8mo ago

Youtube is now unusable without a frontend

I have an extension that can individually disable all the most useless/addicting components of the Youtube site, such as shorts and whatnot. On the search page, I have turned on:

hide Shorts

hide For You

hide Trending

hide 'People Also Searched For'

hide Search Categories

hide Promoted Videos

hide Promoted Websites

hide Suggested Products

Do you know what Youtube has started doing? They are now inserting engagement slop DIRECTLY into the search results, as seen in the image above. It's literally a short, yet it's inserted like a video so you're forced to see it. The only possible way to remove it is by using a privacy frontend, as even on incognito mode, Youtube will look at the three videos you've watched and start inserting shit based off that.

Louis Rossman is right, they all have rapist mentalities... "just let me stick it in"

182 comments

I’ve noticed that the search results are getting less and less relevant to what I’m actually looking for. I guess one day the search bar will disappear like the headphone jack of the iPhone.
- They're so brave.
- they are screwing it on purpose to make room for their AI
- That sounds familiar. Remember when we used to watch TV?
  
  Oh that thing where in between the ads you can watch low quality reality shows for a few minutes? Yeah, those were the days…

Louis Rossman is my Alex Jones. He's angry, compelling, and talking about something that makes him seen like a conspiracy theorist to normies. Unlike Jones, though, he's usually right (if not always, I haven't fact checked everything he's ever said). It's extremely cathartic to see someone use such extreme rhetoric to talk about privacy and software ownership and right to repair; e.g. it's not "advertiser's entitlement," it's "rapist mentality."
Ironically, youtube's inability to completely differentiate between people at the same IP has accidentally gotten my non-techie roommate into him too. I never shared his videos with her, never said anything about him, and one day I hear his voice as she browses the web. I'm so proud of her.
My least favorite thing about the "engagement friendly" slop in youtube's search results is that it takes up HALF of the results. Because clearly what I expect from SEARCHING for something is to dredge up a bunch of shit that ranges from tangentially related to completely unrelated.
For example, I too just searched a song. Let's see how that went:
7 results
4 "people also watched" videos
5 results
2 "More from [band name]" videos
2 results
3 "people also searched for" suggestions
2 results
3 "For you" vids (IS IT THE FUVKING SEARCH RESULTS I ASKED FOR???? BECAUSE IF NOT, IT'S NOT REALLY "FOR ME," IS IT?)
2 Results
3 "From related searches"
2 results
That's 20 results to 15 irrelevant pieces of ADHD triggering visual clutter. Luckily the results were actually relevant, unlike whatever you're getting.
To all the commenters saying "I have X, I don't have this problem": I have adblock, I don't have this problem, YOU'RE MISSING THE POINT:
YOUTUBE SEARCH IS BROKEN BY DEFAULT. The largest video sharing site on the internet is BROKEN BY DEFAULT. It shouldn't require extra software to function properly when functioning properly requires less work on the server's side
- I agree with him on right to repair and other rights issues but I can’t stand the guy. He’s incredibly abrasive and annoying. I’m interested in people who have interesting things to say. Long, angry rants about stuff I already agree with are just a waste of my time.
  
  I feel this, to an extent. I rather like the guy, I like what he stands for (for the most part, I don't agree with his stance on at-will employment), but I don't generally watch his videos for the same reason; angry preaching to the choir. I already agree, it's mostly a waste of my time to watch.
- I loved Rossmann, but he made a sharp turn to reactionary politics and selfish ideology about the time he really took off. His views on just about anything outside of right to repair are usually so far from right as to be entirely wrong. He also has this idea that because he’s good at repairing things, he must have great takes on everything, and started making so many ridiculously terrible politics videos it became almost impossible to find actually useful content. He’s a smart dude, but like many smart dudes, he’s an idiot in most ways outside his specialty.
- It's not that it's broken by default, it's that it's broken deliberately. They don't want you to just be able to find what you need and then leave, because that's the civilized way of doing things, and they are GREEDY FUCKING BARBARIANS.
  
  Deliberately broken by default?

Youtube search results have been garbage for a while now :(
- ~~Youtube~~ Google search results have been garbage for a while now :(
  
  ~~Youtube Google~~ search results have been garbage for a while now :(

I get nothing. Google is all pissy I turned off history and refuse to use their app. So they refuse to suggest anything.
The upside is no bloat and no ads, just have to know a topic.
- positive for me cause I dont want to see their shitty recommendations anyways. I just like/dislike a video to indicate I watched it.

