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Interesting you got YT Red on there too. I heavily rely on YouTube Red to avoid ads on mobile, I hope they never get rid of it. I'm guessing the revenue is so l

Interesting you got YT Red on there too. I heavily rely on YouTube Red to avoid ads on mobile, I hope they never get rid of it. I'm guessing the revenue is so low for it on your chart because most people don't have YT Red, not because it's not pulling its weight as compared to ads. I would probably just stop using YouTube on mobile if they ever removed YT Red, I don't know how people can stand the ads. There are so many ads.

mikeyjk 6y ago
On Android there is an app called NewPipe to avoid mobile adds. I'm having to pinch pennies, though.
- gundmc 6y ago
  This thread is in the context of compensating creators, not just skipping ads. Using Newpipe does nothing for creators.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- google234123 6y ago
  That's definitely breaking the TOS
  - gilrain 6y ago
    They did say they're hard up. Sheriff of Nottingham over here, scrounging the last gold coins out of the cast.
    - google234123 6y ago
      I don't think it's cheap to serve video content. That takes a lot of bandwidth, engineering, and compute resources.
    - google234123 6y ago
      It's not cheap to serve video content. That takes a lot of bandwidth, engineering, and compute resources.
      - tpxl 6y ago
        And they give it to you for free!
      - Applejinx 6y ago
        It scales, though. It makes sense that a thing like Google YouTube exists: if you can scale enough, it becomes worthwhile at least to yourself to provide it. Your main benefit is control and exclusivity: you can expect very large results from very small controlling actions. Most likely doesn't make you enough money to redistribute it to lots of content creators, though it serves your purposes to have 'em thinking that is what they're there for. I'm happy enough to serve consumer-grade video content at no cost to me through YouTube, on their terms. It's limiting, but I can put a lot of video out there without paying a host to serve the bandwidth. And YouTube gets to continue to pretend they are the only game in town.
echelon 6y ago
YouTube without YouTube Red is not worth the trouble. The YouTube Red / Google Play Music decoupling has me worried for the future of the product. I'm both upset Google Play Music is going away and that it might risk YouTube Red.
- xmprt 6y ago
  They're still investing heavily into YouTube Premium (no longer Red) now so I don't see them getting rid of it anytime soon.
  - metiscus 6y ago
    It's also still too early in the google ADHD cycle to kill it. Probably just reaching mid life at this point.
    - google234123 6y ago
      Nah, YouTube Premium makes sense. It's basically TY without ads. Why would that be too hard to maintain?
      - xmprt 6y ago
        You hit the nail on its head. Google usually discontinues products which have high maintenance cost so even if it turns out that YT Premium makes less money than people watching ads (and I highly doubt the average person watches more than $10 worth of ads in a month), they'll still keep it.
        adambyrtek 6y ago
        Not really, for example Reader had really low maintenance costs. In fact at some point it was maintained by some of its former developers in their 20% time with no official head count.
        6y ago
madmax108 6y ago
If avoiding ads is your only concern, then Youtube Vanced [1] does the same as well. Have used it for the last couple of months and can happily recommend it. It's practically just a modified Youtube client, so every feature just works out of the box _(unsure how this compares with Newpipe though)_. [1] https://vanced.app/ https://vanced.app/
- bonoboTP 6y ago
  I was so confused why it's called Vanced, then I realized what's missing at the start of the word. It's genius.
- kikokikokiko 6y ago
  For the people that do not want to give Google any money ever, you have many alternatives. I personally use Firefox(the 68 version) + Ublock Origin on Android, but you can simply use Brave out of the box. You can log to your account and have your full preferences and history. Also I use an addon to allow background playback on Firefox, but in Brave it's also out of the box. I would never support Google in any way, so no ethical concerns on my part. I support some channels through Subscribestar. Patreon does not support free speech, so it's a no go for me too.
  - Applejinx 6y ago
    I prefer not to support SubscribeStar in any way, as that normalizes right-wing extremists who break the Patreon TOS. I guess it depends on how much distance you want between yourself and your brand and right-wing extremists, and what things you're willing to accept under the guise of 'free speech'. But that is the mother of all sub-threads, so it might not be worth us getting into that infinite recursion fueled by dishonest argument :)
    - kikokikokiko 6y ago
      I prefer that the tool I use to be the middleman between me and the creator I support to not decide for ME who is acceptable or not for ME to support. But I understand your point, this discussion would have no end here in Hackernews. Let's agree to disagree :-)

mikeyjk 6y ago

On Android there is an app called NewPipe to avoid mobile adds. I'm having to pinch pennies, though.

