my view that's close to the ideal scenario: Everybody gets to choose between watching ads and paying.

[BriggyDwiggs42]

I give my favorite creators money through the ubiquitous patreons.

[al_borland]

I just subscribe to YouTube Premium. From what I hear, views from Premium viewers are worth more to the creators than ad funded views, and I don’t need to deal with deciding which patreons to back, and spend 10x (or more) trying to pay for each individual.

[BriggyDwiggs42]

Sure, if that works better for you.

[hirvi74]

Perhaps controversial, but I rather just have ads. Not that I do not think this is a preferable model, but rather, donates cost real money and ads cost nothing except time.

While time is finite and valuable, if I am already on YouTube, then I have already committed to choice of wasting that nebulous amount of time in the first place.

[BriggyDwiggs42]

I’d absolutely rather give money. For me there’s a lot less friction in that even if technically it costs time all the same. With a job I have control over how I convert time into money; not so with watching ads.

As much as youtube can waste time, I also feel like I’ve been given genuine value by certain people on the site, so I wouldn’t say it’s simply wasting time.

[hirvi74]

I watch quite a large array of channels. I am not sure I could feasibly afford to donate a meaningful amount to all them. So then, I am forced into the dilemma of deciding which ones are more worthy than others, and that is not something I am particularly willing to do.

If one's patreon did have perks associated with it, then I would be more inclined to 'donate', as well.

[cma]

Patreon is also getting enshittified, grandfathering rates for the legacy people who give it a network effect, and then jacking them up on new creators to take advantage of their moat.

[BriggyDwiggs42]

Unsurprising. I sort of feel this is just the natural cycle of the company structure, and that we have to hope any enshittifying service eventually gets bad enough to drive a large group to another platform earlier in its lifecycle. I’d support creators on any other platform if they offered to take money on it, but there’s only so much I can do as the person giving the money.

[baobun]

If enough people do it, monetizing on Youtube becomes untenable for most, driving creators to hopefully healthier platforms who might now stand a chance.

[hombre_fatal]

So if I don't like Visa and Mastercard, do I also get moral carte blanche to not pay anyone because hey I'm totally urging them to only use merchants that I prefer?

Sounds like awfully convenient motivated reasoning.

[spaceribs]

Are you asking what we should do about this situation?

Split up any and all monopolies, and nationalize what should provide a common good such as payment networks and internet infrastructure.

[matwood]

As a Google shareholder, I would love for YT to be spun out.

[daniel-grigg]

That’s how the market works. You avoid paying extra taxes than required right? Even though that denies the government extra funding. The only difference being one has been decided as wrong and the other is fine.

[StackRanker3000]

This is a weird framing

Yes, society has deemed that it’s fine to make use of the avenues that have been explicitly created to reduce your tax burden - that’s why they were created. Society is also relatively fine with using unintended loopholes for the same purpose (although it is a lot more controversial and criticized), because we don’t tend to punish people for breaking laws, rules and regulations that don’t exist. When we end up caring a lot about them, we plug the gaps

The other person was talking about straight up not paying for goods and services that are sold at a given price, which is stealing. The more apt comparison would be to tax evasion (actually breaking the law), which is a crime, widely considered wrong and punished accordingly

[hombre_fatal]

It isn't how the market works, and you absolutely don't take this line of reasoning when paying someone rendering services to you which is why you instead tried to analogize it with taxes.

You only use this argument for Youtube content creators because it's trivial to avoid payment and then backsplain it with unique moral justifications.

[m4rtink]

Arent Visa and Mastercard defacto global monopolies that have had many controversies in the oast or bowed to outside pressure, refusing to handle payments for many perfectly legal businesses ?

[hombre_fatal]

Yes. And they get some of your money in almost every transaction. Does that mean you are morally justified to dine out for free now?

[Workaccount2]

mono, like in monopoly, means single. They would be a duopoly. Which they aren't anyway because there is also amex and discover. So maybe a quadopoly?