What I have noticed is that if you add “before:2025” (or any other future date) it doesn’t show the unrelated stuff.

Try piped. Your feed is only what you subscribe to and theres a toggle to hide shorts
- Or NewPipe
  
  Or Tubular
  
  Or PipePipe (at the time it was basically Newpipe with comments to me)
  
  Stuck in local
- Is it possible to turn recommendations on? I'm fine with those, but I never want to see shorts again.
  
  No I dont think so. Theres a trending page on a feed page
- I've tried looking into that but I couldn't get it working. It didn't add any subscriptions to my feed. Going to the site now I don't even seem to be able to click on anything. I just tried disabling my ad blocker and now I can click on stuff, but none of it won't load any videos. Any idea what's up with it? I'd love to be able to switch off YT if I can.
  
  Which instance are you on. I use piped.adminforge.de with uBlock and it works fine. Also the feed shows stuff from my subscriptions (I think I adjusted something in the settings for that).
  
  I used Piped for a while, but it's always broken half the time or incredibly slow, it was giving me an aneurism. Freetube and never looked back
  
  Depends on the instance, it might be down or having work done on it, and also I think there might be some ongoing war with youtube api to keep everything working but im not sure. I just signed up on the kavin rocks one, every couple of days it will be down for a bit but it comes back up.
- Is there a YouTube client for iOS? I know, iPhone bad etc, but it’s what I’ve got for now. 95% of the time I’m watching YouTube it’s not on my pc. There’s a Vanced in the App Store but I don’t trust it, especially since Vanced was shut down about 2 years ago if I’m not mistaken…

Ya'll need FreeTube.
- Yal'l n'eed t'o lear'n a'bou't apo'str'phe pl'ac'em'en't'.
  
  Ya will need freetube
  
  This boy ain’t right
  
  Rookie numbers! Needs more apostrophes.
- It's "y'all" - as in a contraction of "you all."

Here's an extension which turns YouTube into an Invidious-like site, removing all addicting elements.
If you're using Linux, I wrote the youtube-tui a few years back, very similar to the extension where you get nothing but the search bar and subscriptions.
- Holy shit this is incredible. I have wanted a way to permanently hide shorts forever, thanks for sharing. Also it's actually recommended by Mozilla which means it has active security audits on it, impressive.
- 🦀

1 minute videos aren't put into the shorts interface, so it's not YouTube noticing that you disabled shorts but rather some YouTuber trying to follow the algorithm using a channel they made for shorts and mistakenly (I assume) uploading a video longer than minute on it. All such videos appear as normal videos instead of as shorts.
Google is terrible though, so I understand why you would think that.

My three biggest problems with YouTube are:
It sucks on desktops/laptops with bigger UI scaling enabled, some stuff just doesn't fit.
The search function on YouTube is useless and completely broken. Instead of searching normally it:
Repeats same results multiple times;
Display unrelated Shorts nobody asked for;
Instead of displaying relevant results it shows stuff you have already watched or picked by YouTube algorithm.

You can't skip sponsored segments with YouTube Premium. You need SponsorBlock browser extension for that.
- I wouldn't dream of paying for premium unless they added an official version of sponsorblock across desktop and mobile. The fact that you can get more out of YouTube with a free client is laughable.
  You're pretty much just throwing away money if you pay for premium.

Firefox, uBlock Origin, on a Linux Desktop. I have none of these problems and have filters to hide shorts, endcards, autoplay, ambient mode. And I block all cookies from Youtube/Google. Works perfectly.
- I'm working towards a Linux distro instead of windows. Until I get there it's Firefox, unblock on a desktop with mullvad VPN. Set the vpn location to Albania for no ads.
  
  Kubuntu is very friendly, it's my daily. Try Mint if you want easier.
- This is the way. And I might add, Unix desktop. Let's not start bikeshedding between FOSS Unix distributions out of dogmatic reasons (I'm sure you didn't mean to specifically single out "Linux" here, but I wish we would stop opposing "Linux" and other Unixes like BSD, Illumos, etc).
  The point is, voting with your data for software that is defending your interests, and respecting your rights.
  Edit: Dang, I didn't expect to get so much slack for "Unix as opposed to Unix-Like". I absolutely meant "Unix-Like", but my point is that it shouldn't matter. Most software is trying to be compatible, these days, and Linux isn't (in spite of all that marketing material) an OS. It is a kernel. So semantics for semantics, can it even be compared to something it is not? I merely tried to be inclusive.
  
