Along with uBlock, there's nice extension called SponsorBlock that uses crowdsourcing to block in-content ad placements.
edit: Did not notice this was already mentioned. Sorry!
I have always wrestled with the ethics of adblocking YouTube. If am subscribed to a channel, that means the content in that channel has value for me. And it is only fair that I provide some value to the content creators in return. Otherwise it is theft.
Anyways this is my reasoning. Hence as much as I find ads to be annoying, I put up with them. I am considering cancelling my Spotify subscription and using the saving to subscribe to YouTube. I haven't done it yet.
At what point is it considered theft though? If I refuse to look at an ad when it plays is it theft? If I get distracted and not watch it for half the time it runs, is it half theft?
If I watch the whole thing and don't actually click through, is that theft?
There's no contract that I've signed that demands my full attention is on the ad. So, half my attention is ok? A quarter? How about none?
Is it enough that I know so and so company is behind the specific ad without me knowing what the ad is about but just realizing it's to sell me their product? Is that enough?
But that's not my problem. That's the content creator's problem for choosing to get paid by advertisers and releasing the content for free mass consumption.
They picked the model - they must deal with the consequences of it.
One of the most obvious consequences is that they have zero right to any of the audience's time, attention, or money. They have entered no contract with the viewer at all.
Frankly - I'd very much rather see a return to viewer funded media. Stop wrapping me up like a product to be auctioned off. Make content I want to watch and ask for fair compensation from me.
If you can't find enough people willing to pay... your content probably doesn't need to exist.
Act like NPR and man up - ask me for my money. Put on content that's worth me opening my wallet.
Cool. So for now, we can have third party tools that silence these ads and these content creators still get paid. At the point where the advertisers don't like this, then things can change. If they change enough, I'll choose a different platform.
> I have always wrestled with the ethics of adblocking YouTube
have you considered the ethics of the ads themselves? Ads are all too often nonconsensual, manipulative, and harmful. They're designed to exploit us. You should respect yourself enough to avoid them when you can.
Adblocking seems very distinct from theft to me, but thankfully even that is irrelevant with SponsorBlock. Those sponsorships don't pay via impression and only the channel themselves could really try to track impressions anyway.
You're free to use SponsorBlock and save so much time, brain space, and frustration, without worrying about altering the creator's pay at all. I don't see why you wouldn't do it.
At this point I've got actual emotional/stress responses to segues in videos. It's ridiculous. At least SponsorBlock saves me a good number of ads and gives me a way to do something when an ad spot isn't skipped.
It may not alter their pay immediately but if enough people start using SponsorBlock, it seems like a logical conclusion that the sponsors will see their ROIs drop and will start paying less for sponsored content.
Only if you were actually going to be influenced to buy the thing in the first place. And it's not like the various bits of advertising from a sponsorship go entirely unnoticed in many circumstances, with various requirements to add text ads to video descriptions and pinned comments.
If you're looking to be actually informed - rather than manipulated - you're not missing out on much with SponsorBlock.
Not to mention I've never actually seen anything both potentially useful and novel-to-me show up in a YouTube sponsorship anyway. It mostly seems to be full of companies with established models looking for ways to boost their adspend even higher after they've tapped out other avenues.
I subscribe to YouTube premium and one of the great features is that creators get significantly more money from my views than from an adsupported user. So every monetized video that I view helps them out a bit more. That along with ad free viewing and YouTube music make it the best value of anything I subscribe too and would be my last service to cancel.
You can subscribe to Youtube Premium to remove ads, but not in-video sponsorships of course. A lot of prominent creators have banded together in the Nebula subscription service [1], where they put their video without ads and sponsorships.
And you can get a great deal on nebula+curiosity stream too. I think I pay like under $20 for the year for both solely to watch Patrick H Willems and Thomas Flight videos and support a YouTube alternative.
It makes sense to cancel Spotify in favor of YouTube Premium since YouTube Premium includes both YouTube Music (music streaming service, like Spotify) and ad-free YouTube videos. It looks like YouTube Premium is a little more expensive than Spotify ($12 vs $10).
I think they were talking about SponsorBlock, which was mentioned on another same-level comment. Probably just didn't realize this was a separate sub-chain (or whatever you call it) without that context.
I've been using uYou+[0] & AltStore for about 6 months (since I switched to iOS from Android & Vanced) and I haven't had any problems with it. It has both SponsorBlock & normal ad block.
