OT rant: Youtube appears to be ad-free again. Was: Why is youtube-dl blocked

[Owen Thomas]

On Tue, 7 Nov 2023 at 09:16, Jeffrey Walton <noloader at gmail.com> wrote:

> On Mon, Nov 6, 2023 at 4:17 PM Owen Thomas <owen.paul.thomas at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> >...
> > Some new thoughts have occurred to me. Is it possible that, rather than
> telling users they're being naughty, Youtube could instead be keeping tabs
> on the number of times it detects an ad-blocker at work so Youtube can seek
> payment for (and make an example of) these users at a later date?
>
> I think it might be difficult to detect ad-blockers correctly or
> accurately.


At the moment, maybe, there is plausible deniability, but I reckon somebody
at Youtube would be looking into it. I imagine the feedback ad-blockers get
is usually via frustrated users when they see an ad, so surreptitiously
twiddling knobs to conclusively discover who is being naughty would have to
be something that Youtube would be considering.


> I run Firefox in a configuration where all cross-site
> cookies are blocked, and all tracking content is blocked.
>

Thanks for the handy tips. I run Firefox too so I'll take this on board.

I feel like I owe something to some of those who provide content on
Youtube, just like I feel that I owe something to Wikipedia (I give to them
at least once every year). Hence, I wouldn't mind watching ads related to a
provider's content if this was a substitute for money that would go to fund
the provider, but I don't want ads thrust in my face asking me to use money
I don't have to buy things I don't need - especially from a site like
Youtube that was initially set up to provide this content free of ads or
charge.
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