I love YouTube

No, you love the creators you watch. Youtube, as a google company, created a businessmodel out of stealing data/private information and selling it to the highest bidder. I use newpipe, i never see ads but if i have a creator i want to support i send them money as direct as possible without middlemen (direct donations during livestreams for example). i pay the creator for their work. If google wouldn't violate my human dignity by shoving a camera up my ass 24/7 i might consider giving them money to run their servers but as long as they try to make me a product they won't see money nor data from me
- That's a fair point, maybe I should look into using newpipe and use what was my monthly payment as a direct donation to my favorite creators instead. Thanks for the informative reply!
  
  If they have a patreon, that would be the best way short of putting the money directly in their hands.
  
  yeah I would say block ads, and then whatever u would normally spend on premium, donate to your favorite creators
  the creatora only get 55% (which isn't bad all things considered) of the ad/premium revenue. by donating directly u spend the same but they get more
- No, you love the creators you watch.
  And Youtube makes that possible. Show me another service that is as good as Youtube is? Unlimited uploads for everyone, extremely fast constant delivery network. Require no logins or accounts to access the site. 4K video etc.. etc.. All for the low price of free with ads, or pay for no adds. They every are even one of the best at paying content creators. There is a reason almost every content creator ends up having some kind of account on Youtube.
  Youtube, as a google company, created a businessmodel out of stealing data/private information and selling it to the highest bidder.
  I don't believe Google is in the business of selling data. There business is ad delivery. They keep the data to themselves as it is their secret sauce to deliver ads.
  
  Google absolutely is in the business of selling user data, through their ad network. AdSense customers use that data to target ads. It’s their whole business model. Just because they aren’t being given a database with all that data doesn’t mean they aren’t paying for access to it.
  Facebook operates the same way.
  
  They keep the data to themselves as it is their secret sauce to deliver ads.
  I don't think that's entirely true. They won't sell direct data, but through their ad and search systems your ads can drill down to very specific people and thus you know about them. It's still crappy. It's kinda unfair I think to outright say they don't sell your data. You data is their core money maker. It's just in a round about way. Sure maybe it doesn't bother you, but in my opinion, the collection of data is the core problem with modern technology, not even just the internet. Data is extremely powerful and valuable.

If money could stop things from enshitifying, there would be very few shitty things on the planet.
If everybody on the planet subscribed to YouTube premium they would still become enshittified.
Even with 8 billion monthly subscriptions at $10 a month or more, Google would raise the prices and provide less service.
They would do whatever they have to do whatever they can do to extract the most amount of money they possibly can out of the product.
This is not just because Google is a shit company, this is because greed knows no bounds. The only way for a company to stop being enshitified is for the company from the top down to be radically opposed to enshittification.
Only a good King can stop enshittification.
There are no good Kings in Google.
- I know. Late stage capitalism is much more of a negative than a positive.
  But I did say slow enshitification. Slow =/= Stop.
  Enshitification:

- You could say I'm a master...
  
  Whoosh moment... but I see what you did there - and I for one, like it!:-P
  Though tbf, I must be insane, b/c I legit just watch the ads. Okay so not watch watch them, or listen either tbh, but let them play out I mean... I watch fewer than one YT video per day, most often per week even, or sometimes per month, so that is just easier for me than anything else, and it feels good to know that I am supporting the content creators that way, which iirc YT does at least a halfway decent job of? (or I could be misremembering that, but I thought like not the best yet not the worst either, more solidly in the middle, median-wise if not average?) Like, it is literally the least I can offer:-D.
  Unless I want to listen to music, in which case I just turn on blocking of the ads - I guess I am not all that perfect (or bat-shit insane - ain't nobody got time for dat!):-P.

Sorry, but I'll pay for it when they stop spying on everything I do. And worse, is that they make it intentionally bad when you turn off suggestions.

- Yea, just install an extension, it's like four clicks
  
  I don't get a single ad when I browse YouTube via Opera, both on android and desktop. No addons needed.
- 90% of my usage is on Mobile and through my Roku TV which both use specific apps to view YouTube. That's my problem.
  I can use revanced to change the app on my phone, or download another app like NewPipe and that would work for a bit. But the hoops I'm referring to are when the apps get banned and need to be updated to work again, AND the hoops I feel I'd need to go to for an ad blocker at the router level so my Roku TV won't show ads through YouTube. (Though I should probably look into that anyway to get rid of ads on my TVs home screen).
  It just feels like a hassle to me, and I'm paying $8/mo as a student anyway so it's pretty cheap too.
  
