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Ads on YouTube

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  • I wish that I'd screenshotted it, but I've had one outrageously long 1+ hr. ad on Youtube. The thing was literally a feature length infomercial, I thought that autoplay had carried onto the next videos in my playlist and couldn't believe that it was an ad when I saw the length. For shit like that to have slipped through Youtube's "quality control" even once speaks volumes - how in the Hell did someone submit an ad longer than a Saturday morning cartoon and have it slotted into the same category as 15 second toothpaste ads?

    The longest ad I've see on YouTube was about 7 years ago and I watched the whole ad because someone paid for the entire Michael Jackson's Thriller video as an ad.

  • Just out of curiosity, what is it EXACTLY about ads on YouTube that you dislike? Is it that they exist at all? That there are too many of them? That they're unskippable? What would you, specifically, find to be a tolerable amount of ads? If you were Chief Ad Engineer at YouTube, how would you structure the ads system?

    I have my thoughts on the matter, but I want to know what YOU think.

    My take on ads is this: I've been using the internet since 1989 - before search engines, advertising, SLIP/PPP/ADSL, etc.

    When ads began to appear on websites in the late 90s, I was OK with it. A banner ad here, etc. Then they started to move. And flash. And make noise. And then popups, and pop-unders.

    At that point I started to BLOCK THEM ALL. If your business model is a game of distraction from the site I'm visiting, then fuck you, your family, and anyone you've ever met.

    Moving on to UI web-based stuff, the demise of excellent sites like AltaVista (with its superior search syntax) and the growth of Goooooooogle (with its astonishingly and intentionally shit search syntax), the progress and intention was obvious.

    There was a brief period where Google, etc, provided what people wanted. But that time has passed. Now it's all in on GIGO: garbage in, garbage out.

    tl;dr: Once advertisers started to behave like gambling sites, they were yeeted to the hell in which they belong.

  • Just out of curiosity, what is it EXACTLY about ads on YouTube that you dislike? Is it that they exist at all? That there are too many of them? That they're unskippable? What would you, specifically, find to be a tolerable amount of ads? If you were Chief Ad Engineer at YouTube, how would you structure the ads system?

    I have my thoughts on the matter, but I want to know what YOU think.

    Know what I don't understand? My wife watches YouTube in bed and I hardly notice ads. Granted, I have my ear plugs in while I read, but I'm not completely tuned out. Ads are rare enough that I'm a bit surprised to notice one.

    When I watch YouTube on my PC, without a condom so to speak, fuck me it's unusable. I simply refuse to engage until uBlock catches up.

    All I got is that her content isn't easily monetized? One one hand, she watching a lot of political news from the Philippines. OTOH, she's mostly on those dumb crime shows where it's all white trash confessing to the pigs.

    As of this week, I can no longer watch in Firefox and have to go to Edge. Anyone?

  • Just out of curiosity, what is it EXACTLY about ads on YouTube that you dislike? Is it that they exist at all? That there are too many of them? That they're unskippable? What would you, specifically, find to be a tolerable amount of ads? If you were Chief Ad Engineer at YouTube, how would you structure the ads system?

    I have my thoughts on the matter, but I want to know what YOU think.

    I was fine with pre-roll ads and mid roll ads.
    Then YouTube became ultra greedy during Covid when tons of people watching, they went from 1-3 ads per video to 30 ads for a 30 minute video (2 ads every 2 minutes).
    What the fuck.

    I installed adblocker because they did that. YouTube was not watchable at all.
    Sucks, because I didn’t mind supporting the platform and creator, but their greed ruined that.

  • Just out of curiosity, what is it EXACTLY about ads on YouTube that you dislike? Is it that they exist at all? That there are too many of them? That they're unskippable? What would you, specifically, find to be a tolerable amount of ads? If you were Chief Ad Engineer at YouTube, how would you structure the ads system?

    I have my thoughts on the matter, but I want to know what YOU think.

    My problems:

    • Ads not for kids in kids videos.
    • Very long "ads". Let's say, 1 hour? I know that there are longer ads, but, well, if you think that an hour ad is not a problem, well...
    • Ads everywhere. In the video, in the recommendations bar, in the main page.
    • Ads INSIDE the video. I know this is not about a youtube thing, but I really hate being in middle of some video an then the guy starts talking about Brave or something.
    • The pourly implementation of ads in middle video. On TV you were able to tell when and how the ads would came and felt natural because your content wasn't cut out of nowhere.

