this post was submitted on 17 Dec 2023
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Technology

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YouTube screwing itself with adblockers again (beehaw.org)
submitted 11 months ago by TheBaldness@beehaw.org to c/technology@beehaw.org
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I use Firefox and uBlock Origin. Not sure what kind of experience anyone else is having with YouTube, but recently my home page has been empty because I "don't have watch history turned on". Okay, fine. I won't be able to browse suggested videos, and I'll spend less time on their platform.

Then I began to get warnings about using an adblocker. Okay, fine. I know they need to make money, so I turned off the adblocker. Now when I'm having my time wasted by ads, I have to ask myself, how bad do I really want to watch this video? Not badly enough? I close the tab and spend less time on their platform.

Finally, I began experiencing glitches when playing videos. The video stops, but the audio continues. This never happened before. Perhaps mistakenly, I attribute this to YouTube, which is owned by Google, trying to force me off Firefox and on to Chrome. That was the last straw.

Now I use YouTube to simply follow the channels I'm subscribed to. When I want to watch something, I copy the URL, paste it into YT-DLP, download the video and spend zero time on their platform at all.

To summarize; Now I'm watching zero commercials, and YouTube is streaming the entire video to me, even if I only watch a small portion of it, and they're collecting less information about my watching habits than ever before.

Nice job, YouTube. Nice job.

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[–] t3rmit3@beehaw.org 10 points 11 months ago (1 children)

It still has to be remotely relevant to me. If they showed me 10 different cars that look like Mini's aesthetics, hey, I'd probably keep those in mind. Instead they show me 5 SUVs and 5 pickup trucks, and unless I actually start to make enough money to start that llama-petting-zoo-cafe I dream about in my worst work moments, I will never need or want either of those vehicle classes.

[–] blindsight@beehaw.org 4 points 11 months ago (2 children)

Research shows it still affects you, though. You'll have more brand awareness, whether you want to or not. Everyone in the US & Canada know what a RAV4 and Forester are. You don't need that explained to you when your coworker tells you about their new car.

And even if you don't drink pop at all, you still know Coke is better than Pepsi.

[–] hulemy@ani.social 9 points 11 months ago

This kind of stuff makes me sad, in a way. Knowing there are people with psychological degrees whose job it is to ""indoctrinate"" people with marketing and advertisements to minmax profits.

Pepsi still better than coke though.

[–] t3rmit3@beehaw.org 3 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

I do know what a Rav4 is, because my coworker drove one, but without looking it up I don't know what a Forrester is.

But also, I think you're confusing the studies that show that all people are susceptible to marketing, with saying that all people are susceptible to all marketing, which is not what studies show. Nor is there such a thing as marketing with 100% market penetration.

Believing that all marketing works on everyone is just as false as believing that there are people whom no marketing works on.

"You can fool all of the people some of the time, and some of the people all of the time, but you can't fool all the people all the time... Well, you keep saying it differently, Abe."