23 ms·

YouTube ads in Safari: you see them now, will you see them in the future?

212 points by taxyovio 5y ago

twobitshifter 5y ago
The battle between ad platforms and users is going to be never ending. For YouTube, the _right_ thing to do is to pay for the premium option which removes ads. Otherwise as difficult as it is to say, you are getting something for nothing and people do make a living from YouTube videos. Ok, maybe you can contribute to a patreon outside of YouTube, but you’re not going to do that for everyone and those videos are not served for free (even if Google is not short on cash)
- afavour 5y ago
  [deleted]
  - FriendlyNormie 5y ago
    $15.99
  - weird-eye-issue 5y ago
    They didn't say they don't have a premium option. They said that for users buying Premium is the right thing to do if you don't want ads.
- FriendlyNormie 5y ago
  No. Fuck your corporation worshipping lunacy. Youtube should be forcibly nationalized and transformed into an ad-free taxpayer-funded instrument of the first amendment with zero censorship. All youtube data centers should be raided and seized by the US military. Hand a golden parachute to anyone at google who might be upset about this. If they’re still upset after the privilege of retiring wealthy and early then it proves they had treasonous intent all along and they should be hanged.
- anticristi 5y ago
  I would, but: 1. I feel a 45% cut to YouTube is too big. Compare that to Patreon, which takes 5%. Granted YouTube offers a lot more for their cut, but the difference feels too big, especially given point 2 below. 2. YouTube is extremely untransparent about revenue sharing, so it feels like I'm paying Google, not the creators. So give me more transparency and take a smaller cut, and I'll be happy to disable my ad blocker and start paying membership.
  - heavyset_go 5y ago
    > I feel a 45% cut to YouTube is too big. Compare that to Patreon, which takes 5%. Granted YouTube offers a lot more for their cut, but the difference feels too big, especially given point 2 below. Agreed. If we look at the Bandcamp model, they only take 10% to 15%, and that's still high compared to Patreon.
    - JohnTHaller 5y ago
      Bandcamp starts at 15% and goes down to 10% after you cross $5,000 per year in digital sales. Payment processing fees are separate and an additional 4-6% according to Bandcamp. So fees start at 19%-21% and go down to 14%-16% once you exceed $5,000 in sales per 12 month period.
  - falcolas 5y ago
    YouTube subscription views are worth far more to the creator (some 10x (I've even heard 100x from some creators) more) than full ad views within the same video. So, regardless of YouTube's cut, it's much more valuable to the creator, and valuable to you (no embedded ads). Win win, at least until an alternative arises.
    - londons_explore 5y ago
      I suspect in the big picture this is not true. The kind of people with disposable income to give for paid subscriptions are far better targets for nearly all adverts, since they are far more likely to buy the premium products that have a far larger and budget, and therefore give the creator more per impression. I don't think YouTube reveals to creators enough information about which audience members generated which revenue for them to make that connection.
- heavyset_go 5y ago
  > For YouTube, the _right_ thing to do is to pay for the premium option which removes ads. Even if you pay for premium, you'll still get sponsored ads in the content.
  - falcolas 5y ago
    That's on the creator, and no ad blocker will stop sponsored content.
    - heavyset_go 5y ago
      Google could certainly detect when sponsored ads start in YouTube content and skip them to honor their "no ads" agreement with YouTube Premium customers. That, or they could pay content creators fairly so that they don't have to shill for NordVPN in every video they release.
      - falcolas 5y ago
        I'm not confident any automated system could properly detect a sponsored segment. Some creators are quite sly with how they're worked in. > pay content creators fairly so that they don't have to shill for NordVPN in every video they release. I'm with you on that.
        heavyset_go 5y ago
        > I'm not confident any automated system could properly detect a sponsored segment. Some creators are quite sly with how they're worked in. SponsorBlock does it, and Google could make it part of their policy for content creators to mark sponsored ad segments in their videos so that they can be skipped.
    - Dah00n 5y ago
      SponsorBlock will. It does require someone to flag the ads first though but so does most ads on adblocker lists.
  - 5y ago
- wayneftw 5y ago
  I would pay to get rid of ads. The only problem is that I would need to log into YouTube to take advantage of that. If I log into YouTube, that requires me to be logged into Google everywhere and I do not want that at all. The only solution is to use Firefox containerization or use separate browsers or separate browser profiles for things and I'm not going to do any of those because all of those options are annoying to me. If my ad blocker stops working on YouTube and/or if they require me to login, I'll simply stop visiting YouTube. There's plenty of other things to do!
  - londons_explore 5y ago
    Google Contributor allowed exactly this, and after setting it up you did not need to be logged in to use it. It's closed down now due to internal politics.
  - rchaud 5y ago
    > If I log into YouTube, that requires me to be logged into Google everywhere and I do not want that at all. You can use Firefox Containers to sandbox Google logins. Alternatively, you can use a different browser when accessing Google-owned websites.
