<story><title>YouTube tests blocking videos unless you disable ad blockers</title><url>https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/technology/youtube-tests-blocking-videos-unless-you-disable-ad-blockers/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>PragmaticPulp</author><text>If you weren’t a paying customer, refuse to become a paying customer, and refuse to watch the ads, they don’t gain anything by having you as a user. It only costs them to retain you.&lt;p&gt;If doing something as simple as asking you to hold up your end of the deal of using their website (letting ads load for the ad-supported content) is too much to ask but paying for the website is also too much  to ask, you have to be honest that you just want a free experience.&lt;p&gt;I don’t buy the argument that you were going to pay them in the future but you decided against it because they wouldn’t let you have it for free.</text></item><item><author>karaterobot</author><text>Is it weird that this makes me want to subscribe to YouTube premium less than before? Feels like I&amp;#x27;ve been poised to give them money for a while, since so many people seem to like the service. Now I feel like they&amp;#x27;re challenging me to a duel.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>jjulius</author><text>&amp;gt;... you have to be honest that you just want a free experience.&lt;p&gt;No, I want an experience that commits to showing the ad(s) up front and not interrupting the video with &lt;i&gt;more&lt;/i&gt; ads in the middle.&lt;p&gt;I use YT primarily for music. I don&amp;#x27;t mind letting ads play at the beginning. It&amp;#x27;s when they inject them into the middle of a song and, suddenly, when I&amp;#x27;m jamming out, &lt;i&gt;RIGHT&lt;/i&gt; at the peak of the track when I&amp;#x27;m having the most fun, two more ads suddenly start blaring, and I&amp;#x27;m forced to let the first one ride for 30 seconds.&lt;p&gt;There is some music that you just can&amp;#x27;t easily access anywhere but on YT for a variety of reasons. It&amp;#x27;s what keeps me using YT, but that approach of ad injection is bullshit.&lt;p&gt;Edit: Concert videos, too. Their algorithm will slap ads in the middle of a song, rather than in between them. I absolutely would not mind an ad here and there between songs, but noooooo.</text></comment>
<story><title>YouTube tests blocking videos unless you disable ad blockers</title><url>https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/technology/youtube-tests-blocking-videos-unless-you-disable-ad-blockers/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>PragmaticPulp</author><text>If you weren’t a paying customer, refuse to become a paying customer, and refuse to watch the ads, they don’t gain anything by having you as a user. It only costs them to retain you.&lt;p&gt;If doing something as simple as asking you to hold up your end of the deal of using their website (letting ads load for the ad-supported content) is too much to ask but paying for the website is also too much  to ask, you have to be honest that you just want a free experience.&lt;p&gt;I don’t buy the argument that you were going to pay them in the future but you decided against it because they wouldn’t let you have it for free.</text></item><item><author>karaterobot</author><text>Is it weird that this makes me want to subscribe to YouTube premium less than before? Feels like I&amp;#x27;ve been poised to give them money for a while, since so many people seem to like the service. Now I feel like they&amp;#x27;re challenging me to a duel.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>nextaccountic</author><text>&amp;gt; they don’t gain anything by having you as a user.&lt;p&gt;Every minute someone watches them is a minute that they aren&amp;#x27;t watching a potential competitor&lt;p&gt;In this sense, having a free tier at all is effective to suffocate competition, even if most users enable adblock</text></comment>