About YouTube and ad-blockers:
YouTube is owned by Alphabet, aka Google's umbrella corporation. Google in turn was devoured by DoubleClick, the largest advertising company to come out of the 1990s web.
When you use Google, you are feeding the attention monster that is the advertising industry.
We should aim to criminalize behavioural advertising and break up the Google monopoly, not tolerate their shit and work around it by using adblockers.
@whvholst @cstross
I'm glad this hasn't happened for you yet.
Adblockers are still recommended to protect your system security.
In the US, YouTube started blocking users who use an adblocker that hasn't been set to permit ads on YouTube . This began as a beta test July 2023, and has become a very widespread annoyance.
To get around it, I blacklisted "youtube.com" in my browser, so I don't accidently go there anymore.
We get this message.
"Ad blockers are not allowed on YouTube"
@EugestShirley @whvholst @cstross Piped and invidious are frontends that don't seem to be affected by the adblocker-blocker shite. I, er, think.
Right now I'm using Firefox's Redirector extension to point youtube matches at the https://farside.link/_/invidious/ redirect. And a uBlock Origin on top, which I am not turning off, like masking in public places. I don't know if uBlock0 is actually *doing* very much in this scenario, but all understanding is now lost behind a pile of proxies and frontends.
@achadwick @whvholst @cstross
Thank you.
You are correct about Piped, it works.
I haven't tried invidious yet.
I'll have to figure out navigation.
I do miss using YouTube.
📅 They say it takes a month to break a habit.
@nblr @cstross Eh, while behavioural advertising is bad, the baseline advertisement stuff is sort of critical to how people who can't afford a piece of media can get access to it for a price they can afford. Not everything should be paywalled, free TV cable and free websites are generally a good thing for those of us for whom the price of electricity, and the price of internet access, is already a bit much.
Not to mention the people who are kids and *can't* work to get money *to* pay a paywall.
@cstross @nblr I guess here's the issue - it's not the Interconnect costs that are being covered already, but hidden.
It's the cost of hosting the server, and the cost of the content on the server, and the content creation of the content on the server...those costs would be added into it, in the same way that when minimum wage is increased here, my local cinemas increase their ticket prices.
@denisbloodnok @nblr @cstross I mean, advertisers don't necessarily expect you to buy something right then and there, in the moment.
That's a nice potential outcome, but it's partially so that the next time you need a thing they advertise for, and you can afford it, you think of it.
Also, advertising to kids is...fraught with the fact that influencing them can influence their parents. It's why there are laws around that (i.e. COPPA), and/or "Shows/movies that act as glorified advertisements.".
@denisbloodnok @nblr @cstross I mean, "Want" is a fair correction, though it still runs the same point - you're not expected to be buying it immediately. It'd be nice for the advertisers, but that's not why they serve ads to everyone, everywhere, all the time.
They want it on your mind the next time you have enough money to spend on a thing you want, and are thinking about what you do want to get.
@denisbloodnok @nblr @cstross That description basically describes anyone who lives with their parents but has a job making some amount of discretionary funds; because then electricity and internet tend to get lumped in with the savings on rent/mortgages.
And, I don't use adblock, but...very few ads try to sell me on something beyond triple digits in dollars CAD. It's basically only cars being advertised that fit that description.
@denisbloodnok @nblr @cstross (Okay, there's also the medical degree schooling, but...all I'll say is it's rather odd when advertising goes outside a reasonable price range.).
And as I understand, YouTube and everyone else banks on their ad services sending ads to many more people than me, even if a smaller portion are in my demographic.
@denisbloodnok @nblr @cstross Or perhaps another way to align the issue - it's not that internet is *currently* too expensive, but...I currently use my reseller ISP of another ISP so that I get a cheaper rate.
If microbilling was involved...that price difference might get well out of my range. Especially if Google/YouTube microbilled instead of providing ads to support their server load.
@cstross I haven't read the other comments yet, so forgive me if this is posting more of the same.
We need to be supporting alternatives to google with our dollars, as well as doing what we can to #degoogle our lives.. I recently purchased an unlocked One Plus phone and am going to install #LineageOS. I'm a #ProtonMail customer as well. It takes time and some commitment to learning new and different tech, but it's that much more click labor I'm not providing Google.
@cstross
I have been paying for the ads free YouTube for a while.
It is exactly what I want.
I wonder if people are using ad-blockers on Spotify? I guess most just pay to avoid them.
(Unless you are worried about privacy, then you can't use any of these services)
@cstross : creators should really start to upload their videos on Peertube.
The best of all? People could subscribe to your Peertube channel with their Mastodon account! No need for them to join the platform, they are already part of it.
@cstross Also spread awareness that targeted ads DO NOT WORK, literally nobody except the middleman trying to cream rent off the top of the system benefits from them. Advertisers lose, we all hate them, and frankly screw googbook completely.
If your product is good, I WILL find it and blaze a trail to your door, but if you try to cram ads about it in front of me I will actively seek out your competitors to spite you.
@kcarruthers @maxthyme @cstross
If targeted ads worked, they wouldn't:
show me ads for new vacuum cleaners a month after I bought one
show me ads for tampons (wrong biology)
show me ads for Microsoft products or things that only work with Microsoft OS (none of those in this house)
If targeted ads worked, I would never turn on an adblocker because a large proportion of the ads would be relevant and interesting.
qed.
@dashdsrdash @kcarruthers @maxthyme @cstross Right? I can still remember ads from the 70s and 80s because they were *good* (yes, Sturgeon's Law, but still). What were the last ads everyone talked about? For me, it was, "The Man Your Man Could Smell Like" from Old Spice, and that New Zealand porn education PSA.
But both of those were partly notable because they were so entertaining and funny, and so many ads today are barely memorable.
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