YouTube cracks down (again) on ad blockers, frustrating users

[Alfonso Maruccia]

In a nutshell: YouTube is now 20 years old, and the platform has changed significantly since its early days. A sizable minority of users is fed up with invasive advertising and actively seek ways to block ads whenever possible. It's a classic cat-and-mouse game.

Some users are once again frustrated by YouTube's erratic behavior with ad blockers. The issue appears to affect various browsers and layout engines, suggesting that Google may have introduced a new anti-ad blocker policy to push viewers back to watching ads.

According to a recent Neowin report, YouTube has begun displaying its familiar banner warning against ad blockers, citing a violation of the site's terms of service. The message states: "It looks like you may be using an ad blocker. Video playback is blocked unless YouTube is allowlisted or the ad blocker is disabled."

Google insists that advertising is essential to maintaining YouTube as a free platform for billions of users worldwide. The company also emphasizes that there is only one "legitimate" way to disable ads: subscribing to YouTube Premium. This paid service ensures that creators are compensated through subscription revenue.

The banner presents users with just two options: allow ads by disabling the ad blocker or try YouTube Premium for an ad-free experience.

The anti-ad blocker banner resurfaced for users surfing the web through Opera GX. The Chromium-based, gaming-oriented browser started showing the warning despite uBlock Origin being active. The same issue seems to affect some Firefox instances, while a few users were apparently unable to remove the banner even after turning the powerful ad blocking extension off.

Neowin reported that Chrome was being affected as well, providing a sluggish performance while uBlock Origin was active. So far, I had no luck trying to replicate the anti-ad blocker issue while watching several YouTube videos. My Firefox setup (135.0.1) plus uBlock Origin 1.62.0 is still working as intended, no issues in blocking ads or watching videos at full speed/resolution to report.

Google has been trying to abate the increasing popularity of ad blockers on YouTube for quite some time now. The video platform is routinely "punishing" users with ad blockers, or even with non-Chrome browsers, while Chrome is currently in the process of transitioning to Manifest V3. The new extension technology is incompatible with uBlock Origin or other powerful ad blockers, while scammers are still having a blast.

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YouTube cracks down (again) on ad blockers, frustrating users

 

[axiomatic13]

I still have YouTube Premium for free from a Google Fi promotion. I watch so little of it that I doubt I will pay for it after it expires. The content is worse after YouTube constant mucking with creators income. My brother-in-law has a channel with 602k subs, and he used to be able to only do the YouTube work, but he's back to a second job again after the last round of changes.

 

[Dimitriid]

This is a battle they cannot win: they need to focus on actually providing some *!@#* value for their premium service. But even that's going to be too little too late by now.

See the issue is that after they went to war with most of their content creators by blatantly favoring corporate accounts while also blatantly ignoring if not actually targeting independent creators they pushed basically all of them into integrated advertisement ("This video is sponsored by..." type of deals).

They had a good thing going with the revenue split but instead of eating out a bit of the fallout from some advertising backlash (By basically keeping their CPM consistent even if advertisement payment was not) they decided to pass it down to content creators pretty much pushing all of them to integrated advertising. If there was at least some good will from creators left they could have offered an in-house, integrated advertisement system (Much like their super-thanks and channel membership options) but it's so maligned I don't think there's any reason for people to not just create their own advertisement deals individually instead.

Like this is just and endless history of youtube mishandling every situation and always siding against their content creators and now instead of doubling down they're basically siding against their users instead: If they play this kind of game, I think we all know what kind of prize they should expect from it.

 

[NumberNine]

Fun Fact: YouTube floated just fine before ad revenue.

 

[opckieran]

Still unaffected, still watching YouTube Ad-Free without a subscription. Google just can’t keep up!

 

[JetFixxxer]

If they want to show ads, keep the frequency of them low. 3 ads for a 10 minute video is ridiculous.

 

[m4a4]

Too little too late.

I might've considered paying a few dollars a month for no ads years ago, but at this point, I don't even want to give them money anymore. Their anti-consumer policies, greed, and general disdain for a lot of their audience and creators leaves many people happy with blocking ads without losing sleep.

This isn't an arms race they will win while they allow "free" access to videos. But if they go full premium, they're as good as dead anyways.

 

[winjer]

The more ads that youtube pushes, the more people will be incentivized to use ad-blockers.
It's a wonder they don't understand they are creating their own problem.

 

[mgwerner]

Ads? What ads?

 

[AlexIL]

At first they rise Premium cost which already was unjustifaiably high. Obviously they got Exodus on their hands. They seriously think slashing adblockers will solve it? Hilarious.

 

[Plutoisaplanet]

If they want to show ads, keep the frequency of them low. 3 ads for a 10 minute video is ridiculous.

