YouTube adblocker anyone?

[Eulipian]

Brave browser blocks ads without any residue.

 

[AlfaNovember]

I use the Orion browser for MacOS (and I pay for their Kagi search) in combination with a firewall adblocker. The two together are reasonably effective; Orion is clearly doing some sleight of hand to keep YT advertising tolerable.

Orion Browser by Kagi

Orion — a web browser designed from the ground-up. Native WebKit speed, full extension compatibility, and absolute privacy is finally together in one browser that respects you.

orionbrowser.com

 

[Bruce Morgen]

The height of stupidity is to recommend my own videos to me!!!

My U-Toob channel is a tiny, non-monetized nothingburger -- yet the site suggested a video I had uploaded myself a couple of years ago. That reminds me of the AliExpress purchase recommendation algorithm -- I buy something from one of their merchants, and the algorithm recommends a dozen or more near-identical items from other merchants within minutes of placing that order.

 

[EJasonC]

I’m not sure where to put this so I’ve tried here.

Does anyone know of an adblocker that effectively kills, stone dead, all adverts on YouTube please?

DuckDuckGo

 

[Bruce Morgen]

I use Brave browser signed out.

It works if you're signed in too AFAICT.

 

[1st.Virtual.Me]

With YouTube Premium, you also get YouTube Music Premium.
I use YouTube Music on iOS all the time. Siri even knows how to use it and access playlists.

On my PC with YouTube, I also loaded SponsorBlock from the Chrome Extensions. People who use SponsorBlock mark the sections of the videos with internal sponsor segments selling T-Shirts, supplements, and other crap. Next people to watch, get to automatically skip the internal sponsor ads.

Every so often I'm the first to watch a video, and I get to mark the sponsor segments. It's a very satisfying.

 

[G|force]

It works if you're signed in too AFAICT.

I prefer to share as little as possible with Google.
I can't like share or comment signed out, and I'm ok with that. I just C O N S U M E

 

[JSmith]

I prefer to share as little as possible with Google.

Agree, however Google will know a lot more about you that one would think... they profile all users, regardless of being logged in.


JSmith

 

[Vovgan]

Yes, pay for Youtube Premium.

Seriously, I got tired of the cat and mouse games with blockers and youtube. I signed up for youtube premium and not only are the ads gone, but videos load up instantly. With blockers, there was often a delay before the video started. You also get to watch some movies for free (but standard definition only). And can watch some videos offline.

I'm always shocked when somebody tells me: “here, wanna show you a video on YouTube”, then they click the thumbnail and then something completely different from that video pops up. People smiling and playing on a beach when the video was supposed to be a clip from Lex Friedman’s interview etc. It usually takes me at least one to two seconds to realize that that's an ad, but for those couple of seconds it feels like reality itself has been cracked somehow. The wisdom of american economist Bryan Caplan: “I manage my entertainment to make sure that I never hear a commercial”.

 

[G|force]

Agree, however Google will know a lot more about you that one would think... they profile all users, regardless of being logged in.


JSmith

Thats true of course.
They have their fingers in all of the pies.

 

[Ruediger]

Adblockers block way more than visual ads. The real magic in pixeling-beaconing-tracking-profiling-monetizing happens invisible. The ad industry has long moved on from trying to get those popups on our screens to way more sophisticated intrusion. Doesn't mean there will be no popup ads. There is no premium subscription to fix an internet full of malicious junk unfortunately.

YT is a never ending fight. Traffic costs money and videos produce a lot of it. Also ads and tracking are google-centric there. Premium can fix that.

But to this date I have never seen a premium offer that also frees the user from what's going on under the hood. Even smaller forums I am on and like to support have extensive ad campaigns/monetization going and only offer to remove visible interruptions for support. They never even consider talking about the 7-20 data gatherers in the background, which are the bigger problem.

My recommendation is to use ublock origin anyway and consider premium if you are a heavy YT user.

Adblocking is digital self-defense today IMO

ps. even if we could block all ads sources, trackers, pixels and alike - we are still subject to identification and profiling attempts by fingerprinting. Partially security measures, but why stop there, right? So if you are paranoid about all this, some browser addons are not enough. This last part just for fun.

 

[delta76]

uBlock Origin , SponsorBlock, Return the Dislike button, that's my three add ons for browser

 

[respice finem]

My U-Toob channel is a tiny, non-monetized nothingburger -- yet the site suggested a video I had uploaded myself a couple of years ago. That reminds me of the AliExpress purchase recommendation algorithm -- I buy something from one of their merchants, and the algorithm recommends a dozen or more near-identical items from other merchants within minutes of placing that order.

Amazon has similar glitches in their algorithms. When I write a review of an item I bought, it doesn't "remember" I wrote it, so I could mark my own review as "helpful". Or maybe it's a new feature

 

[BlueTunes]

Yes, pay for Youtube Premium.

Seriously, I got tired of the cat and mouse games with blockers and youtube. I signed up for youtube premium and not only are the ads gone, but videos load up instantly. With blockers, there was often a delay before the video started. You also get to watch some movies for free (but standard definition only). And can watch some videos offline.

I pay for YouTube music Premium family which is my primary music source.
I use all of the 6 licences it gives me as well.
For the money and the fact I get YouTube premium as well (no ads) it's a perfect solution.

I find YTM rather good tbh.

 

[Talisman]

The whole recommendation engine is so stupid. Just play one video on a topic and most of your recommendations become that. Gets so tiring to see the same topics over and over

This is so frustrating for me that I've stopped watching videos "out of curiosity" about topics I'm not usually interested in, because YouTube will regularly show me dozens of similar videos on my home screen, destroying my feed. It's so stupid and frustrating, the product of an algorithm that doesn't think about the user at all but just wants to keep you glued to the ads for as long as possible.

 

[goat76]

Makes no difference, they come back…….

The enshitification is here to stay

You are right, the shorts are back on my YT homepage, and I must turn them off again.

 

[delta76]

My U-Toob channel is a tiny, non-monetized nothingburger -- yet the site suggested a video I had uploaded myself a couple of years ago. That reminds me of the AliExpress purchase recommendation algorithm -- I buy something from one of their merchants, and the algorithm recommends a dozen or more near-identical items from other merchants within minutes of placing that order.

they want you to buy spares to replace those things once they break

 

[Scytales]

I'm still with Firefox - µBlock Origin (with more or less all blocklists enabled) and Sponsorblock are doing the job well.
P.S. But I'm on Linux, not iOS.

Same. uBlock works fine under my Linux environment.

 

[whataboutmusic]

Agree, however Google will know a lot more about you that one would think... they profile all users, regardless of being logged in.


JSmith

That is true but there are alternatives to google's monopoly...if you use another search engine with a privacy respecting browser like brave or firefox with some additional settings and ubo...and most importantly a privacy respecting vpn service...I think you are good for the most part.

That all goes away though if someone use a smartphone because ios and android are far from private.

 

[delta76]

Same. uBlock works fine under my Linux environment.

recently I noticed YT ads escape uBlock origin. Like in the beginning of the video there is an unskipable 15s ads. I updated UO and that goes away for a few days now. Basically a cat and mouse game.
Haven't noticed any ads on Smarttube on Shield/TV or vanced youtube (android phone)