Comment by stillpointlab
11 hours ago
I don't think it is fair to pin this on Google - I get the worst ads on X. But something about how the X ad network works means that even when I report the ad, block the ad poster, etc. there is this army of alternate ad accounts that all show the same ad.
I was feeling very guilty last night as I was watching YouTube and getting 30s+ unskippable ad blocks every 10 minutes in some video. And the repetition and low quality were grating on me. I thought: being rich is never having to watch another ad. Why am I letting these ads own spaced repetition slots in my brain that could be filled with knowledge? Instead of learning, my mental energy is being taken up by psychological manipulation to purchase? The relentless repetition of the mind-numbing ad interspersed throughout otherwise educational content.
Being rich is owning the real-estate of my own mind. I sometimes feel like a digital serf in my own head.
Why are you subjecting yourself to that instead of downloading Firefox + uBlock origin?
See the headline of this article for Exhibit (I've actually run out of letters in the alphabet) why adblocking is a moral imperative.
As much I love a good old "Why don't you just ..." response that terrifically misses the point - in this particular case I was watching YouTube through their Apple TV app.
Now, there may be another "why don't you just ..." or "well, actually ..." response you have queued up, maybe some ramblings about a pi hole, or some anti-Apple hate, or some other solutioneering. Go ahead, tell me.
But it is the structure of incentive that forces this. The YouTube creators that make the content do need to get paid. And Google offers an option: Youtube Premium. That give both me and the creator what we want and (for the time being) removes the ads.
So either one is rich in time (doing whatever "why don't you just ..." hoop you expect me to jump through) or rich in money.
Sounds like you've made a choice to watch ads. Which is fine, but then maybe don't complain about it.
3 replies →
> The YouTube creators that make the content do need to get paid
Nope.
They may get paid, they may not. That's the risk they've chosen. They may also get their Google account banned with no recourse for something minor or even non-existent.
> So either one is rich in time (doing whatever "why don't you just ..." hoop you expect me to jump through) or rich in money.
That's what they want you to think, you've been watching too many ads.
> I was watching YouTube through their Apple TV app.
That is an active choice, not forced in any way.
> The YouTube creators that make the content do need to get paid.
There are better ways, and we would all be better off except for the small group of greedheads benefiting from the chaos
The ad supported internet is dying. Good riddance
I think it is fair to pin this on Google, Meta, X, and any other ad networks that seem to have no control over their own platforms.
They're like Dr. Frankenstein, creating a monster and then just letting it roam the countryside. But worse, because they profit (immensely) from the chaos their monster wreaks.
Pin it on Google, Meta, X, etc, and also on the sites that display malware ads to clients. They're all culpable.
X has been the most shameless, after all brand name advertisers left. Here is one state-level actor campaign that has been going on for months:
https://imgur.com/a/HZwfyNH
It's not advertising anything, it's just a straight up scam exploit site. It uses exclusively stolen or fake accounts. The links are shown as "amazon.de" or similar but of course do not go there, no doubt just a bug X haven't gotten around to fixing just yet.
This is on the kind of level where if we had actual law enforcement for tech companies, the next time some X executive lands in Europe they would be in cuffs.
Somehow I would never assume that X would act "moral". Google on the other hands even few years back was generally acknowledged as a good actor which was once again corporate charade people would fall for. Including myself.
I was feeling very guilty last night as I was watching YouTube and getting 30s+ unskippable ad blocks every 10 minutes in some video. And the repetition and low quality were grating on me. I thought: being rich is never having to watch another ad
You don't have to be rich to avoid getting those ads. You can make them go away for ~$15 a month. If you can't afford that, you have bigger problems in your life than YouTube ads, and your first step towards fixing them is to spend less time watching YouTube.
Yeah, but that also says to Google that their methods are successful. That makes my skin crawl.
(Shrug) The creators need to get paid one way or another. Do you want them to start running their own commercials, as if sponsored segments aren't bad enough?
2 replies →