I watched a Warframe (game) YouTube video on the Steam integrated browser, without beeing connected to my account and Holly s* it was horrible.

In a 14 minutes video, I got 5 ads. 1 (or more skippable once) at the beginning, 1 during the first half of the video, 2 during the second half, and 1 at the end.

All were skippable after 5 sec.

2 were close together at about 1 min interval during the second half of the video.

But that is not the only issue. 4 of those ads (not the last one at the end), were Israeli hate/war anti-hamas propaganda.

I consider these ads horrible and they should not be allowed in my opinion.

  • AzureDiamond@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    2241·
    1 year ago

    Most people, including myself, seem to agree, that ads were never the problem. When YouTube started, it had ads too and nobody cared. But the ads got worse and websites started to shove them down our throats. I miss the times of a single banner below a video. I don’t think Google and all the others realise just how much determined nerds can achieve. So far the ad blockers seem to win the race, minus some minor setbacks.

    • Uriel238 [all pronouns]@lemmy.blahaj.zoneEnglish
      461·
      1 year ago

      It was October Spooky when Microsoft dropped the GetWinX.exe icon on everyone’s Win7 and Win8 taskbars. The first time, we all followed the directions and dove into the registry to remove it, because it wasn’t enough to just delete it. The icon would self restore.

      Then Microsoft reinstalled their adware in a critical security update Big Mic also started using dark patterns making upgrading opt-out, and hiding the onay anksthay toggle.

      Thats when an engineer, UltimateOutsider, I think, created the GetWinX Control Panel which not only did the full remove in a wizard but also monitored on boot to see if it came back.

      It was a reassuring day. I think no matter how much the companies enshittify, it will only drive pissed off engineers to write hard bypasses. It’s how we got the GCP. It’s how we got Windows Loader for every release since XP’s activation process.

      • grue@lemmy.worldEnglish
        255·
        1 year ago

        That kind of shit is why I run GNU, and so should everybody else.

        • corsicanguppy@lemmy.caEnglish
          124·
          1 year ago

          You don’t run gnu; you probably run Linux. In the same sense, you don’t mention how you ride the tires to work but you probably mention riding a bicycle, bus or car. You go to see art, not the tools used to create it, and this is why van gogh’s art is on display and not the brushes he used to such great effect.

          Keep it in perspective no matter how hard the feet-picker wants to distract you.

          • grue@lemmy.worldEnglish
            93·
            1 year ago

            No, I run GNU. I don’t give a fuck whether the kernel is Linux or HURD, but I do care that as much of the system as possible is copyleft instead of merely permissive.

            • elscallr@lemmy.worldEnglish
              122·
              1 year ago

              Well this whole exchange was definitely the dumbest pedantry I’ve seen today.

              Well done.

    • Ensign_Crab@lemmy.worldEnglish
      34·
      1 year ago

      When youtube started, the ads would load perfectly every single time and the video was a tiresome afterthought that would load in fits and starts if it loaded at all.

    • YurkshireLad@lemmy.caEnglish
      25·
      1 year ago

      I use an ad blocker but I cringe when I see my wife viewing a short recipe online, on a page with 10+ ads.

    • RedditWanderer@lemmy.worldEnglish
      12·
      1 year ago

      Now on mobile they even open up the sidebar where the playlist normally is and puts an extra ad there too. Then it breaks your fullscreen and youre left with the comments open and a banner ad. So dumb.

    • narc0tic_bird@lemm.eeEnglish
      121·
      1 year ago

      This. Ads can be somewhat okay as long as they don’t interrupt or otherwise hinder the functionality of the website or application I’m using.

      YouTube’s video ads interrupt the main functionality of the website for the full duration of the ads (some are skippable after 5s).

      • ripcord@kbin.social
        29·
        1 year ago

        In the early days of the Internet, ads were ok.

        Then the popups came.

        Then came the popup blockers.

        It’s been an arms race since the beginning. The ad-throwers get greedy, not knowing when to stop pushing. That’s how things escalate.