    Taking it from the last point: that's why I love Pluto.tv. I can be watching my, whatever, and then I know that ads are coming, because uses the same timing as regular TV, so I can use that time of ads to just ignore them and get on my phone or do something else, like old TV times. Not in middle of my video that it's gonna last 5 minutes, damn.

    Edit: One last thing that I've forgot. I hate that everyone can submit ads, making the platform more like a town with no law. Why would I care about a product made with AI which ad itself is also made with AI?

  • I know many people, including me, that fall victim to the manipulation of advertising.

    Back in the olden days, it was "here is my product, and this is the price, if you like it buy from this store"
    Now it's not just the actual ad, it's product placement in tv and movies, celebrity endorsement, influencers, and all that.

    Just remember that advertising costs money, and that is in the price of the product. Products that don't advertise can easily be better value.

    There were a time when I wanted to study marketing. I always love how Coca-Cola doesn't try to make you buy its product, it's just there, it doesnt say "buy!", "we cheap!", "we are better than the others!" or any bullshit. That dream ended when I learned what SEO was and what was doing to internet.

  • Just out of curiosity, what is it EXACTLY about ads on YouTube that you dislike? Is it that they exist at all? That there are too many of them? That they're unskippable? What would you, specifically, find to be a tolerable amount of ads? If you were Chief Ad Engineer at YouTube, how would you structure the ads system?

    I have my thoughts on the matter, but I want to know what YOU think.

    Advertising is pollution

    Full stop.

    Every marketer is trying to coerce you into a decision you wouldn’t arrive at on your own by limiting the information available and lying to you.

    If I were chief ad engineer at YouTube i would probably be afraid of anyone knowing what I did for money.

    You know facilitating the theft of people’s money by targeting them with brainwashing.

    If you’re a marketer. Get a real job pal.

  • I know many people, including me, that fall victim to the manipulation of advertising.

    Back in the olden days, it was "here is my product, and this is the price, if you like it buy from this store"
    Now it's not just the actual ad, it's product placement in tv and movies, celebrity endorsement, influencers, and all that.

    Just remember that advertising costs money, and that is in the price of the product. Products that don't advertise can easily be better value.

    Products that don’t advertise can easily be better value.

    This is exactly my reasoning in refusing to do business with service providers that (in my view) over-advertise (looking at you Geico, Progressive, United Health, Taco Bell, other major advertisers)...

    Any service provider doing that much advertising is telling me 2 things with every ad: First, you already obviously have too much money and, Second, you obviously don't need my money.

    Fuck you and your "brand recognition".

    🙄 🤡 🖕 💩

  • I despise ads because they steal time, and their very existence is an insult to the people that are exposed to them. All ads tell me is „your time is worth very little and we believe you are easily manipulated“.

    Based on average ad length and cost on YouTube, ChatGPT has calculated that advertisers pay about $9 per hour of ads. While that seems a bit high to me, it is plausible. My time is worth more than that.

    Yes, I do pay for YouTube premium. Though in a cheaper country, because the normal price is excessive imho.

    Ads can exists, I do not have any problem with it. I think that we need to have tools and techniques to avoid them. If the medium doesn't let you use those tools, it's right there where I have a problem: Ads in a magazine? Just change page, Ad on TV?, just change channel, Unskipable ad? Woah woah woah. YouTube, dear, you are forcing me to watch something that I don't wanna. Edit: The same with Netfilx... Amazon... Spotify... It's not like I can change of app like I would with TV channels

  • Just out of curiosity, what is it EXACTLY about ads on YouTube that you dislike? Is it that they exist at all? That there are too many of them? That they're unskippable? What would you, specifically, find to be a tolerable amount of ads? If you were Chief Ad Engineer at YouTube, how would you structure the ads system?

    I have my thoughts on the matter, but I want to know what YOU think.

    Advertisements are an attack to manipulate me and change my behaviour. I don't tolerate them at all. They also ruin the product, because it eventually becomes more important to cater to the advertisers than the users.

    If Youtube went back to how it was originally (no ads, downloadable videos, creator-controlled, etc), I, and many others, would happily pay them even if we could get the content for free (see Patreon, or GoFundMe, or PornHub, or Imgur, or Reddit, or many other sites as examples).

  • Just out of curiosity, what is it EXACTLY about ads on YouTube that you dislike? Is it that they exist at all? That there are too many of them? That they're unskippable? What would you, specifically, find to be a tolerable amount of ads? If you were Chief Ad Engineer at YouTube, how would you structure the ads system?

    I have my thoughts on the matter, but I want to know what YOU think.

