Jason KoeblerNov 20, 2023

New: Firefox users have reported an "artificial" 5-second delay when they try to load YouTube videos that is magically fixed if they use Chrome, which has been going viral in a few different places. I asked Google what is going on. They

1) Didn't deny the artificial wait time is happening
2) Said it's part of its war on ad blockers, not targeted at Firefox

Mozilla also told me no indication this is targeted at Firefox

https://www.404media.co/youtube-says-new-5-second-video-load-delay-is-supposed-to-punish-ad-blockers-not-firefox-users/

YouTube Says New 5-Second Video Load Delay Is Supposed to Punish Ad Blockers, Not Firefox Users

Firefox users are reporting an 'artificial' load time on YouTube videos. YouTube says it's part of a plan to make people who use adblockers "experience suboptimal viewing, regardless of the browser they are using."

404 Media
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@jasonkoebler This should be of help on the desktop versions of Firefox: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/user-agent-string-switcher/

On Android it won’t be installable without some extra steps, which I can explain if anyone is interested. 

User-Agent Switcher and Manager – Get this Extension for 🦊 Firefox (en-US)

Download User-Agent Switcher and Manager for Firefox. Spoof websites trying to gather information about your web navigation—like your browser type and operating system—to deliver distinct content you may not want.

Nov 22, 2023 at 12:25amWeb