Really interesting read about the history of YouTube adblocking, how the new detection works, how uBO is responding, and how not to block the new popups.
There used to be one, but it was shut down. IMO there shouldn’t be an ‘official’ instance, users should be evenly distributed across instances and everything should be decentralized. The same goes for Mastodon or Lemmy, having most users concentrated on mastodon.social or lemmy.ml is not good. Centralization is pretty much always bad, but it’s the only model of how services on the internet work that new users coming from centralized platforms understand. It’s sad and unfortunate, but we might be able to change that. The more terrible decisions are made by corporations, the more successful will free and open source, decentralized software be. We saw it with Mastodon when Musk bought Twitter, we saw it again with Lemmy when Reddit was fucked by spez.
I want to avoid solutions that involve using the YouTube app/website (including modded YouTube apps like Revanced or browser addons to use on the website)
Youtube Premium? The creators do get more than the standard ad-supported viewer and you don’t get any ads.
I get that we’re all trying to not see ads without paying money but I do acknowledge their infrasturucture and the feats they have accomplished trying to turn a profit. When youtube vanced was pulled, I did try reVanced for a while but eventually went with Premium.
I’m not saying you should get Premium and give up the fight, I’m aaying consider your usage of Youtube and whether if you can drop it or not. In my case I don’t watch TV or movie streaming platforms (not even on demand) and so Youtube is my primary video consumption platform and it made sense for me to pay.
Whether if I’ll switch to another country’s pricing by using a VPN or not, that’s for me to consider.
I absolutely hate Google and won’t ever give them even a single penny. If there’s a creator I like, I support them through Patreon, Ko-fi, Liberapay or preferably anonymous crypto currency like Monero.
Okay, good on ya. Hate Google on as much as you want.
I don’t have an infinite supply of income to be able to support their lowest monthpy subscription tiers of all my favourite creators, which ends up being the same financial issue with paying for multiple exclusive platforms, but for creators instead.
Even if I do support my most favourite of the most deserving creators, I don’t have the time to reap their benefits (eg. WIPs, streams, etc) as I already am consuming and enjoying their works that they publicly release. The only exception to this is exclusive content that isn’t posted on Youtube - which even then some creators do release them eventually.
You could probably take whatever premium costs each month and spread it around different creators you like each month. That may be more effort than is worth it to you but I’d bet they’d get more money from you still.
Could be luck, but of those I only found Viewtube and Freetube to be responsive at this time of day to a live stream (the others either loaded endlessly or said they couldn't load the page)
That was only of the web/desktop ones.
Freetube seems to support youtube chat as well, which the others don't.
Smart tube next has always worked on TV with live and live chat. Usually newpipe works with live just hard to find the videos, usually end up pasting YT links.
The other options (especially LibreTube) are much better for Privacy as they don’t include any Google trackers and LibreTube doesn’t even connect to Google servers. It proxies everything through a Piped server, meaning Google never sees your IP address or any other connection details. It’s basically anonymized YouTube.
Sure, but you don’t really lose anything by using privacy-oriented solutions like LibreTube. It’s just a really nice YouTube client for Android, it also has SponsorBlock and DeArrow integration, a nice and convenient download feature and many other things
I’m losing my tailored recommendations. And yes, I’m compromising my privacy for them, but I find value in that trade. I suppose I could open the official app, scroll my feed, and still open the videos in another front end, but as long as ReVanced exists I’ll take the easier route. And it has sponsorblock and newpipe integration for downloads.
You can create an account on a Piped instance and use it to sync your subscriptions and playlists. You can also log into your account when using LibreTube on Android. Invidious also allows for account creation, but I’m not aware of any mobile apps allowing to connect to it.
This is the answer. I use Newpipe on mobile and Invidious on desktop. I dont even know what youtube ads look like. I run it all behind a pihole just to be sure. Works like a dream.
I use newpipe x sponsorblock, invidious, and pinhole as well, but it’s worth pointing out to those unfamiliar- pihole does nothing for YouTube ads. Pihole is great for sites that add google ads or random junk to their pages, it has no ability to block ads that come from the same domain as a sites content because it is DNS based.
Personally, I prefer LibreTube on my phone and Piped on desktop. I also use NextDNS when I’m on the go and Pi-Hole when I’m at home. I haven’t used an official YouTube app or website for the last 2 years.
LibreTube isn’t broken, it’s the Piped instances that have issues. You just need to switch to another Piped instance in the settings. Click on the three dots, then select settings, go to ‘Instance’ and at the top you can hit ‘Choose…’ to change the Piped instance. I haven’t experienced any issues with adminforge.de. kavin.rocks also seems to work well.
uBO team (2 people) should not be responding to questions on reddit or elsewhere. They should just update the filters and post a "extension updated, should work again now".
In the end, Youtube will win if they want to win. Google can throw unconscionable amounts of money at their techs to fight the adblockers while the volunteers spend their attention and patience.