    - TedShiller 5y ago
      If you click on a YouTube link now will the browser know what container to open that in?
      - wasmitnetzen 5y ago
        Yes, you can configure it in a way that every Youtube link opens in the Youtube container.
  - sharps1 5y ago
    I have a separate profile that is set-up for Google (In Brave). You could also use a container tab if using Firefox (Or even a profile, but FF profiles don’t work as well as Brave ones). You can also see the YouTube creators who have BAT accounts set-up. I do pay for YT premium family as well as I don’t want other family members to see ads. Regarding FF profiles - if using more than one at a time, you need to set the others to -no-remote, and then opening links only ever opens up in the main windows. In chromium browsers when opening outside links whatever browser profile that had focus last opens the links).
- ziml77 5y ago
  I think even with YouTube taking a large cut, people should really consider Premium if they use it a lot. It means that there will actually be something to back up the claim people make that they would pay to not have sites serve them ads. Also Premium views are worth more to content creators than ad supported views, so it does help the people you love to watch. Not as much as through something like Patreon obviously, but it's a bit unreasonable to support every creator that way.
  - that_guy_iain 5y ago
    One of the reasons I justify spending money on Premium is that it supports the creators. I get a bunch of people who think it's silly I pay for Premium, but I really hate watching ads so for me that alone makes it worthwhile. One channel I really like I have the youtube membership and pateron subscriptions. It's a UK true crime podcast that does every recording with professional camera and audio in a recording studio. Seems like it's expensive to do and I get a lot of entertainment out of them so seems fair to help them out a bit more, especially since most of their videos probably get demonetized.
    - adamcstephens 5y ago
      How do I find out what portion of a subscription goes to a creator?
      - SpelingBeeChamp 5y ago
        It's not clear to me what you are asking, but if your question has a definite answer and it relates to Youtube as a business, I can probably help answer. Youtube has been my full-time job for years. About Premium generally, if you can afford it and you are considering it, there is no reason to hesitate. I say that both as a channel owner and as someone who pays for Premium every month. You never see an AdSense ad again, and you make that happen while still supporting the channels you enjoy. Pretty win-win, IMO. Two things that most people don't know about Premium: 1. On a per-view basis, Premium views are actually 'worth more' than ad-watching views. We're talking tiny fractions of a cent, but they add up. 2. Most so-called "demonetized" views remain eligible for Premium revenue.
- decasteve 5y ago
  Serving videos without ads was how YouTube's monopoly was built. It became an ad platform later. That created an expectation that YouTube was a library in the public interest. Pre-2010 Google marketing had that public interest and internet stewardship angle to it. Serving content over the web assumes that the content will be downloaded by a browser for rendering. Control over what and how that content gets rendered is controlled by the user. I think this aspect made, and still does make in the present tense, the web what it is. That's why the browser is called a user-agent--an agent that acts on behalf of the user. YouTube could also move to another protocol, or develop a proprietary one to protect its interests. Otherwise it feels like they want to have their cake and eat it too.
  - topicseed 5y ago
    You're mentioning the end user's learned expectation to get videos for free. But what about the creator's expectation to get paid for their hard-earned views, to then pay for the gear purchased and the production of the entire video, including team members? If you're really anti ads, don't take the content for free, find another piece of content that answers your ad-free philosophy.
    - decasteve 5y ago
      I'm saying platforms can't have it both ways. If they want to avoid ad-blockers and video downloaders then pick another medium, or invent one and create a new thing that achieves this objective. The web is not TV. Public content on the web is public and user-rendered. That's what made the web and YouTube what it is today. YouTube has every right to create a proprietary YouTube client (which they do on mobile devices) and prevent browsers from accessing it. Don't serve files to my browser if you don't want me to use them. Creators, for better or worse, are putting themselves at the mercy of YouTube, as serfs to feudal lords. I'm sympathetic, and happy to pay (and do) for your goods directly, but don't complain to me if your lord mismanages your affairs. Even TV users had VCRs to save content "offline".
      - topicseed 5y ago
- csunbird 5y ago
  But Google is going to use my data for advertising, with or without premium. An adblocker gives me the luxury of not seeing ads while keeping my data private.
  - sofixa 5y ago
    Maybe it's only for the EU, but on adsettings.google.com you cab tell it not to use personalised data for ads.
    - matheusmoreira 5y ago
      Google still has the data though.
    - csunbird 5y ago
      Unfortunately, I do not trust this setting at all. They still have the data and they will hoard them, and use it for unknown purposes.
  - babypuncher 5y ago
    I don't think any adblocker could realistically stop Google from tracking what you do on YouTube.