  This is a weird response to me.
  This is the way. And I might add, Unix desktop.
  Sure man, rock on. ✊
  Let’s not start bikeshedding between FOSS Unix distributions out of dogmatic reasons (I’m sure you didn’t mean to specifically single out “Linux” here
  Eh.. OP seems to be talking about their own setup. They probably "singled out" Linux because it's what they use.
  I wish we would stop opposing “Linux” and other Unixes like BSD, Illumos, etc).
  I oppose none of those things, but Linux isn't Unix.
  (Usually the Unix folks are the ones at pains to point that out.)
  
  It’s not so much opposition rather than other BSDs having almost negligible desktop presence… If we really want to get into semantics, too, Linux is technically not UNIX.

I simply just stopped searching or clicking on anything I'm not subbed to while logged in. It's like you commit a crime when you click something. Next ~~then~~ thing you know, that same fucking channel is following everywhere you go, in the home page and under every video you watch. Fuck google and fuck all this enshitification campaign the internet is undergoing

Unusable for me with ads as well. Grey loading screen and choppy audio instead of actually loading ads, never gets to the video. If I reopen the video a few times to skip the ad the video loads fine. No problems with online gaming, streaming services, etc so I know it's their shit Roku app and ad network and not me. Ad blockers make it actually usable.

soon google will block ALL forms of front ends
- I doubt it as that would break all of the embedded videos on the internet

Their incompetence opens room for other platforms
- Oh, we've been through this though. Which other platform will ever have the cash to be a real contender here?
  
  DouYin, you know, the Chinese YouTube
  That's sarcasm though, as I expect them to be as malicious as YouTube
  
  Things like freetube seems to be basically a simple yt front-end.
  I don't know what happens if a significant amount of yt users used freetube. but that probably won't happen.
  I find it a lot more pleasant to use than yt.
  
  Twitch could. Still wild they don’t allow editing vods or uploading videos.
- Video hosting is a money sink, I wouldn't hold my breath that somebody else comes along.
- PeerTube isn't too bad if you're willing to host your own videos as a big creator, and smaller creators can pool resources for smaller instances.
  
  My main issue with Peertube is that for some reason, after just a bit of its use the internet connection on my laptop just shuts down until a reboot. It was present on both old and new laptop, and while the same thing happens when I torrent sometimes - only Peertube does it consistently. Would really like if there is a fix for this.
  But yea, I agree in that the answer is not a platform, but a selfhostable solution.
- The free market has always resulted in the best outcomes for the people!!

I get usable results for "Boards of Canada". You've got some personal problems happening.

Has been for years already sadly. I recommend https://github.com/user234683/youtube-local to watch directly and https://github.com/ytdl-org/youtube-dl to download. They both remove the dark patterns trying to abuse the attention of viewers.

May I ask the name(s) of these extension(s)? Currently having this issue and that’s why I mainly use MPV to load my music playlist on.
- Untrap for Youtube
  The same dev also makes an extension that lets you block individual elements for facebook, instagram, leddit, etc. Useful to break a habit

also be sure to disable cookies on youtube, it gets rid of weird suggestions and usually only suggests videos related to the current one

i ran into this kind of garbage the other day looking for a Nicholas Jaar video when i couldn't recall the name. like BoC, there's tons and tons of tracks by Jaar, but results gave me one or two of his most popular tracks and a buuuuuunch of other stuff. i couldn't even just keep scrolling, there were a dozen results and then the "related search" garbage.
ugh, i'm so fed up with google, and at the same time not motivated enough to figure out workarounds. i have work and shit to do around my house.
i guess, with me, they won.
edit typo

Piped. Trust me.

I remembered there was a thing that came out not too long ago that proved that silicon valley executives literally don't know what consent is.

I disabled History and only see my channel subscriptions. None of the options above appear in my Youtube feed.
- Yeah i did this until they make the entire homepage blank if you keep history off. Very annoying.
  
  but why would your homepage not be your sub box
- i had history disabled for a while until i realized that it then forgets your progress in longer videos… deal-breaker for me

Upvoted for BoC

as a boards lover myself, i just have to comment on this, for one, impeccable taste in music.
anyway, i tested this myself, seems fine. Have you tried disabling the watch history bullshit? It even lists a sidebar full of album related shit.
So uh, go off queen ig.