    People seem to think the cost is just the wasted time from playing ads, but the lasting mental pollution in my brain is worse. I don't want that shit in my head. I don't want to think about ads. I don't want to see ads when I close my eyes. I don't want shitty ad jingles popping up in my mind while I'm trying to live my life. A youtube video is not worth having to carry more ads in my head.

  • Just out of curiosity, what is it EXACTLY about ads on YouTube that you dislike? Is it that they exist at all? That there are too many of them? That they're unskippable? What would you, specifically, find to be a tolerable amount of ads? If you were Chief Ad Engineer at YouTube, how would you structure the ads system?

    I have my thoughts on the matter, but I want to know what YOU think.

    It's not the ads I hate, it's the data harvesting I hate. Static ads without trackers don't exist on YouTube, unfortunately.

  • Just out of curiosity, what is it EXACTLY about ads on YouTube that you dislike? Is it that they exist at all? That there are too many of them? That they're unskippable? What would you, specifically, find to be a tolerable amount of ads? If you were Chief Ad Engineer at YouTube, how would you structure the ads system?

    I have my thoughts on the matter, but I want to know what YOU think.

    I just have a moral objection to advertising in general, and try to subject myself to it as little as possible.

  • I understand that we exist under capitalism and that it costs money to host and distribute these videos.

    I'm willing to pay for access to this service by letting an ad play (probably while I'm pouring a glass of water in another room and have my speakers off).

    What gets me is a 3 minute ad on a 44 second video. Interrupting the middle of a sentence with an ad is also annoying. Placing a 30 second ad in the middle of a song can also fuck right off.

    Find an appropriate spot for your ad, and make it's length sensible with regards to the length of the content I'm watching. Or just don't offer an ad supported tier of your service.

    ^ this. All of it. It’s death by a thousands cuts and just shows the incredible amount of greed they have (not shareholder value, it’s bloody greed).

  • Just out of curiosity, what is it EXACTLY about ads on YouTube that you dislike? Is it that they exist at all? That there are too many of them? That they're unskippable? What would you, specifically, find to be a tolerable amount of ads? If you were Chief Ad Engineer at YouTube, how would you structure the ads system?

    I have my thoughts on the matter, but I want to know what YOU think.

    There is no tolerable amount of ads, because not only are they an awful experience, they explicitly drive user hostile growth and decisions in the future (ie enshitification).

    I used to pay for YouTube to avoid ads, before I got sick of Google and refused to give them any more money. Now I use a pihole and a browser based adblocker, as well as 3rd party front ends, because fuck Google. I don't give a shit if I'm denying them income.

  • There is no tolerable amount of ads, because not only are they an awful experience, they explicitly drive user hostile growth and decisions in the future (ie enshitification).

    I used to pay for YouTube to avoid ads, before I got sick of Google and refused to give them any more money. Now I use a pihole and a browser based adblocker, as well as 3rd party front ends, because fuck Google. I don't give a shit if I'm denying them income.

    to me I still use the paid version because, for me it's not that expensive on the family plan, and I do want the content creators to get paid. I do hate the monopoly etc... but as far as I can tell it's one that can't really be broken. Far as I can see no other site can actually arrange a system in which creators get paid any substantial amount.

    also do have to note the inevitable put up or shut up part of nature. There's basically only 2 options of systems when it comes to the internet, either we deal with ads or we pay for services. Until a magical extra option appears I'm OK with paying to avoid ads.

  • I know many people, including me, that fall victim to the manipulation of advertising.

    Back in the olden days, it was "here is my product, and this is the price, if you like it buy from this store"
    Now it's not just the actual ad, it's product placement in tv and movies, celebrity endorsement, influencers, and all that.

    Just remember that advertising costs money, and that is in the price of the product. Products that don't advertise can easily be better value.

    There are lots of local brands that don't advertise that are better than nationally-known brands, at a much lower cost.

  • to me I still use the paid version because, for me it's not that expensive on the family plan, and I do want the content creators to get paid. I do hate the monopoly etc... but as far as I can tell it's one that can't really be broken. Far as I can see no other site can actually arrange a system in which creators get paid any substantial amount.

    also do have to note the inevitable put up or shut up part of nature. There's basically only 2 options of systems when it comes to the internet, either we deal with ads or we pay for services. Until a magical extra option appears I'm OK with paying to avoid ads.

    I pay to avoid ads on Amazon Prime... Now i have to endure unskippable ads every 10 minutes, and my annual fee is up over 50% since i started.

    Fuck them. No matter what, these mercantilists will extract everything they can, and they will break any promise or contract they sign as soon as it bemefits them. We, however, cannot do the same.