    - cm2187 5y ago
      Flushing browsing data regularly should, except of course if you have to login to youtube.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- cpeterso 5y ago
  I watch YouTube on my TV and the ads are annoying enough that I actually looked into subscribing to YouTube Premium to make the ads go away (and better support the content creators I follow). But I'm not ready to pay YouTube $12/month just to make ads go away. I would probably pay $5/month. Netflix's basic plan only costs $9/month.
  - luma 5y ago
    YT Premium also includes YT music, and the creators you want to support get extra from Google when Premium users subscribe. For me, it’s worth the price and has almost entirely replaced TV for me (still need my F1 races...)
    - wooger 5y ago
      A totally unrelated service that you have to pay for ( and more expensive than rivals) is not a positive.
  - a1369209993 5y ago
    > I actually looked into subscribing to YouTube Premium to make the ads go away Please don't; this gives money to (and thus rewards and encourages) advertisers; use something like http://youtube-dl.org/ http://youtube-dl.org/ instead.
  - benhurmarcel 5y ago
    The price of Youtube Premium is high because it's bundled with a music subscription. That's a shame and is also the reason I don't subscribe.
    - wooger 5y ago
      Me too. And the fact that even with premium, PiP on iOS is still deliberately broken on web & in their app.
  - shultays 5y ago
    I am using https://github.com/yuliskov/SmartTubeNext https://github.com/yuliskov/SmartTubeNext and it is pretty good.
- _Algernon_ 5y ago
  YouTube has the right to send or not send the file to my computer. My browser has the right to process the video on my behalf, including not showing it to me if it is an ad. My right to decide what my purchased computer does trumps YouTube's right to make a few cents by showing me ads.
- cm2187 5y ago
  It also enables tracking of what I watch by the company I trust the least in the world with tracking me.
- wooger 5y ago
  THen the right thing to do is not bundle that premium feature with other youtube music bullshit and inflate the price to 5x what it should be. And also, stop user-hostile behaviour on iOS to block OS level features (PiP, background audio) from working, even if you pay up. I would rather block ads and use Firefox exclusively than pay that much for a still-compromised experience.
yliu 5y ago
Despite the title being about YouTube, this is fundamentally about Safari's declarative Content Blocker API being totally inadequate in the face of modern ad delivery technologies. Yes, it's fast and relatively more secure compared to old ad blocking techniques (which requires granting full access to effectively arbitrary JS), but ad tech has evolved since 2015 and Safari's Content Blocking API has not evolved with it. With other browsers showing varying degrees of interest in declarative content blocking, it's worth looking at Safari as a warning of what declarative content blocking, if unmaintained, will do to cripple ad blocking for users.
- Flow 5y ago
  I use Wipr as a content blocker on both macOS and iOS. I never see ads on YouTube. But I've always felt that it might not be enough some day. Perhaps that day is nearly here.
  - js2 5y ago
    This is a recent change by YouTube. Wipr uses the same content blocking API as Adguard and has the same limitations: https://giorgiocalderolla.com/wipr-faq.html#youtube https://giorgiocalderolla.com/wipr-faq.html#youtube
  - ameshkov 5y ago
    Note that YT changes aren’t yet rolled out everywhere. Also, if you’re not authorized there’ll be no issues, but it won’t stay like that forever.
    - Ballas 5y ago
      I'm not authorized and started getting the new ads about a week ago (with wipr).
  - cuddlybacon 5y ago
    I've been using Wipr. I've been getting the white placeholder screen for just about a year now. Every one in a while I get actual ads getting thru, before a new update fixes it.
floatingatoll 5y ago
Would migrating to the modern Safari extension API, which permits JavaScript injection into pages, be a better path forward here for this website modification tool?
- ameshkov 5y ago
  Safari on macOS supports executing custom JS on web pages since forever, regardless of what version of API is used. It’s not supported on iOS, though.
  - floatingatoll 5y ago
    Ah. Thanks!
  - dwaite 5y ago
    More accurately, it is not supported automatically. You can do Safari App Actions, but who wants to hit a menu on every navigation?
tambeb 5y ago
It's because of things like this—not to mention the added overhead/middleman—that I think ad blocking at the DNS level is the best way to go. With both Android and iOS supporting encrypted DNS system-wide, blocking at the DNS level is more convenient than ever (mobile & wifi are covered, no need to set DNS for each wifi network, etc.). I realize of course, though, that DNS level blocking is mostly a non-starter with regards to YouTube since the ads are served up from the same domains as the videos (mostly? generally? not certain here).
- tyingq 5y ago
  If, at some point, all we have is hostnames and url lists to block with, the ad folks will figure out how to unblock themselves.
  - tambeb 5y ago
    I run my own little ad blocking DNS service and the thing I'm probably most concerned about is websites/publishers/etc. deciding to serve their ad and user tracking assets from their own domains. Though most would probably need—or choose—to use subdomains and be easily blockable all over again.