  What you need Google to spoon feed you and wipe your ass too?
  
  On your tv. Go to settings, apps, see all apps, android tv home, then uninstall updates. Go to Google play store, your username icon, settings and disable auto-update apps. It'll remove the crap at the top.
  To remove specific things from the home screen, scroll down to the one you want to remove. Then hit the little circled minus button.
  You can also install custom launchers if you really wanted to.
  If you care, you can also "uninstall" uninstallable apps with adb. And there's a program called adb app control(I think that's the name) that'll let you easily remove them. They also have an called adb tv: app manager on the playstore. You need to enable adb debugging. But the app tells you what to do. Just don't uninstall anything you don't recognise. There'll be a lot of things that are really important.
  As a signing off gift, smarttube is like revamced but for your tv. Find their github, download it, put it on your tv, either woth a USB or I use an app called send files to tv.

sounds like propaganda

Fuck google and the horse it rode in on. Never paying them a single red cent. They already make bank selling my data.
Fuck em with a cactus.

I'm still annoyed at the removal of google play music. I want to just buy tracks or albums, instead of a subscription, and just own a flac/mp3/music file I can do anything with.
I rip cds now, and feel 0 guilt for that even though its illegal here because quite frankly the artists are getting more money this way.
- What country do you live in? Curious to know which country wouldn't ripping cds
  
  UK, they ruled it was legal then later ruled that it wasn't.
  Ruling from 2015
- I used https://bandcamp.com/ a couple of times. You can buy albums and get a link to download mp3 files.
- Check out soulseek.
- Depending on where you live, you could buy music (both individual tracks and albums) from 7Digital. It's only a website so no need to even install an app. And in case some track/album isn't available, you could use a VPN to buy it.

- woala
  Is this a cross between a wallaby and a koala?
  
  At least he didn't say viola.
- woala
  It's spelled wololo dumbass #voila

Let me just share a few FOSS apps that are arguably better than their official google counterparts.
For YouTube: Libretube, NewPipe
For YouTube Music: InnerTune, ViMusic
And, not open source, but if you want to support the creators (and artists) you like, buy merch. YouTube doesn't get a cut of the merch sales to my knowledge.

YouTube, removes downvote count, and implements shitty start up noise that I can't disable, and raises price. Then wonders why I don't want to pay for that shit.
- and the shorts start up page pops up as soon as you open yt , to push you into the mindless scrolling
  
  A certain rebrand of vanced is super helpful as it gives you the option to hide shorts.

Let them sell my data that they're tracking, it should cover the costs.

ReVanced is the way.
- ReVanced resurrected Sync for Reddit for me, maybe I should check out what ReVanced does for YouTube.
  
  Revanced YTmusic > Spotify premium.
- ReVanced gang checking in
- ReVanced FTW

Enshittification is not a thing that will be slowed if only we just pay Google more. It's a well-honed business strategy. Nobody in their right mind would stop their plans just because people start paying them more, voluntarily.

Just use ReVanced

I'm no bootlicker

ublock origin on my PC works amazing. I forget yt has ads most of the time. If web drm becomes a thing I'll hopefully have a pinhole in front of my traffic by then
- Not sure if you meant pihole or not, but if you did, I thought I'd just mention that a pihole doesn't remove ads on YouTube due to the fact that the ads and the videos are served from the same server. You block the ads, you block the videos. Made me quite sad after I set my one up.
  Unless you didn't mean pihole, in which case do enlighten me as to what a pinhole is :))
  
  I meant pihole stupid autocorrect. That's sad to hear... I wonder how ublock works cause yt never shows ads for me but videos work great

Google will never see a single cent from me! (besides when i buy my next pixel because they are actually kinda worth the money)
- 😂
- Lmao Google won't see your money... except when you give them hundreds for their flagship phone which will collect every last bit of data from you that it can.
  My brother/sister in christ, please put GrapheneOS or an equivalent on that phone when you get it lol
  
  Actually the Pixel phones track less than the other phone and the boot loader of pixels is open, so yeah mine runs a custom ROM.
- lol same

I'd rather click two buttons than give them my card information and send them money, but ok.

