You mean like desktop backgrounds IRL? 🤯

I have yet to see my first ad on any youtube video.

https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases

testing

Does that mean if viewing numbers plummet they won't roll it out? wink wink, nudge nudge!

I watch youtube on a smart TV where I don't have a way to skip ads. I know there are ways to do it, I just never implemented.

The experience with Youtube is getting so much worse. It used to be one ad at the start of the video. Then it was two. And now ads in the middle of the video. They are also so long! It completely breaks the narrative of the video and is so distracting.

All of this just makes me want to watch less Youtube, which is likely not a bad thing.

Link? Or just Google it?

I'm in the same boat here, I watch on my TV through a Roku and I don't think there are any options for ad blocking.

You could see if an adblock dns works, you dont even have to set up pihole for that (its just local hosted adblock/whattheheckyouwant dns).
If it makes problems you can set it to default or cloudflare or something

Setting another dns is in most cases just going to the settings and pasting a link

Edit: if you set the dns in your router it works at all devices at home

And thus we say fare thee well - U-Toob

Very likely - but that’s not going to happen. Some people will watch less, some will complain but keep watching the same amount, and the majority will just take it as a fact of life and not change their behaviour.

This sounds like a problem I'm too third party client to understand

on the rare case that i watch YouTube on tv, if it's at the beginning, i just quit the video and restart over and over again until i see a 5 sec skip. sometimes it takes longer than the ads would've taken but I'd rather do that than take it on the chin to be honest. I'm also hoping others do it too so maybe they get some telemetry data.

and if it's in the middle of the video i just quit. if it's important enough i can just watch it on my phone or PC without ads.

Installation - Invidious Documentation

The official Invidious documentation

(docs.invidious.io)

The docker section there is what I used.

Ublock Origin on Firefox With Sponsorblock is the answer.

Edit: Mispelling, fuck autocorrection

I think we've seen enough changes in social media platforms over the past few decades to say that your claim is true until it's not. As payments to content creators fall, and as garbage postings increase, the actual value to the average user of the site is clearly decreasing. So we'll see how long YouTube is relevant.

When the ad is playing, are you able to press up a couple of times and click on the little (i)? It might then go to a "why am I seeing this ad" page which you can then click ok on then click on don't watch this ad again and it will skip the ad. Doesn't work if you're casting a video from a phone, and it doesn't work on some channels.

Youtube has ads?

I did not know this, and I love it! Thanks for sharing!!!

Content creators should just open a blog with magnet links

It's actually very important to "waste" some time. You can't be 100% productivity. It's unhealthy.

But youtube is actually set up to act as an algorythmic addiction.

Then they won't get that sweet ad money. They're part of the racket.