On a similar note, does anybody know of a frontend or add on for Instagram? I do not want the suggested content and reels they shove down everyone's throats because it is very easy to waste hours and get distracted easily with it. Also no ads would be nice. I have to use Instagram to keep in touch with certain people who I have no alternative means of keeping in touch with.
- you're looking for "Instander"! I went on a quest for this myself awhile back
  
  Thanks!
- I’ve been using beeper for the last 2 months and it has been working perfectly, I can see as video if someone sends a short, I can listen to an audio recording and see all of my messages without ever seeing the instagram feed.

The damn site tries to crash my browser before showing me what I want

Works for me
- I also got very relevant results for that query.
  
  I find most searches will give me the first 3 or videos meeting the criteria roughly followed by a bunch of random stuff that has nothing to do with what I searched
- Works fine on yt revanced
- Fine for me too

My method for android & desktop. I never sign in to YouTube & never use the app. Using Joplin synced through Nextcloud (any syncable note taking app would do the trick) I keep a list of channels ("subscriptions") & interesting looking videos ("watch later") which I group by length. Obviously, this way the links can be via Piped, YouTube whatever.
I only ever interract through browser which is never signed in. Kiwi browser on Android, Firefox or Brave on desktop. All of them run uBlock + SponsorBlock + DeArrow.
DeArrow is by the same dev/s as SponsorBlock & gives anti clickbait crowd sourced titles & thumbs. Its become an invaluable tool so I'm glad to have paid to offer some support.
All of the browsers have history/cookies etc cleared once closed.
- My method for android & desktop. I never sign in to YouTube & never use the app. Using Joplin synced through Nextcloud (any syncable note taking app would do the trick) I keep a list of channels (“subscriptions”) & interesting looking videos (“watch later”) which I group by length. Obviously, this way the links can be via Piped, YouTube whatever.
  As a Joplin user, I find it interesting. So you have a "subscriptions" folder and a "watch later" folder? What is your routine?
  
  Nothing sophisticated, I just have a note for videos. The note has headings (use the [toc] trick at the top of the note to jump directly to the headings without having to scroll through everything)
  You could categorise video links by genre or whatever your preference. I chose to categorise by length, say up 10 minutes, 11 to 20 minutes, 20 to 30 minutes & so on. So i set up appropriate headings.
  Thats it. I also set up a heading for "Audio" as some videos are essentially podcasts, audio based talks etc & Kiwi browser allows background play.
  Its a few extra steps over tapping "save for later" in YouTube app but it takes seconds to copy title, copy url & paste into a note & it caters for videos from any source. To remove myself from the shitty algorithm it works for me
- Man, I wonder if there will be freetube support for DeArrow that looks great

In fairness, I have no idea what I would want from that search query.
- Boards of Canada is a very popular IDM artist, and they're the third result down from the top.
- It looks like it's a band name, as the third result is from a channel with that exact name. Idk what the first search result is, but that second one seems vaguely related probably because the guy mentioned it in his silly short
- It's indeed the name of a band
- Verbatim search terms in results title
- Hot and sexy nude planks of Canadian Maple plywood.

Great band though, you've got good taste
- Agree

I’m really surprised at how bad of an experience people are having! I have a bunch of channels I follow and people I interact with. Some big channels but most small. I love channels with only a few hundred to a few thousand viewers. The creators post their videos and then I talk to them through the comments. We have some really interesting conversations.
Lots of other channels I follow I don’t interact with but still really enjoy. A lot of hobby channels are amazing! I generally avoid the news and politics stuff, though I still occasionally watch Ukraine videos or Trump trial stuff. I get sick of those after one video though!
- Yeah, tbh, the insane focus on privacy makes YouTube a lot worse, no shit. The algorithm just throws shit at the wall hoping it sticks, what do you expect?
  Make a burner account only for YouTube. See how the quality goes up because you can follow people you are actually interested in.
  I personally really don't see the privacy risk with that? (then again, I gave up on the idea of true privacy online years ago. Privacy through obscurity is enough. I don't care big companies recognize my habits, as long as they don't know 100% exactly who I am.)
  
  You can subscribe without an account using third party clients like NewPipe or FreeTube

Cool music taste.

OK but what does that have to do with privacy?
- They can't do what they are doing here without an intent to violate privacy.
  
  How so

They are in a endless cycle

You guys still using youtube?

hold up... danTDM?