[rbits]

Relying solely on YouTube monetisation is already untenable for many channels. That's why they do sponsorships and Patreon

[cebert]

Ok, well either pay or don’t use YouTube then if you don’t want ads.

[cwillu]

The browser is my agent, and it will do my bidding, not google's. You building your company on something that can be legally circumvented is not my problem.

[StackRanker3000]

”I can get away with it, therefore it’s OK” is an interesting moral philosophy

[TheOtherHobbes]

Not as interesting as "And that's 100% ok when the big people operate like that, but very very bad when the little people try to stop them."

[ta1243]

That tends to be the approach large companies take, and are championed for it. "It's not their fault the tax code allows them to spend $50m on accountants and lawyers to find a $5b loophole" etc.

[thowawatp302]

That’s how google set up this relationship with their users.

“What goes around comes around,” shouldn’t be surprising.”

[moooo99]

Considering that is the framework FAANG in its entirety is based on, I find your reaction quite surprising

[spaceribs]

I'm enjoying this holier-than-thou attitude that seems to pervade a lot of comments, as though following the "rules" is all we need to do and is morally justifiable.

These "rules" weren't voted upon by either creators or consumers. Most of them are arbitrary and capricious. Features implemented by YouTube, like showing where people skip to the most, are also an attempt to cut into sponsorship dollars, was that within the "rules"?

Let me be clear: Following the "rules" under these monopolistic circumstances is the philosophy of cowardice in the face of power and doesn't hold as much intellectual merit as you might think.

[StackRanker3000]

Did the person I was replying to say any of that? You’re putting words in both their mouth and mine

I’m receptive to various arguments here that invoke power differentials, pragmatism, even deliberately breaking the terms of a service to help affect change, etc. I’m not necessarily someone who always follows the rules, and even though I do pay for YouTube I don’t view it as a real moral failing to use the free service with an ad blocker turned on

The comment I responded to didn’t have any of that, it just boiled down to “I can do it and they can’t stop me, so they can suck a dick”. Maybe not the end of the world when it’s directed towards Alphabet, but I hope that mindset doesn’t extend to everyone they interact with

[chii]

It's how the world has worked for a very long time, and i dont think that has changed much today.

[lxgr]

And that's how we'll eventually get mandatory DRM on all Youtube videos.

We're already halfway there with ad blocker blockers anyway; once the sum of "lost revenue due to collateral damage of blocked users on old/non-DRM-supporting browser versions" and "increased revenue due to finally defeating ad blockers" is positive, it'll happen.

[apitman]

> The browser is my agent, and it will do my bidding, not google's

I've got bad news for you

[chii]

and that's why people choosing chrome over firefox has that bad news.

[spencerflem]

My current thought re: piracy is that I never pirate unless I'd be happy if the company I'm pirating from went out of business.

[probably_wrong]

If YouTube agreed with this point of view they would put up a paywall, the same way neither Nebula nor Netflix are available for free.

[eadmund]

> Why should I reward that by paying them?

Do you want to have a great YouTube experience? Paying for it gets you that.

I watch YouTube videos frequently. Never see an ad. It’s great.

[cvoss]

If I can actually pay someone for content, then, if I don't pay, I should expect not to be granted access to content.

But that's not how YT works. YT doesn't charge you for good stuff. It charges you for not delivering crap. That's not legitimate business, that's a racket. I have no qualm punishing YT for that. Content creators are free to find other ways to monetize their labor, if their labor is actually valuable. (And so many of the good ones do, quite successfully.)

[Uehreka]

YouTube gives you two (2!) ways to pay for content. You can choose to pay with money, or you can choose to pay with your time and attention. If you don’t like paying with your time and attention, then either pay with money, or don’t use the service.

This “It charges you for not delivering crap.” line is bullshit. Serving video content costs money, they’ve given you the choice of how to pay for it, and you don’t like the choices but want to keep getting the content.

[gausswho]

Worse. It charges you by building a profile about you.

21st century nation states can better solve video scale delivery without middle parasites like Google.

