I am constantly on YouTube. I have a stable of creators I follow and watching them has replaced the time I would have spent on other streaming services. It’s how I chill.
So I signed up for YouTube Premium and watch it on my TV with no ads. I have no complaints. I get full HD videos, streamers get paid, YouTube gets paid, and everyone is happy.
If one of your reasons for using YouTube premium is “streamers get paid”, you should probably look into things a bit further.
The vast majority of YouTube premium revenue goes towards music publishers who, statistically, don’t have any relation to the content you watch, and contribute nothing towards it.
The content you watch likely still has embedded advertising because YouTube has some of the worst, if not the worst, rates paid to people who actually create the videos on their platform (this means there’s no such thing as “ad free YouTube” without using an ad blocker, even if you pay for premium)
I also use YouTube music instead of Spotify or Apple so I am fine with music rights holders getting paid. I haven’t seen any ads on my premium and I have had it for years and use it on my laptop, tvs, and tablets. The only ads I see are the sponsored segments in videos that not even an ad blocker can block because it’s part of the video done by the creator themselves.
I mean, that’s great and I’m glad you’re happy with that but:
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This is a privacy forum and that is the opposite of privacy. Every video, like, click, and comment you submit is still used to profile you. There’s no opting out.
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I love watching YT videos but the actual interface is fucking horrific: I can’t filter out the garbage I don’t want to watch like Shorts, podcasts, and live videos. This would be very simple for YouTube to ad.
They hijack my search results if the video I’m looking for is not in the top 5 to show me more “suggested” videos.
My home feed, instead of showing content relevant to my interests that I’ve expressed using likes and subscriptions, is full of garbage clickbait and videos I already watched 1 time 8 years ago, and the same fucking videos that are already in my subscription feed. It’s ridiculous how bad they are at this.
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If I’m paying for a service I expect to not see ads and YT premium does nothing about in-video ads.
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The actual creators are paid a tiny fraction of what YT is, despite providing the vast majority of the value. And YT treats them like garbage anyway.
When there is a competing subscription service that solves these problems and works well, I’ll be happy to sign up for that. Until then I’ll keep using LibreTube and YT can eat a Weiner.
- That happens whether you’re subscribed or not.
- Sort of agreed, not really relevant to the parent comment though. 3+4. You can’t have both “no ads allowed in-video” and “creators are paid a majority share of the money we make serving the video”. YouTube was (and still is if I understand it correctly) barely profitable, and if it is profitable right now I’m sure it is because of the worst kind of data-mining.
It is way harder to provide an effective platform for content than it is to deliver actual content, especially as effort/content has close to zero effect on vitality/attention/profitability, while the aspects we want in a platform (especially in regards to privacy) are entirely unprofitable. As someone who uses adblock and generally dislikes the corporate aspect of YouTube I at least has to acknowledge that YouTube has to make money somehow, and that in-video sponsors seems like a win-win for everyone involved, especially when you can skip them pretty much effortlessly.
Normally I wouldn’t even comment this shit, but as we are (hopefully) part of a shift to actual community driven platforms (fediverse in general), I think we have to aggressively discuss how to monetize these platforms enough so that they don’t actively drain the wallets of the people maintaining them, and this is a very relevant aspect of that discussion.
Hopefully not too ranty, extremely inebriated.
- That happens whether you’re subscribed or not.
- Sort of agreed, not really relevant to the parent comment though. 3+4. You can’t have both “no ads allowed in-video” and “creators are paid a majority share of the money we make serving the video”. YouTube was (and still is if I understand it correctly) barely profitable, and if it is profitable right now I’m sure it is because of the worst kind of data-mining.
It is way harder to provide an effective platform for content than it is to deliver actual content, especially as effort/content has close to zero effect on vitality/attention/profitability, while the aspects we want in a platform (especially in regards to privacy) are entirely unprofitable. As someone who uses adblock and generally dislikes the corporate aspect of YouTube I at least has to acknowledge that YouTube has to make money somehow, and that in-video sponsors seems like a win-win for everyone involved, especially when you can skip them pretty much effortlessly.