Pretty sure my Adblocker already does all of this I still use Youtube about 10% of the time to find new channels Piped provides some suggestions while you watch some Video but it can't replaces YT's homefeed

In using smarttube on my shield and search works perfectly, and revanced still works on mobile. I never use thd Tube on desktop, is there no good solution on that platform?

It's usable with the default stuff, well, minus the fucking 5 second ads

Uh, yeah. Use
<search engine of choice>
, give search term, go to
<video>
tab or corresponding functionality.
Why would you use youtube's internal search anyway? It's age-old knowledge that such platforms use algorithms to "engage" (manipulate) you.

I use YouTube with https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/search-fixer-for-youtube/bojdknokkpgboeonegndfcgkaommhleo
- You're using Chrome in 2024 while also browsing Lemmy? Dear God, man. I wish I had your determination and\or powers of ignorance.
  
  No need to be insulting, we are all here to make lemmy great.
  
  I use what works best for me. I use Lemmy because it's better than reddit. The official Reddit app is just unpleasant to use.
  Here's your Firefox plugin: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-suite-search-fixer/

People here won't complain about anything until their favourite youtuber tells them why it's bad.

It's amazing how hard some of you work to make YouTube enjoyable. Here's a tip: stop watching YouTube.
- The problem is no other platform has that much content. Looking for an obscure scene from an old tv show? It's probably on YouTube. Wanna know more about Brigitte Bardot's career? Someone has a nice channel about her. The fact that the platform sucks amd his own by effing google doesn't change that there is just so much great niche content to be discovered. Hopefully we'll have a fully working foss alternative soon enough. I'll gladly pay for that if the money goes back to creators.

"Literally UNUSABLE!"
Meanwhile 99% of the planet uses it just fine.
- No, they all hate it too.
  
  1.3T visits in 2023. 100M are paying for premium. They are doing just fine.
- 99% of the planet are sheep who just click the first thing that shows up, if not enables autoplay while it feeds them incel nazi conspiracy shit.
  
  Or even worse, feeds them modern clickbait news.

I've used Vanced, ReVanced, Newpipe, LibreTube etc. for years and finally just gave up with the neverending third part app hassle, got YouTube Premium and disabled watch history. Sure it's costly, but at least everything works, there are no ads and shorts don't work without watch history. Win some, lose some ¯⁠\⁠_⁠(⁠ツ⁠)⁠_⁠/⁠¯
- You sparked my interest, in which way YouTube premium is better than newpipe ?( I'm using the sponsor block version) I mean you won't convince me to give my money to such evil company but I'm curious about what convinced you ...
  
  Some people just don't like the hassle. In my opinion, having had premium and used revanced with sponsorblock, revanced is better.
  
  I was a YouTube premium family account owner. Paid for myself, my partner and three friends accounts (think it was five slots?)
  The recent price hike was too much, so I've been using frontends as of late.
  The YouTube premium experience is seamless, much faster than the frontends but at the same time your getting shit shoveled down your throat at every chance.
  I've had lots of issues with libretube servers as of late. Pipe pipe is better but overall since I dropped my sub I've been watching far less on YouTube as a whole.
  
  Out of those I mentioned, Newpipe was actually my favourite (LibreTube felt too beta, only used it for a week at most) and I've used it for years. Vanced was great too. But there's always something, like what happened to Vanced for example. I don't know, I felt like I was spending way too much time installing third party apps, trying to get them to work properly after Google's endless shenanigans. Paying them is more convenient / less time consuming.
- Good for you, but this is the wrong sub for you then.
  
  You're totally right, I wasn't paying attention to the sub, my bad.
- Not good for privacy
- Same here. I know we're pariahs for admitting something so obvious, but sometimes the easiest way to get good service is to actually pay for it. Youtube Music alone is worth the monthly sub, since it is VASTLY superior to Spotify.
  
  The problem is that YouTube music is vastly inferior to google play music.
  I'm not a fan of services that make themselves worse and then charge you for it.
  The paid experience is a decent one, but it isn't the same as service that I want. I want to control what I watch and not be fed what they think I want to watch.
  But I don't disagree that paying for a good service is worth it.
  
  Aren’t playlists still broken? I remember shuffle not working, repeating some songs and then going off with unrelated videos before the playlist was even over.

I don't know anyone that watches YouTube regularly. Seems like such a boomer thing
- Do you need help lifting the rock you're living under?
- Boomers watch broadcast TV. It's what they grew up with.

182 comments