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Youtube Ads are getting too frequent..

[[[ Solved - Using FreeTube for now ]]]

It seems youtube is breaking into the middle of long-form video much more often. And most of the ads are for snake oil - Fear mongering "Tinnitus will KILL your brain in three years" baloney.

Is there a Fediverse equivalent to YouTube? Can the Fediverse be applied to this? Will it solve the above complaint?

I have been to Odysee but with very few exceptions none of the content I want is there (They have Veritasium, and minute Physics, but not Vsause, Technology Connections, or Stand Up Maths)

19 comments
  • It’s so bad I can basically only watch YouTube on my computer with Adblock. It would be helpful if YouTube premium weren’t $15 per month.

    • I could not afford that either. I have U-Block origin but for some reason, I had turned it off for YouTube. Probs because I heard a rumor that they were going to flat block people using ad-blockers. I have turned U-block back on again.

      • There will always be a workaround unless they start using DRM on YouTube videos

  • There's Revanced if you use Android, SmartTube for AndroidTV, on pc the best solution is Firefox with UblockOrigin+Sponsorblock (I also use Enhancer for Youtube).
    Also saw some mentions about Peertube, I think it's something like Youtube for the fediverse but I haven't really checked it.

  • Ok, So far FreeTube is working well - I can subscribe to all my favorites. I will probably be using Freetube, at least until Youtube finds a way to squash it.

  • Agreed, and Twitch is even worse. I avoid streamers that run ads all the time.

  • My solution appears to be a bit unique, at least on the deskfop.

    I have four extensions on my Librewolf browser. Ublock, NoScript, Alter, and Chameleon.

    Additionally, I use newsboat rss reader which reads a list of youtube rss urls from a simple txt file. This keeps my youtube subscriptions without subbing on google's platform. Whenever I open one of these rss feeds via newsboat, Librewolf opens and uses the Alter extension to redirect to an Invidious instance. Ublock and Noscript block everything. Chameleon feeds a fake fingerprint to invidious as well. The invidious url remains in tact. I copy this url.

    In a terminal on Linux, I invoke yt-dlp on this url. I include a sponsorblock flag that literally cuts out the mention of sponsors and the sponsored content. I watch it with mpv/devour, often including the captions as well.

    On my GrapheneOS phone, its more simple, i just use Libretube which has sponsorblock turned on. To avoid ads otherwise I use mull browser with ublock, noscript, and a few other about:config settings. I also bypass paywalls for major news sites using ublock and a list I yoinked from somewhere on github.

  • I use Firefox with UBlock and I don't see any ads on Youtube. You should try this.

    As for a fediverse version of YouTube there's peertube, but realistically hosting video is more expensive and you would never see a collection as large as YouTube on the fediverse IMO.

    • Somehow my Ublock origin got turned off, I turned it back on. I use FreeTube to watch the channels I am subscribed to. I go to YouTube itself to watch things I search for.

19 comments