[PurestGuava]

> 21st century nation states can better solve video scale delivery without middle parasites like Google.

If it's that easy, why has nobody done it?

(Hint: governments don't want to run YouTube, probably shouldn't run YouTube, and nobody else wants or can afford the immense costs that come with running YouTube.)

[gausswho]

I'm unconvinced. I suggest that YT's outlay is a sneeze among the budget of the US. In my estimation, all nations are lagging in the definition of what constitutes a public utility. In a decade we will be facepalming why advertisements were even needed for this common infrastructure.

[PurestGuava]

Most things are a sneeze compared to the budget of the federal government of the US, that doesn't mean that's a reasonable expectation for the US government (or any government) to run them.

[someone7x]

> In my estimation, all nations are lagging in the definition of what constitutes a public utility. In a decade we will be facepalming why advertisements were even needed for this common infrastructure.

I’m just glad others feel this way.

Why the hell can’t I have my own spam free email account from the post office? Because the ads, the precious ads.

[manquer]

The money goes to creators as well, not just pay for video streaming .

On average creators get paid more for premium views than they get from ads .

[krelian]

The mental gymnastics some will go through to justify being a cheapskate...

[shakna]

I block ads, everywhere, because I keep getting epilepsy-inducing ones.

The browser is my agent, just like my screenreader is.

Google is to blame here - and I'm saying that as an author who does advertise there because of marketshare.

[hahn-kev]

So is your DVD player but it doesn't mean you don't have to pay for the movies

[Hasnep]

No, but if someone is handing out free DVDs with adverts on them I can put a sticker over the adverts. If the adverts are in the movie, I'm allowed to skip them.

[shakna]

Google are free to ban me, free to not hand me the data. But if I tell them who I am, what agent I'm using, and then they hand me data... I'm also free to throw half that data in the bin.

Especially if I'm protecting myself.

[scbzzzzz]

My major problem with ads is the disrespect of my privacy. People deserve to get paid for the hard work they put. I have immense respect for creators .

But at the same time, these yt creators are relying on google ads . Which are intrusive, doesn't acknowledge and care about privacy. If you turn on ad privacy, you see gambling, scams ,crypto ads. How is that responsible? You as a creator is ok with getting money and ok with indirectly making people addicted, fall for scams? That's not right.

I am ok with sponser ads and am against sponsorblock. They are not tracking me, violating my privacy and telling me about new products .

youtube subscription doesn't stop youtube for collecting you data and use it for ads during other google service .

[belorn]

Those are two different problems. Paying creators and requiring online platforms to follow laws and not participate in crime like fraud are not the same issue.

If they want to sell a service in exchange for payment, then they are free to do so. For legal reasons they are not doing that. The explicit legal definition used by lawyers and politicians is that advertisement supported services are not a payment, but an optional content that the viewer might or might not look at. This optional aspect of advertisement is how laws distinguish between it and a sale. From a legal perspective there is a difference between selling a sample product for 1 cent, compared to giving it away for free. One is a sale, and the other is a free giveaway, and thus they are under different legal definitions.

There are similar legal theory for when a platform should be held legal responsible their products, for their advertisement, and when local laws applies and how. News papers, radio, and TV has each been forced to handle local advertisement laws and regulation, and there is a reason why most had departments to curate which advertisement they could publish. They also get held responsible if they break local law.

[beeflet]

no. maybe you can get funding through some sort of patronage, but I'm not going to watch ads.

even if I did pay for a subscription, they would find a way to jack up the price or insert new ads while collecting my data. The landscape isn't competitive enough. People like this idea that "if you don't pay for the product, you are the product" but it's not complete. Just because you pay for a product doesn't mean you're not the product. We used to pay for cable TV, only to still get ads. We used to pay for windows licenses, now with ads!

I will continue to waste their bandwidth while blocking ads until they hopefully go bankrupt and get replaced by some bittorrent-like p2p solution.

[mystified5016]

You're right, someone has to pay to make these AI generated ads for fake boner pills in the middle of my documentary. Won't someone think of the poor ad creators?