Comment by puttycat
7 months ago
The YouTube abominations keep piling up: Vertical videos on a desktop, endless ads (thanks to the Chrome manifest change that disables decent adblockers), useless feed.
I highly recommend installing an extension that hides the home feed and sidebar recommendations, which at least makes YT non-distracting again.
I think in (South-East) Asia the people like vertical videos for some reason. Seems how many people record videos on their phones - at least in Thailand.
For most developing and recently developed countries, the gateway to modern technology is the smartphone.
The first world had a lot of computers, video cameras and horizontal screens in general before they had smartphones.
I think it plays a part.
Nothing about using a phone requires users to hold it vertically to take video.
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The most infuriating thing is that there is no technical reason for vertical filming sucking so much.
The phone camera sensors often have a aspect ration of 4:3 but the sides are cropped in software. So the videos just get mutilated because convention.
Though at least 4:3 format is making a come-back because it is the prefect comprise format. Looks great on a tablet, is usable in both landscape and portrait mode. On Desktop it leave space to read comments. Perfect for youtube videos.
I don’t have the numbers, but I’m pretty sure that Asia (lots of people) use phones as their primary (sole, even) device.
Since a phone can show portrait or landscape videos in fullscreen (just hold the phone vertically or horizontally), it makes sense to shoot in whatever orientation fits the content or situation best.
The real problem is that computer monitors don’t easily offer orientation switching :)
> shoot in whatever orientation fits the content or situation best.
I'm with you there. It's the same for shooting still photos.
...but that doesn't stop people from shooting portrait video and then constantly panning back and forth because the whole (crowd, landscape, giant sea monster, whatever) doesn't fit in the frame.
There's a good chunk of the world whose only device to interact with the internet is a smart phone or tablet
Asian people like watching vertical videos on a desktop?
Actually in Thailand I don't think many people own a desktop. But many people do own phones.
Gaming on mobile phones, even MOBA games and first person shooters, seems quite popular here. For me, it's unplayable.
Been looking for a comment to post my own pet peeve under:
Pausing a Youtube video overlays the video with a row of more video recommendations.
So if I'm pausing the video to see something in the video, video thumbnails are in the way.
This happens in the Roku app and sometimes in the desktop browser, but for some reason I couldn't trigger it when I tested it just now. Maybe one of my extensions blocks it.
Pausing for me on mobile downsizes and letterboxes the video, shifts it to the left, and shows an ad on the right. The forward/play or pause/back buttons also shift to the left, which means that you can't tap the same spot to resume.
uBlock Origin lite is V3. And blocks youtube ads