bss0315h ago
You do you. I like my YT Premium. Many of the creators I watch there simply don’t publish anywhere else, and I don’t have time for ads, especially if I’m watching on my smart TV.
Show threadScrubbles

This used to be the case, but it’s a different equation now. Ads used to be one or two per video. Fine, I get there are bills to pay.

Now it’s pure greed and pushing us to a subscription for a service they purposely made shitty so we would think exactly what you are. 4-5 ads, with forced ads interrupting the videos, and auto redirects to more ads after the video fonishes. Unskippable multi-minute ads.

And if you’re thinking “well then just pay for it”, tell that to Netflix, Hulu, and all of the streaming services that were “ad-free” until they decided that actually, pay twice as much or watch ads (even though your paying).

So while I understand you’re saying, you’re assuming Google will play fair. They won’t. They will up the price, they will still force ads, and it will get worse. I’m taking a stand now saying enough is enough. I’m not rewarding them for enshittifying the service.

1:41amWeb
Show threadZexks13h ago
No one is assuming anything. I cancelled my netflix when they started that shit and stopped watching prime. These are services you can turn off when the terms dont align with your approval. If/When google tries the same shit ill cancel that too.
Show threadbss033h ago
I decided to keep Netflix (and just pay for the ad-free tier), but dropped prime because there was some content that was not available ad-free, and UBO (et. al.) was unable to strip them.
Show threadoppy198413h ago

Check out Nebula, it is paid but there are no ads and they have a decent amount of YouTubers and are adding more regularly.

Also your feed is based on subscriptions not an algorithm.

Show threadScrubbles12h ago
Oh don’t worry, I’m there, I’ll happily give money to them
Show threadVespair4h ago
This is the future - independent creator channels and collectives. In truth we consumers might end up paying slightly more, but vastly more of what’s collected will go into the hands of the actual creators and creatives than to a bunch of suits who do nothing.
Show threadTilgare5h ago
So you refuse to pay because they MIGHT do something bad? That’s a pretty weak argument. You’re taking a stand against… What? You were never a paying customer in the first place, and they have not enshitified YouTube Premium in the over 10 years I’ve had it. In fact, I still pay a grandfathered $8/mo for my account - which is grace I was never given by Hulu or Netflix as they repeatedly jacked up the price over that same timespan. Seems to me they’ve earned the benefit of the doubt.
Show threadScrubbles2h ago
They actually did. They called it Google Play Music, and Google TV/Google Play Videos. I paid for those. Youtube Music and Youtube premium are the enshittified versions of those, and they will continue to make them worse.
Show threadTilgare2h ago

I will concede that the YouTube Music app started (and might still be) worse than GPM was in the end. But I’m not sure it could be considered enshittification. Yeah, the YTM app itself was kinda shit, especially at first - but they didn’t make the service materially worse and charge more for features they took away. They didn’t jack up the price to coincide with the “new” service, they just consolidated the two separate services into one. They didn’t introduce ads. They didn’t silently take down a ton of the music offered and leave the price the same - they still have the same 100M tracks as the other guys, and you ONLY get music from those other services.

I agree and get where you’re coming from on this example - but I think people use the term enshittification more broadly than it’s actual definition, and in my opinion this doesn’t fit.