Televisions show many more commercials than that. You would be bound to get 5 unskippable, full 30 second long ads during the same amount of time if it was TV. YouTube instead offers 5-15 second ads.

Yes it is annoying, but it pays the bills and is what brings such great content to YouTube. Do you really think those content creators would be offering as much content if they weren't earning revenue?

 

[MakeMSGreatAgain]

They can bite my shiny metal arse. They treat content creators like crap, they have previously and probably still do censor users comments, and they charge way too much for premium.

Stop screwing content creators, stop censoring, and make premium like $4.99 a month max and/or give a ton more value to it. Until then, f**k'em.

 

[bandit8623]

My biggest issue is they keep grabbing if I don't have a free hand to click skip on an ad they play another right after...

 

[mgilbert]

Televisions show many more commercials than that. You would be bound to get 5 unskippable, full 30 second long ads during the same amount of time if it was TV. YouTube instead offers 5-15 second ads.

Yes it is annoying, but it pays the bills and is what brings such great content to YouTube. Do you really think those content creators would be offering as much content if they weren't earning revenue?

That's why I only watch shows I record on a DVR. I skip the ads. If they decide to make it so that I can't, I'll quit watching TV. There are just too many ads, everywhere.

 

[wiyosaya]

uBlock in Waterfox still seems to work without problems, and I get none of the crap about ad-blockers being against their TOS.

 

[pnntmp]

Just tested, using uBlock origin - no sign of ads.

 

[Megalomaniac]

I refuse to pay Youtube.
As a content creator, I shouldn't need to pay them. Their premium service should be free for me.
Their ads are incessant. You can't Fast Forward through a video without being hit with several ads.

 

[kiwigraeme]

Televisions show many more commercials than that. You would be bound to get 5 unskippable, full 30 second long ads during the same amount of time if it was TV. YouTube instead offers 5-15 second ads.

Yes it is annoying, but it pays the bills and is what brings such great content to YouTube. Do you really think those content creators would be offering as much content if they weren't earning revenue?

Nah Americans get a truck load more adverts on their TVs - was shocked think I first visit in 1988 how many - is it a 40 minute show takes 1 hour. Go to cinema is USA pay top dollar and still truckload of non trailer adverts

I really think Americans have been conditioned to think this amount is normal and acceptable
I suppose another reason for rise in Netflix immersion

Didn't mind as kid intermission break - least snacks , toilet break at the flicks ( movies)

 

[GABulldog]

So far so good for me. I don't see ads and don't see the banner warning.

 

[New Day]

Nah Americans get a truck load more adverts on their TVs - was shocked think I first visit in 1988 how many - is it a 40 minute show takes 1 hour. Go to cinema is USA pay top dollar and still truckload of non trailer adverts

I really think Americans have been conditioned to think this amount is normal and acceptable
I suppose another reason for rise in Netflix immersion

Didn't mind as kid intermission break - least snacks , toilet break at the flicks ( movies)

More than that, people need sound to function (see my response here: https://www.techspot.com/news/10718...ai-training-copyrighted-works.html#comment_13) . As a child I wanted it all on demand with no ads. As an adult I have not watched TV, and if in rare case in a non-native environment ask for the device to get muted at least when commercials run, or I've left the room.

 

[redgarl]

The day they will enforce it will be the day I will delete all my comments and move on.

They need us more than what they can get out of ads revenue.

 

[p51d007]

I still say Youtube should buy facebook & twitter. THEN they can
rename it YouTwitFace!
About the only time I'm on youtube, is if a link pivots there.

 

[Subset6]

Im with yah folks but as much YouTube as I watch I’m willing to pay, that $15/month crap was bs. Thankfully YouTube premium lite is now a thing for 8 bucks, never used the music, downloads or other non just videos anyways.

Pretty much all the other online streaming content providers is expensive hot garbage. 8 bucks a month I can’t argue with, can’t even get a Chipotle burrito for that.

 

[daffy duck]

Well probably Opera already incorporating manifest V3 and all Chromium based shite will suffer the same fate by July at the latest. Firefox will continue to support v2 and why I support it.

DoJ needs to ramp up it's breakup of Google.

BTW what happens on Safari? Never used it for YT I just realised. Is ublock available from the Apple Store?

 

[Vanderlinde]

"Ads making youtube afloat"
[TABLE]
[TR]
[TH]Year[/TH]
[TH]Revenue ($bn)[/TH]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]2020[/TD]
[TD]19.7[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]2021[/TD]
[TD]28.8[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]2022[/TD]
[TD]29.2[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]2023[/TD]
[TD]31.5[/TD]
[/TR]
[/TABLE]

Those where the numbers from the last couple of years. I really don't have the impression Youtube is at a big loss here. It's not cool to have one vid spammed with ads.

(weird; the inline editor accepts tables, but the forums layout does not)