Youtube let the other shoe drop in their end-stage enshittification this week. Last month, they required you to turn on Youtube History to view the feed of youtube videos recommendations. That seems reasonable, so I did it. But I delete my history every 1 week instead of every 3 months. So they don’t get much from my choices. It still did a pretty good job of showing me stuff I was interested in watching.

Then on Oct 1, they threw up a “You’re using an Ad Blocker” overlay on videos. I’d use my trusty Overlay Remover plugin to remove the annoying javascript graphic and watch what I wanted. I didn’t have to click the X to dismiss the obnoxious page.

Last week, they started placing a timer with the X so you had to wait 5 seconds for the X to appear so you could dismiss blocking graphic.

Today, there was a new graphic. It allowed you to view three videos before you had to turn off your Ad Blocker. I viewed a video 3 times just to see what happens.

Now all I see is this.

Google has out and out made it a violation of their ToS to have an ad blocker to view Youtube. Or you can pay them $$$.

I ban such sites from my systems by replacing their DNS name in my hosts file routed to 127.0.0.1 which means I can’t view the site. I have quite a few banned sites now.

  • locuester@lemmy.zipEnglish
    5522·
    1 year ago

    I enjoy watching YouTube with no ads so I bought premium. I actually bought the family one and share it with 4 others. Personally, I find it to be a great deal.

    I also pay for extra storage (even tho I have a nas) because it’s convenient to have.

    I’m a pirate at heart, have a 3k movie library on Plex and use nefarious to queue download, and I’m a long time crypto nut so I understand privacy and sticking it to the man.

    But I also find great quality of life improvements by simply paying fair prices for good content 🤷‍♂️

    It’s a fun hobby to try and dodge ads and steal and stick it to these companies. But really can be time consuming and gets old (it did at least for me when I got old).

    • RubberColby@lemmy.worldEnglish
      6·
      1 year ago

      Same. I watch YouTube every single day for multiple hours a day. Whether in the background or actively watching. I see the value in paying for a service that I am constantly using. I’m not some YouTube shill. I just personally find it worth the money.

    • cley_faye@lemmy.worldEnglish
      3·
      1 year ago

      Some people fail to see that, it’s a matter of how you value the service. I still think the current price is a bit high for a subscription, and I have some issues with how these subscriptions end up being split between youtube and content creators.

      But, should youtube go all out and make ad blockers unusable? Sure, I’ll probably pay. The content on youtube, assuming a fair share to creators, is way more valuable than ten-ish buck a month. I’ll still fight to the end to make ad blocking work though.

    • momtheregoesthatman@lemmy.worldEnglish
      42·
      1 year ago

      I’m in the same boat and state of thought here. I’ve got a monster Plex collection on an unnecessarily large NAS… But; I pay for Spotify, YouTube and Proton. I use them all, I see value and still use a piHole, uBlock and all that stuff like nothing changed. More power to you.

    • kalkulat@lemmy.worldEnglish
      1·
      1 year ago

      I enjoyed watching favorite -old- movies not chopped-up to insert 2 or 3 of 5 minutes of commercials. I quit cable-TV and got my views where I could.

      There was a time when people were asked to choose between TV adverts and Pay-TV with no adverts. Those who went for Pay-TV got a few years of respite. Then, as always happens, they got screwed over. Don’t believe that line for a second. They’ll just bide their time, and next thing you know, you’ll be watching ads-a-plenty again.

    • kalkulat@lemmy.worldEnglish
      11·
      1 year ago

      fair prices Who gets to define what ‘fair’ is? Someone who’ll decide every year that ‘fair’ is 50% more than last year. Ask me how much I’ll pay, accept that number, and guarantee it for 5 years. OR go away and leave me alone.

      • locuester@lemmy.zipEnglish
        2·
        1 year ago

        Woah dude. You decide what’s fair. If $0.33 per day isn’t fair to you, then don’t pay it. I personally find $0.33 fair.

    • WheatleyInc@lemmy.worldEnglish
      44·
      1 year ago

      A paid adblocker/ video downloader is worth 20$ a month for 5 people? Every feature in premium has a third party tool alternative you could easily use anyway.

      • viking@infosec.pubEnglish
        2·
        1 year ago

        Set a VPN to Turkey and you get it for $3.

        I’m blocking ads regardless, but if you wanted to pay, there are cheaper ways.

      • locuester@lemmy.zipEnglish
        1·
        1 year ago

        As you could have guessed, I also use iPhone. I just like things to work. I’m too old for tinkering with shit constantly. I write software all damn day and when I’m done I just enjoy peaceful relaxing in nature. Not all the tinkering I did as a kid