gundmc 6y ago
This thread is in the context of compensating creators, not just skipping ads. Using Newpipe does nothing for creators.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
google234123 6y ago
That's definitely breaking the TOS
- gilrain 6y ago
  They did say they're hard up. Sheriff of Nottingham over here, scrounging the last gold coins out of the cast.
  - google234123 6y ago
    I don't think it's cheap to serve video content. That takes a lot of bandwidth, engineering, and compute resources.
  - google234123 6y ago
    It's not cheap to serve video content. That takes a lot of bandwidth, engineering, and compute resources.
    - tpxl 6y ago
      And they give it to you for free!
    - Applejinx 6y ago
      It scales, though. It makes sense that a thing like Google YouTube exists: if you can scale enough, it becomes worthwhile at least to yourself to provide it. Your main benefit is control and exclusivity: you can expect very large results from very small controlling actions. Most likely doesn't make you enough money to redistribute it to lots of content creators, though it serves your purposes to have 'em thinking that is what they're there for. I'm happy enough to serve consumer-grade video content at no cost to me through YouTube, on their terms. It's limiting, but I can put a lot of video out there without paying a host to serve the bandwidth. And YouTube gets to continue to pretend they are the only game in town.

echelon 6y ago

YouTube without YouTube Red is not worth the trouble. The YouTube Red / Google Play Music decoupling has me worried for the future of the product. I'm both upset Google Play Music is going away and that it might risk YouTube Red.

xmprt 6y ago
They're still investing heavily into YouTube Premium (no longer Red) now so I don't see them getting rid of it anytime soon.
- metiscus 6y ago
  It's also still too early in the google ADHD cycle to kill it. Probably just reaching mid life at this point.
  - google234123 6y ago
    Nah, YouTube Premium makes sense. It's basically TY without ads. Why would that be too hard to maintain?
    - xmprt 6y ago
      You hit the nail on its head. Google usually discontinues products which have high maintenance cost so even if it turns out that YT Premium makes less money than people watching ads (and I highly doubt the average person watches more than $10 worth of ads in a month), they'll still keep it.
      - adambyrtek 6y ago
        Not really, for example Reader had really low maintenance costs. In fact at some point it was maintained by some of its former developers in their 20% time with no official head count.
        6y ago

madmax108 6y ago

If avoiding ads is your only concern, then Youtube Vanced [1] does the same as well. Have used it for the last couple of months and can happily recommend it. It's practically just a modified Youtube client, so every feature just works out of the box _(unsure how this compares with Newpipe though)_. [1] https://vanced.app/ https://vanced.app/

bonoboTP 6y ago
I was so confused why it's called Vanced, then I realized what's missing at the start of the word. It's genius.
kikokikokiko 6y ago
For the people that do not want to give Google any money ever, you have many alternatives. I personally use Firefox(the 68 version) + Ublock Origin on Android, but you can simply use Brave out of the box. You can log to your account and have your full preferences and history. Also I use an addon to allow background playback on Firefox, but in Brave it's also out of the box. I would never support Google in any way, so no ethical concerns on my part. I support some channels through Subscribestar. Patreon does not support free speech, so it's a no go for me too.
- Applejinx 6y ago
  I prefer not to support SubscribeStar in any way, as that normalizes right-wing extremists who break the Patreon TOS. I guess it depends on how much distance you want between yourself and your brand and right-wing extremists, and what things you're willing to accept under the guise of 'free speech'. But that is the mother of all sub-threads, so it might not be worth us getting into that infinite recursion fueled by dishonest argument :)
  - kikokikokiko 6y ago
    I prefer that the tool I use to be the middleman between me and the creator I support to not decide for ME who is acceptable or not for ME to support. But I understand your point, this discussion would have no end here in Hackernews. Let's agree to disagree :-)