Their demonetization "policy" or lack thereof is a major reason why I block ads. I don't believe that Alphabet operates in good faith in this matter.

Next step from Google will be to make creators that have Patreon set up be ineligible for ad revenue or ban linking/mentioning Patreon outright.

I can strongly recommend the SponsorBlock extention (also available in revanched).

Creators are victims here too. For most of them YouTube was a very different place when they were beginning their careers on the platform.

Not that it changes your point, I just feel it's important to keep in mind that the process of "Enshittification" sucks for everyone (well, except shareholders).

They are wrong. Most creators don't get paid from ads.

Yeah, Nebula is an alternative that's trying to grow. Think it's creator owned too which is nice. I haven't made the switch yet, but if I wanted to support creators directly I'd choose Nebula over YouTube. And if I could, I'd send money straight to them via Patreon or PayPal or other.

That's a really good idea!

I'm sure some do, but I also don't hang out to watch "10 most fatal crashes (#2 will amaze you)" and "here's a 10-minute SEO-optimized video to tell you something that would otherwise take 20 seconds to read" videos, which are probably typical "creators".

The criteria for getting monetized really aren't that big. They don't have to be that large, and most small to medium sized channels will usually make more from direct sponsors and supporters. But also, those are the creators working on the thinnest margins, and they definitely feel the loss of the YouTube ad money.

But the bigger issue is that demonitized videos just don't get promoted as heavily. The reduction in reach is a major blow to small and medium sized channels, as reach is how creators find new supporters, and it has an impact on future direct sponsorship potential. Plus if you have multiple videos demonitized, you can get your whole channel demonitized.

Edit: Autocorrect believes "deminitized" is a word.

You think I'm jumping through mental hoops for telling people to use an ad blocker?

It's the flathub repo, which is also listed on their official website! But your link is valid too

That's the link to the official FreeTube Flatpak. More generally, the linked site, Flathub, is the largest source of Flatpak applications. If you click through the .io site, you'll land on the Flathub page if you look for the Flatpak.

I actually switched from the .deb to the Flatpak just this afternoon so I can do updates with my package manager. The .deb version "phones home" (you have to enable it I think) every time it starts up to check for updates, but Discover (my package manager) fetches updates for Flatpak apps along with everything else. It's basically been the same experience as the .deb so far.

This is amazing, definitely gonna try this when I get home! Do u know if it does SponsorBlock as well?

If you're on Android I'm actually going to recommend a new app from Futo called GrayJay. It's cross-platform so you can watch videos from YouTube, Twitch, PeerTube, Rumble, Kick, etc. all from a single app.

And/or with SponsorBlock if you don't care about sending that data to the open APIs. It's pretty useful if some channels you watch have a lot of sponsors, self promotions, etc.

Now that we are recommending alternatives, iPhone/iPad/Mac have Yattee. It uses Piped/Invidious as backend and is in the appstore

NewPipe+SponsorBlock is a fantastic fork that's pretty awesome.

I've been very happily using YouTube ReVanced, do u know how SmartTubeNext and NewPipe compare to it?

Yes

That's the scary part about Twitter.

Most companies turn the burn up slowly. Musk took one look at the frogs, then turned the stove up to max, hired a technician to hold a welding torch up to the base of the pot, hired a chemist find an additive for the water to increase its boiling point and heat retention, pissed in the pot, and is actively pouring gasoline all over the kitchen with one hand while flipping the frogs off with the other.

And the frogs are just taking it.

What message does that send to YouTube?

Seriously though, what does it say about people that still think he's a genius and secretly has a plan he's working on? Those guys are reaching levels of stupid I struggle to comprehend

GI Joe and He-man were ads, but they were enjoyable ads. Advertising has gone from a masterful creative craft, to an industry where they just shove the cheapest shit they can produce in front of your face as many times as possible, while loudly screaming their name. It's pretty pathetic that it still works.

If adblocking becomes illegal people will still do it (and you should too), some really stupid article tried to claim circumventing Anti-Adblock was illegal under DMCA a while back (interestingly they took it down when people continued to block their ads) and the filter providers did it anyway. Piracy still happens in countries where it's criminalized, ad blocking will continue, though the Quorans (used them as an example because they're the biggest snobs about the law and ethics) and people like them will likely use it less, though it's not like they don't already think it's wrong (some also think it's already illegal).

I am going back to irc and telnet bbs

JavaScript was a mistake

There will always be a free internet. It just may not be the one currently dominated by corporate datacenters.

No, thanks. Mozilla is the worst of the open source world. I prefer not to give them market share. Brave works beautifully for me and YouTube may disappear tomorrow and my life wouldn't change a single bit.

Do you know what the DMCA is?

Do regular apps and desktop applications like freetube and newpipe count?

I use three so the middle one doesn't get dirty.

Two- with hot sauce in the middle, so you know which one broke.

It's more like using the pill and a condom. Different ad blockers can block different sets of ads.

That's too figure out which extension is causing an issue. If everything works right then you have nothing to worry about.