        • CosmicTurtle@lemmy.worldEnglish
          10·
          1 year ago

          The pop-up divs annoy the fuck out of me. And most websites have gotten smart about them by creating the div ids on the fly so ublock can take them on.

          I’m getting close to completely disabling JavaScript at this rate.

          • Thetimefarm@lemm.eeEnglish
            7·
            1 year ago

            I started using noscript on my phone despite how annoying it is to use day to day. Desktop have more tools to manage pop ups better, but on mobile the only reliable way I’ve found is to nuke everything and just re enable what you need.

      • meco03211@lemmy.worldEnglish
        6·
        1 year ago

        As a matter of principle I will doff my headphones and look away or hyperfocus on the specific area to skip the ad waiting for it to become available.

      • Stumblinbear@pawb.socialEnglish
        32·
        1 year ago

        While I think this may play a part, YouTube was unprofitable for more than a decade and probably still is right now. It’s not greedy to want to pay server costs

        My company is heavily considering raising premium prices because ad revenue is now equal to the subscription cost, and we’re still very unprofitable. That’s not greedy, that’s basic business

  • _number8_@lemmy.worldEnglish
    1091·
    1 year ago

    if they come for yt-dlp i will record their videos with a fucking VCR and clip out the ads so help me god

    • grue@lemmy.worldEnglish
      202·
      1 year ago

      If I’m provoked to retaliation, my tactic would be to start aggressively mirroring other people’s content to PeerTube.

      I haven’t done so yet out of respect for the creators, but my patience with Google is wearing thinner and thinner…

    • netburnr@lemmy.worldEnglish
      10·
      1 year ago

      I’ve got a vcr in my closet, I don’t know why, but maybe their days are coming back.

  • Rhoeri@lemmy.worldEnglish
    712·
    1 year ago

    I can’t watch YouTube without getting ads with some gravy seal in camo walking around in the woods telling me there’s a storm coming.

    Who’s allowing these clowns to spread their propaganda?

    • ominouslemon@lemm.eeEnglish
      16·
      1 year ago

      I don’t know what a “gravy seal” is, but I’m trying to picture it and I’m kinda laughing to myself

      • Heavybell@lemmy.worldEnglish
        40·
        1 year ago

        Imagine a fat, old, or otherwise unfit civilian who has purchased tactical-looking gear and weapons, which he uses for aggressive posturing. That’s my understanding of the term.

        • skulblaka@kbin.social
          201·
          1 year ago

          Pretty much spot on. This imaginary man also owns a truck too big to park and will assault you for being gay and/or brown. People just like him populate moderate swaths of the American South and make other minor appearances farther north.

          • grue@lemmy.worldEnglish
            18·
            1 year ago

            People just like him populate moderate swaths of the American South and make other minor appearances farther north.

            People like him populate rural America everywhere. The South is just slightly more rural than other parts of the country.

    • jennwiththesea@lemmy.worldEnglish
      9·
      1 year ago

      Seriously!! I don’t mind the frequency so much as the absolute SHIT they’re serving up. Conspiracy theory after conspiracy theory. I’ve been skipping some of my favorite creators because I just don’t have the emotional wherewithal to deal with the bullshit every five minutes. It is truly enraging.

      I also got a Nebula subscription. It’s not perfect, and I wish more of the people I follow were on there, but it helps so much, mentally. I don’t have to see crappy ads I didn’t sign up for, or feel guilty for using an ad blocker, because the people I follow are getting paid through the subscription.

  • 🇰 🌀 🇱 🇦 🇳 🇦 🇰 ℹ️@yiffit.netEnglish
    581·
    1 year ago

    Ads are the reason I stopped listening to regular FM radio. I used to live in a more rural town and it was at least half an hour to get to any city I would have to go to for more than basic groceries. Once when I was coming back somewhere that takes a whole hour drive to get home, I heard nothing but commercials the entire drive. Not one fucking song (aside from ad jingles) for a whole fucking hour. Ridiculous.

    I switched to Sirius. And it was great… Until they got bought/merged with XM. Now they have a monopoly on satellite radio, they immediately cut features and jacked up prices. They also started playing ads. So I cancelled that.