You've found quite the hornets nest, it seems.
I pay for premium because YouTube does video delivery better than anyone else in the world, and it's not free for them to provide. Lots of things to hate about YouTube/Alphabet, but theft is a corrupt way of expressing discontentment.
Also, if I pay for premium, then content creators get paid, and I don't have to shell out for merch to not feel like a terrible person.
- I imagine if it doesn't make sense to you already, I won't be able to help you understand, but here goes anyway.
  A company pays a lot of money to have a service developed and hosted, then offers a paid teir, and an ad supported teir. If you neither pay, nor watch ads, yet still use the service, then the company is incurring fees due to your usage while receiving no revenue for providing the service.
  Like, YouTube videos are great. Practically a utility at this point. However YouTube, the platform, is a company not a charity; if you cost them money, while providing $0 revenue, you're stealing their money.
  Personally I don't think theft is justified outside extreme desparation (stealing food, basically), and given that YouTube gives you an option that does not require giving them money I find it hard to justify stealing bandwidth.
  
  Because the content creators get no muhnee.

Got a new phone and number.
Wanted to log into YouTube.
Had to wait a month to get the verification email because google is a shitshow when it comes to security.
Ended up never using google products since then ever again.
- It's kinda weird how they track you so much, yet they can't even get their shit together to make recovering your account easier.
  They're option if you can't get any access codes at all? Delete your account.
  So they're basically saying "yeah we really care that no one else should be allowed access to your account. Not even you if you fuck up. But, we thank you for building an amazing portfolio of your digital profile. Now fuck off."
  If anyone has an issue where you genuinely can't get into your account. If you have an android tv with the Google account linked, or, and I'm assuming it works as well, an android tv box, go to the built in Web browser. It'll let you sign into your Google account where you can disable all 2fa.
  I got caught out by this, and because I used my Gmail as my Samsung account, I was also locked out of my Samsung account.
  And a little tip to Google. If you're going to forcefully collect all of this:
  Then let us at least fucking use it to sign into our accounts.
  Actually, I said "recovering" which is false. Google doesn't let you recover.
  
  I was about to say "well at least they don’t want your contacts“ and then I remembered that you sync your contacts via google.

Creators also earn way more from Premium views than ad views.
I have no problem with services being ad-supported, and I also have no problem with them charging for a premium ad-free option.

Youtube without ads + bonus functionalities
Youtube Music
Both are FOSS btw
- Alternatively: Firefox for Android + uBlock origin addon works well for me.
  Unfortunately, there's no Sponsor Block addon for Firefox Android.
  
  If you go through a ton of hoops, you should be able to get sponsorblock on firefox android.
  It requires getting firefox beta, logging into your account. On, a pc, going to the mozilla addons website, logging in, creating an addon list. Then enabling addon lists in firefox beta. I found this which helped me, but the addon I wanted to use (libredirect) wasn't available on android. it does say firefox nightly, but I couldn't find the option, only ok firefox beta
- I'm using NewPipe now after Vanced finally quit working for me about a month ago and it's great and sooo lightweight but I'm definitely missing some features from vanced. However, I'd rather kill myself than pay for YouTube premium and NewPipe is free so this is not me complaining.
  I'm using InnerTune, another FOSS option, in place of Vanced music and again, works great just missing some features.
  
  I had the same issue until I discovered ReVanced. It's literally the same old app but updated. I also have newpipe which I typically use for specific things.. Or if I don't want to receive video recommendations for a certain video

A little VPN to Argentina does wonders for the bank balance. I don’t mind paying but I refuse to pay extortionate amounts.
- I still have no clue how to complete this process, so I just use ReVanced.
  
  It was quite easy I think.
  VPN to Argentina. Use incognito browser. Sign in to YouTube. Sign up for premium. When asked for an address use Google maps and pick a random residential address in Argentina.
  I think that was it. Was a few years ago now.

K.

I will never pay or use proprietary user subjugating software/ services

Or you can use an ad-blocker. Also youtube is profitable just fine. If it wasn't Google would have shut it down a long time ago.