If things do not work, the easiest is to get to a working state (latest version, removing any custom filters, disabling extensions) then once confirming that it works, gradually enabling things back until you can identify the offender.

Not as far as I know, but I don't have much experience with Brave Browser. They probably use the same ad-filtering lists on the backend but their implementation is probably not identical. I know that for this situation in particular, Brave Shields was causing Youtube to act up but Ublock Origin wasn't (might be fixed at this point in time).

Just for the sake of clarity, what exactly do you think will happen?

Please do tell what could go wrong. Is the internet sheriff going to turn up?

Even your dog will get hacked

Im imagining any russian person who sees this comment just smiling smugly

Ukraine use ads for anti-putin propaganda. So the russian goverment told Google to moderate ads, or all Google services will be banned. Google decided to just disable ads in Russia completely.

They already do make more than "a little profit" from YouTube. The shareholders demand infinite growth tho, so Google has to nickle and dime their users for even more profit. The bane of any publicly traded company.

It's not the advertising that's the problem, it's the tracking and surveillance that comes with it. Until they get rid of that, uBlock Origin is a necessary security measure.

Original YouTube, before Google, was one of many Video streaming websites -- living alongside competitors such as Dailymotion, Vimeo... And Google video. Those guys, yes, would've deserved this sort of compassion.

Google's YouTube is an evil entity that bruteforced itself into a de facto monopoly, routinely changes the rules for content creators that have built the platform and often depend on it for their living, allows a predatory system of copyright trolls to thrive at the expense of the creators, frequently allows creators to be robbed of their channel and income by arbitrary strikes while being completely deaf to requests for help, leverages Google's power to crush potential competitors, influence public opinion, stifle free speech... I could go on. Sympathy for such an entity, quite frankly, for me, is a form of Stockholm syndrome.

the nature of the web is that you are sent information and a suggestion of how to render it. The user is free to view as little or as much of that content as they decide.

"ad blockers arent allowed on youtube" is an insane statement. ad blockers arent on youtube. you are just being selective about which content you render.

it is greedy to try and rewrite the fundamental workings of the web because you feel entitled to profit.

Along with what the other comment says, it's also how intrusive it is. If it was in-line ads or banner ads or something that'd be one thing. It's constant ads that stop videos though. Even short videos I feel like you get multiple ad breaks. It's horrible.

It's okay little buddy, you tried your best.

I think this bot is on Crack

I've heard anecdotally that they've done small user trials of fully blocking people for X amount of time for using adblock.

I think this should work with any browser that allows you to apply a custom user stylesheet. This used to be normal in the past, but Chrome took it away, and I don’t know if Firefox still allows it. Copied from a reply I put in another post:

Ok, do this: download this stylesheet: http://damianvila.com/external/fuckyoutube/hider.css Save it somewhere where you can find it easily. Open Safari and go to Safari > Settings > Advanced. In the "Style sheet" dropdown, select "Other" and navigate to the style sheet. For maximum effect, do this while you have YouTube open... :D

The stylesheet is organized in a way that you can comment/uncomment blocks to customize what you want/don't want to see on YouTube. Right now it has my preferences, but if you want to keep something, or hide something I had viewable, just comment/uncomment as you wish. The ads part is clearly marked, and the rest is menu things and navigation elements (I don't need most of those). I also hate Shorts with a passion, so I hide those too. Keep in mind that this can only be used in the desktop version. It doesn't work for mobile or any of the apps. Sadly, you'll have to suffer with the shitty ads there. But at least, you can have a decent experience while watching on your Mac. And since it's a user stylesheet, and has no Javascript whatsoever, YT has no way ob detecting or blocking it, so they can do nothing (other than changing the names of the titles, but that is easily fixed).

Have fun.

P.S: you'll notice that sometimes, where there should be an ad, you'll see like a blink in the video. Don't worry, it's normal. The video will continue without problems, and you won't see the ad.

P.S.2: This stylesheet sometimes blocks shitty Google (or other sites) pages (because people are assholes and put things there that shouldn't be there). If you happen to find yourself in this situation (a page that is suspiciously blank, or don't allow to scroll, or behaves oddly) you can temporarily change the sylesheet to "None Selected", and see if the problem is fixed. When you're finished, remember to switch back to the stylesheet, or you'll have a shock when you go to YouTube... XDDDDD

Genuine question, why be avid anti-apple? I’m a mac fan, but I still use Linux and windows in my daily life. I’be never understood the anti-mac hate

Can confirm. I did that at college. Yes, it technically violated the policy, but even though my lecturers and everyone else knew, nobody batted an eye. When OP is working with sensitive data, however, things coupd be different.

I work in government and spend all day remoting into judges', prison officers', and social workers' PCs. The most sensitive material you can imagine and all of it on windows.

Now look up how old your hospital's systems are which store all your health records lol

YouTube has a lot of great instructional and educational content. I use it at work fairly regularly for that.

I've been using everything you mentioned for months and my videos still get in the algorithms, and my comments can be seen.