    I’ve been using Spotify Premium ever since. It started off pretty great; they’ve recently been cutting back features and jacking up the price tho. So I may end up cancelling Spotify, too, if shit keeps trending downhill. Especially if they put ads in the premium service I pay for specifically to not have ads.

    • Sir_Kevin@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
      28·
      1 year ago

      I’ve been adding music to my mp3 collection since Napster got started. It feels old fashioned now but I have yet to see a reason to use an alternative method. I actually have a lifetime subscription to SiriusXM. So I pay nothing, and I still don’t listen to that shit.

    • Hamartiogonic@sopuli.xyzEnglish
      241·
      1 year ago

      Remember the time when people used to have a stack of CDs in the car? Some cars even had a a fancy player that could hold multiple discs.

        • Hamartiogonic@sopuli.xyzEnglish
          1·
          1 year ago

          At least those flash drives can easily store your entire library these days. You only need one, and it doesn’t even have to be an expensive one.

          • hardcoreufo@lemmy.worldEnglish
            2·
            1 year ago

            I do have a little 1TB drive I got for 50 bucks on sale. It works great. The car software not so much. It picks up right where I left off in a song when I turned the car off but when the track finishes it skips to the first song of the next album then begins to play normally. Never had that issue with a CD player.

    • whofearsthenight@lemm.eeEnglish
      103·
      1 year ago

      What features has Spotify cut? I’ve had premium for like 5 years and I think I’ve seen a dollar raise in price.

    • nodrod@lemmy.worldEnglish
      71·
      1 year ago

      Idk I pay for Spotify family premium and it’s only gone up $1 since their launch in 2011… I think that’s pretty good. Now if it becomes and annual thing then fuck’em.

    • JineteDeAbuelas47@lemmy.worldEnglish
      3·
      1 year ago

      If you ever give up on spotify, ViMusic is an FOSS app on F-Droid that is compatible with androod auto (you have to enable developer options first for 3rd party apps but it is fairly easy and quick to do)

    • pedz@lemmy.caEnglish
      21·
      1 year ago

      For me it was TV. I stopped watching TV when I became aware of the amount of ads for cars. There’s at least one ad for a car in every “commercial break”. So I just stopped about 15 years ago.

      I filled the entertainment gap with internet and lately I’ve been using YouTube a lot. However it’s also becoming annoying with the sponsors inside the videos as well. I was not using SponsorBlock before but I installed it a few days ago.

      If I’m ever forced to watch the awful ads on YouTube, I’ll quit too. My life is just gonna be better for it.

    • AndyLikesCandy@reddthat.comEnglish
      101·
      1 year ago

      Google must be scraping the bottom of the barrel of crazy that’s also stupid enough to pay for ads, I think it’s common knowledge now that Google games analytics to artificially inflate the appearance of ad impact.

        • AndyLikesCandy@reddthat.comEnglish
          21·
          1 year ago

          I don’t think they need to be pushy, just the quality of product decisions has been going down as time goes on. Monopoly a bigger issue for sure, If not for the massive decline in value to both users and advertisers, we wouldn’t mind the monopoly so much.

  • adONis@lemmy.worldEnglish
    443·
    1 year ago

    These ads make it impossible to use YT as a free learning platform anymore.

    When I want to dig into a subject, I want to do it focused and without being distracted, and YT makes it impossible. The only content one can tolerate ads on is entertainment, which makes YT just another TikTok.

  • Flying Squid@lemmy.worldEnglish
    33·
    1 year ago

    Hi! We’re Liberty Mutual! All of our ads are weird and quirky, which is funny! Quirky equals funny, right? You’re laughing, aren’t you? This one has an emu! An emu is funny, isn’t it? Liberty Mutual!

  • TwilightVulpine@lemmy.worldEnglish
    151·
    1 year ago

    Not only the way they keep pushing more and more ads is becoming way too much, they don’t have any standards for what sort of ads they push. From blatant political propaganda to petty false advertising of apps. A reckoning is way overdue.