Realistically there is an equation money lost by ad blockers vs money gained by making ad blocking harder (money in - dev cost) unless its about sending a message.
Pretty sure there are still Methods to get free access to satellite TV channels (the paid encrypted ones, I’m aware that there are Free channels) the methods just changed from how it was done in the old days, nowadays you need internet to download the keys, which kind of defeats the purpose since you could just use a Free IPTV service on that same connection.
Also Satellite has fallen out of favor these days.
Yeah. I don’t see the moderator leaving as a huge loss or anything because the fight against misinformation and noise in inglorious and full of people who refuse to help themselves. They have a life demanding their concern, and as far as I care, if they finally ripped the bandaid and went and focused on that life of theirs, then the world has become a better place.
Well there’s a very realistic 3rd option where people get tired of the cat and mouse game and either suck it up and watch the ads or pony up for YouTube premium…?
That is our win condition. To make it so costly for them that they bail on the idea. Because if we don’t, then it’s one step closer to their internet: locked down, hidden charges everywhere and content under their terms.
This isn’t just about ads, it’s about keeping information free.
The point is to make adblocking so tedious that only fairly tech literate people would do it. That cousin whose pc you set up and installed uBO on? They won’t figure out how to update the filters, they will just whitelist (or realistically just turn off uBO) or premium.
Basically nobody will actually abandon YT over this and those who do will be so low in numbers it is ~0 to YT.
I don’t think we should underestimate the savvy programmers out there, who are just as fed up with ads as the rest of us.
And at this point, most of the cousins who don’t know how to update their adblocker are already there. It’s a matter of time. YT won’t keep pouring money into this. Just long enough to the “balance the books.” When the ‘number of viewed ads’ start slowing down again and they’ve hit their max viewership, they’ll call off the hounds.
does this affect the ip range blockers. I thought about getting one of those, but youtube will probably find a way to cook ads into regular content, but we have AI now…
Most of the streaming sites are serving ads from the same subdomain these days. I think Paramount might still be separate? But causes issues when you try to log in as well, so have to pause Pihole to log in. Then ads are (sometimes) blocked :)
With uBlock Origin I’m not getting anything, but the Ghostery plugin with “adblocking enabled” set to on actually now returns a blank youtube site. As soon as I switch it off (so blocking trackers only) it works perfectly fine and with zero ads.
YouTube isn’t rolling out the anti-adblock to everyone. It seems to depend on things like your account, browser, and IP address. And if you’re not logged in or you’re in a private window, you’re safe. As a result, there are a bunch of people saying, “I use XYZ and I haven’t seen an anti-adblock popup yet,” unknowingly spreading misinformation.
STOP BLOCKING SPONSORS. LET THE SMALL CREATOR EARN THE LITTLE THAT THEY DO FROM AD REVENUE YOU THIEVES. FUCK THE PIRATES WITH A FLAMETHROWER UP THE ASS.
They get ad revenue from the majority, and we still give them algorithm. I’m not taking time out of my day to tip someone for a service I haven’t even received yet.
Last time it stopped working for me I just needed to update revanced manager, make sure the patches were updated on the main screen, and re patch the recommended APK version which had increased. They’ve done a pretty good job at keeping up
You can also get grayjay, which will also condense twitch, nebula, youtube, etc into one consistent feed without trackers or ads. Also it supports the down vote plug-in and 3rd party comment solutions so you can get even more from the app then you can with say revanced which is just the regular old YouTube app with patches.
So today, YouTube’s pop-ups rolled down to Views will be limited to one unless you remove your adblocker at which point the pop-ups ceased. (I was intentionally rolling them down). Have: Firefox, DDG Privacy Essentials, NoScript, uBlock Origin
Techs working to give me access: I love you guys! I really appreciate what you’re doing.
Fuck the hurtful comments, and do it to fight capitalism and enshittification.
That said, when I can no longer YouTube without ads, I will no longer YouTube, which also means no engagement on video forums. Useful, interesting rants is what I have to offer.
But the hurtful comments leave a bigger mark than the good ones
As a volunteer for a charity, I feel this so much. I work incredibly hard to help people, I get paid nothing for my time. The entitlement and rude demands burns me out way faster. Especially when people seem to put far more effort into complaining and being rude than they do thanking me or showing appreciation for what we do.
I’ve moved on from trying to block the ads to using a front-end and a macro to do the annoying part for me. It’s been nice. I hadn’t realized how bad youtube’s UI was until seeing a clean one. I definitely recommend using one of the less notable ones, they seem to be faster.
That’s also how I often access YT. Libreddit is already selfhosted in the local network (+ wireguard on clients) and I’ll look into hosting something for YT.
Sadly most people want to keep their recommendations and the UI, so they’ll stay on the official site.
Mine are super inconsistent now. Obviously I have uBO, but I can typically watch like 10-ish videos a day before the popups start, at which point I just turn on libredirect.
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