  • Just out of curiosity, what is it EXACTLY about ads on YouTube that you dislike? Is it that they exist at all? That there are too many of them? That they're unskippable? What would you, specifically, find to be a tolerable amount of ads? If you were Chief Ad Engineer at YouTube, how would you structure the ads system?

    I have my thoughts on the matter, but I want to know what YOU think.

    Ads are a brainwashing technique designed to turn my baser instincts against myself for someone else's gain. And they're unwanted content that disrupts the flow of the content I've chosen to watch.

  • Just out of curiosity, what is it EXACTLY about ads on YouTube that you dislike? Is it that they exist at all? That there are too many of them? That they're unskippable? What would you, specifically, find to be a tolerable amount of ads? If you were Chief Ad Engineer at YouTube, how would you structure the ads system?

    I have my thoughts on the matter, but I want to know what YOU think.

    Ads bad. If I want to support a creator I will do so personally not via watching ads. I'll stop watching YT before I suffer through a single ad.

  • 308 Stimmen
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    S
    Same, especially when searching technical or niche topics. Since there aren't a ton of results specific to the topic, mostly semi-related results will appear in the first page or two of a regular (non-Gemini) Google search, just due to the higher popularity of those webpages compared to the relevant webpages. Even the relevant webpages will have lots of non-relevant or semi-relevant information surrounding the answer I'm looking for. I don't know enough about it to be sure, but Gemini is probably just scraping a handful of websites on the first page, and since most of those are only semi-related, the resulting summary is a classic example of garbage in, garbage out. I also think there's probably something in the code that looks for information that is shared across multiple sources and prioritizing that over something that's only on one particular page (possibly the sole result with the information you need). Then, it phrases the summary as a direct answer to your query, misrepresenting the actual information on the pages they scraped. At least Gemini gives sources, I guess. The thing that gets on my nerves the most is how often I see people quote the summary as proof of something without checking the sources. It was bad before the rollout of Gemini, but at least back then Google was mostly scraping text and presenting it with little modification, along with a direct link to the webpage. Now, it's an LLM generating text phrased as a direct answer to a question (that was also AI-generated from your search query) using AI-summarized data points scraped from multiple webpages. It's obfuscating the source material further, but I also can't help but feel like it exposes a little of the behind-the-scenes fuckery Google has been doing for years before Gemini. How it bastardizes your query by interpreting it into a question, and then prioritizes homogeneous results that agree on the "answer" to your "question". For years they've been doing this to a certain extent, they just didn't share how they interpreted your query.
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    anzo@programming.devA
    I’ll probably never trust anything they’ve touched until I’ve taken it apart and put it back together again. Me too. But the vast majority of users need guardrails, and have a different threat model. Even those that also care about privacy, if they just want a solution that comes by default, this adtech 'fake' or 'superficial' solution does provide something. And anything is more than nothing.
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    Niemand hat geantwortet
  • 210 Stimmen
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    T
    In 2025 it would be anything above 3.6 million. It's a ton of money but here's a list of a few people that hit it. https://aflcio.org/paywatch/highest-paid-ceos Now if they added in a progressive tax rate for corporate taxes as well.... Say anything over 500 million in net profit is taxed at a 90+% rate. That would solve all sorts of issues. Suddenly investors of all these mega corps would be pushing hard to divide up the companies into smaller entities. Wealth tax in the modern age could be an inheritance tax. Anything over the median life earnings of individuals could be taxed at 100%. So median earnings in my area is $65K * 45 years (20-65k) = $2.93 million.
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    L
    Arguably we should be imposing 25% DST on digital products to counter the 25% tariff on aluminium and steel and then 10% on everything else. The US started it by imposing blanket tariffs in spite of our free trade agreement.
  • New Cars Don't All Come With Dipsticks Anymore, Here's Why

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    L
    The U660F transmission in my wife's 2015 Highlander doesn't have a dipstick. Luckily that transmission is solid and easy to service anyway, you just need a skinny funnel to fill it.
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    J
    Of course they don't click anything. Google search has just become a front-end for Gemini, the answer is "served" up right at the top and most people will just take that for Gospel.
  • Are We All Becoming More Hostile Online?

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    A
    Back in the day I just assumed everyone was lying. Or trying to get people worked up, and we called them trolls. Learning how to ignore the trolls, and not having trust for strangers on the internet, coupled with the ability to basically not care what random people said is a lost art. Somehow people forgot to give other the people this memo, including the "you don't fucking join social networks as your self". Anonymity makes this all work. Eternal September newbies just didn't get it.