Normally I wouldn’t even comment this shit, but as we are (hopefully) part of a shift to actual community driven platforms (fediverse in general), I think we have to aggressively discuss how to monetize these platforms enough that they don’t actively drain the wallets of the people maintaining them, and this is a very relevant aspect of that discussion.
Hopefully not too ranty, extremely inebriated.
- That happens whether you’re subscribed or not.
- Sort of agreed, not really relevant to the parent comment though. 3+4. You can’t have both “no ads allowed in-video” and “creators are paid a majority share of the money we make serving the video”. YouTube was (and still is if I understand it correctly) barely profitable, and if it is profitable right now I’m sure it is because of the worst kind of data-mining.
It is way harder to provide an effective platform for content than it is to deliver actual content, especially as effort/content has close to zero effect on vitality/attention/profitability, while the aspects we want in a platform (especially in regards to privacy) are entirely unprofitable. As someone who uses adblock and generally dislikes the corporate aspect of YouTube I at least has to acknowledge that YouTube has to make money somehow, and that in-video sponsors seems like a win-win for everyone involved, especially when you can skip them pretty much effortlessly.
Normally I wouldn’t even comment this shit, but as we are (hopefully) part of a shift to actual community driven platforms (fediverse in general), I think we have to aggressively discuss how to monetize these platforms enough that they don’t actively drain the wallets of the people maintaining them, and this is a very relevant aspect of that discussion.
Hopefully not too ranty, extremely inebriated.
- That happens whether you’re subscribed or not.
- Sort of agreed, not really relevant to the parent comment though. 3+4. You can’t have both “no ads allowed in-video” and “creators are paid a majority share of the money we make serving the video”. YouTube was (and still is if I understand it correctly) barely profitable, and if it is profitable right now I’m sure it is because of the worst kind of data-mining.
It is way harder to provide an effective platform for content than it is to deliver actual content, especially as effort/content has close to zero effect on vitality/attention/profitability, while the aspects we want in a platform (especially in regards to privacy) are entirely unprofitable. As someone who uses adblock and generally dislikes the corporate aspect of YouTube I at least has to acknowledge that YouTube has to make money somehow, and that in-video sponsors seems like a win-win for everyone involved, especially when you can skip them pretty much effortlessly.
Normally I wouldn’t even comment this shit, but as we are (hopefully) part of a shift to actual community driven platforms (fediverse in general), I think we have to aggressively discuss how to monetize these platforms enough that they don’t actively drain the wallets of the people maintaining them, and this is a very relevant aspect of that discussion.
Hopefully not too ranty, extremely inebriated.
I’ve blocked their ads for years. I support content creators by buying merchandise and with Patreon.
After hearing about this, I’ve decided to give YouTube Premium a try. It seems like an easier and more consistent way for me to support creators. I watch YT almost daily, and get a lot of value from it. I hate ads and refuse to watch them, but Premium users don’t see them.
I wouldn’t blame anyone for walking away from YouTube over this. But for me at least, this was kind of a no-brainer.
I know Google tracks users and targets us with ads. I’m deep in their ecosystem anyway, and rely on their services for work, hobbies, and managing my data. I am stuck with them, unfortunately.
I do block what I can (Meta, Microsoft, Amazon) with Pi Hole and browser extensions. But there’s no total escape from an internet footprint, short of dropping off the grid. I’m dependent on Alphabet to live my lifestyle, for better or worse.
The biggest pain with premium is how prevalent in video ads are. Not fun to pay and still see ads anyway.
I wouldn’t mind if they were right at the start or at the end. But they’re always either 30 - 60 seconds in or in the middle of the video and so many of them are over a minute.
Sponsorblock can help with that … if you’re watching through something that can use it.
If we’re lucky, in time (and with enough YouTube premium subscribers) the need for YouTubers to have 3rd party sponsorships will decrease.
I know this is really bad. And I know they need to make money somehow. But on precedent I just refuse to pay for YouTube premium, having been there since the beginning. Before adverts started showing, and everyone predicted they’d plague us with ads until charging you to get rid of them.
Also a part of me refuses to believe Google can’t afford to run YouTube without adverts.
If we’re lucky, in time (and with enough YouTube premium subscribers) the need for YouTubers to have 3rd party sponsorships will decrease.