yes it does make profit. it's revenue is over 31 billion dollars if it was not making profit after having this much revenue. Google will just delete it.
- Yes, YouTube is profitable for Google. In 2022, YouTube generated an estimated $29.2 billion in revenue, and its parent company, Alphabet, reported that YouTube contributed roughly 10% to all Google revenue. YouTube's primary revenue streams are advertising and subscription services. In 2022, advertising accounted for about 85% of YouTube's revenue, while subscription services accounted for about 15%.
  YouTube's advertising revenue comes from a variety of sources, including:
  Display ads: These are static or animated ads that appear before, during, or after videos.
  Video ads: These are longer ads that play before, during, or after videos.
  TrueView ads: These are skippable ads that appear before videos.
  Bumper ads: These are 6-second unskippable ads that appear before videos.
  Sponsored videos: These are videos that are created by advertisers and promoted on YouTube.
  YouTube's subscription services include:
  YouTube Premium: This service offers ad-free viewing, background playback, and access to YouTube Originals.
  YouTube Music Premium: This service offers ad-free music listening, background playback, and access to YouTube Music Originals.
  YouTube's profitability is due to a number of factors, including:
  Its large user base: YouTube has over 2 billion active users per month.
  Its high engagement: YouTube users watch an average of 1 hour and 15 minutes of video per day.
  Its targeted advertising: YouTube's advertising platform allows advertisers to target their ads to specific demographics and interests.
  While YouTube is profitable, it is not as profitable as some other online platforms. For example, Facebook's advertising revenue is about 98% of its total revenue. This is because YouTube shares a portion of its advertising revenue with content creators. However, YouTube's profitability is still significant, and it is a major source of revenue for Google.
- Its current operating profit is estimated to be about 3-18% of the total revenue after removing costs, which while something wont last long when you have a finite number of people to show ads and get subs from but an infinite amount of data to store and transmit worldwide.

Lol yeah downloading newpipe is suuuch a hoop to jump through. 🙄

Have you tried Piped? It lets you watch Youtube without ads, though you can't use it to comment, but I say you should give it a try.

I hate Ggle as a corporation, but LOVE YouTube. With that being said, FreeTube, NewPipe, and InnerTunes will be used by me until YouTube/Ggle goes bankrupt. After they replaced G**gle Play Music with YouTube music I want them to burn a fiery death.
- Why? I use YouTube music all the time, it's great.
  
  It's great.... In your opinion. It is trash, in my opinion. Everyone can enjoy what they want but it's not for me (at least not if I have to pay)

if youtube forces me to watch ads i will stop watching youtube. i'm fine with it not bein profitable.

Installing ublock origins and sponsorblock is not jumping through hoops
And Google.with its basically infinite money should name it worthwhile to be paid for. But YouTube premium is garbage
- I can't block the ads on my Roku TV, which is where most of my watching takes place.
  
  https://github.com/iBicha/playlet
- My problem with ad block is that it ends up hurting the creators more than it does YouTube.
  
  Ads are but a few sheckles nowadays or we wouldnt have sponors merch and every other cash revenues for even the most mildly "successfull" creators
  Perhaps you are also forgetting YouTube puts ads on videos now regardless if the creator has the abiity to do that
  10 years ago, ads may have been the main source for creators
  Edit: cant forget em3 ads back to back or some.people haveeven seen 10 back to back, no creator is good enough to deserve that kind of torture to sift through as a viewer

It's like saying AAA games should probably be way more than $60. Despite the fact they used to be $40... then $50... and more expensive carts have ALWAYS been around since the SNES? and definitely N64 days lol.
- You must be confused beefcat because I'm agreeing with you lmfao.
  Also, I'm not proposing a solution. If I had one, I wouldn't be on KBin talking to you. I'd be in my megayacht playing Remnant 2 surrounded by hookers and blow.

Cope, mald and seethe, Youtube shill.

NewPipe exists.

I actually deleted the app and just started using it way less. If I use it’s it’s for a podcast, and through a mobile browser or a third party app.

True. Google has good regional prices and pays creators more than some other streaming services. By not blocking ads I support both platform and creators. Furthermore, creators in my country get more money from premium viewers than from ads.

Same. It’s like $5 for 6 months if you use a VPN at checkout. At that price point, why not.
- Is that trick "safe" for your Google account? I wouldn't mind paying for yt premium, but it's really not worth 7€ a month to me. Maximum half of that.
  
  If I did that I would just create another Google account specifically for YouTube so I don't risk my main account. But then my main account has so many subscriptions and so much watch history that would also be a significant dislike for me.
  
  Probably not, but I don’t really use google services. My account is mostly empty.

Your ignorance is so cute! I could just ~~punch~~ pinch those cheeks!
What would you say to someone with premium that still uses revanced because it's a better client? Probably nothing because there's no script for that.
- I used revanced on sync for Reddit to keep it alive past it's death date, though I'm much more engaged with Lemmy since Sync released for it too.
  What makes the revanced version of YouTube better to you? Maybe I should check it out.
  
  Sponsor block integration.
  
  Downvotes for one thing, also removing shit I'll never use, easier downloading when I want to archive a video, etc.
- Damn dude why are you being such an ass

People get so insufferably smug about this. Also, completely ignore the YouTube music bit, and just talk about how to block ads.

I'm grandfathered in at that permanent 7.99 per month, it's a no brainier.
- Wish I was lol