    - bozzcl 5y ago
      Same here, I can think of a million ways to circumvent DNS blocking. The good thing is, most sites are not gonna adopt them very quickly. Besides, DNS blocking would have value even if all sites started doing that: there's plenty of malware/phishing domains to be blocked and I don't think those have better alternatives!
- ascagnel_ 5y ago
  I run a Pi-Hole on my local network, and I still see YouTube ads -- they're served from the same CDN as the videos. The way in which YT delivers ads (pre-, mid-, and post-roll videos on the same CDN/domain as the content) seems, on the surface, to thwart any type of static ad detection.
viktorcode 5y ago
There's some misconceptions being put forth in the article which I, as a developer of a Safari ad blocker, would like to address. Content blockers are limited by design to ensure privacy and speed, but they may work together with other kinds of Safari extension. So, when AdGuard guys say that the only debugging tool you can use is Console, know that this isn’t true. There’s SFSafariExtensionHandler API which you can use with blockers as another extension with higher privileges to track who blocked what. Very handy in debugging (and informative for the user). Should I say that converting something like EasyList to Safari content blocker json is trivial? It is. Granted, ABP has more capabilities in its extended syntax, so you won’t be able to convert everything. There's also some rules that don’t match 1 to 1, but it isn’t something that can’t be solved. Compiling speed, for the process that happens once the blocker rules json is changed, is irrelevant for the users, unlike battery life. Thanks to the compilation, content blockers have less overhead. The number of rules limit is a non-issue. As explained in the original, EasyList has lot of mergeable rules. I may add that it has some overlapping rules too. And if for whatever reason you hit 50k limit, you can add another content blocker extension to your app. And the most important thing. It seems that AdGuard guys don’t get why content blockers in Safari don’t run scripts. It’s privacy. But Safari itself doesn’t prevent you from doing that, only not as a part of content blocker extension that is privacy-safe. Speaking of YouTube ads, yeah, it’s a pain point. By blocking resources you can get to the point where an ad will be a white screen or a video loading delay. To get around those you have to get beyond what content blockers are offering. I’m thinking about adding that capability into my blocker, but it isn’t a priority.
- ameshkov 5y ago
  As someone who contributed to the post we're discussing, let me please respond. > There’s SFSafariExtensionHandler API which you can use with blockers as another extension with higher privileges to track who blocked what. I am not sure what you mean here. This API (available only on macOS) does allow injecting scripts and stylesheets, it does not provide any feasible debugging tools. Granted, you may inject a script that will get some information about what's blocked, but it's far from what's required. Just compare what Safari provides with AdGuard's filtering log on any other platform or with uBlock Origin's log. The lack of such tool is the main reason filters maintainers avoid dealing with Safari. > Compiling speed, for the process that happens once the blocker rules json is changed, is irrelevant for the users Compiling speed is the reason for the rules limitation. > There's also some rules that don’t match 1 to 1, but it isn’t something that can’t be solved. Unfortunately, there is something that cannot be solved, and YT is a great example of that something. > The number of rules limit is a non-issue I have to disagree here. We're not dealing with EasyList alone, there're many other lists (regional lists for instance). You may say - okay, let's split them all to different content blockers. There's a serious problem with that, though. Different content blockers are completely independent. However, that's not how those lists are being developed - there're lists that are supposed to influence each other. Let's take the simple example - unblocking something. For instance, here is the most obvious example that happens all the time. There may be a regional list that unblocks something blocked by EasyList (or EasyPrivacy) because this "something" breaks an important website in that region. Putting EasyList into one content blocker and the regional list into another breaks the regional list. > And the most important thing. It seems that AdGuard guys don’t get why content blockers in Safari don’t run scripts. It’s privacy. But Safari itself doesn’t prevent you from doing that, only not as a part of content blocker extension that is privacy-safe. We accept that argument despite me being literally sick of hearing it (so there's privacy on iOS, but no privacy on macOS since scripts are allowed to extensions there, okaay). What's important is that we do not propose allowing running arbitrary scripts. We propose extending the declarative API in a controlled manner and it does not conflict with Safari vision. Also, that's just one of the feature requests (and bug reports) reported over the years. edit: typos
Labo333 5y ago
Unfortunately, the web gets everyday closer to some kind of "interactive TV". Computations are moving to the server side and clients are merely there to get input and display information. An illustration is the very controversial Mighty browser. As a result, programs will shortly become dependent on having an internet connection. Today, people use more Google Docs than Notepad. This removes a lot of freedom because computing now comes at the price of a subscription (for internet but also for other services be it SaaS, data monetization or server costs for self hosting).
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- judge2020 5y ago
  Only if you want to use google docs’ features and optionally share it with someone later down the line easily. Save that, you can simply send them your .rtf file over email and ask them to make changes then send it back to you once they’ve done that. Did I mention you can’t work on it at the same time?
- nexuist 5y ago
  The entire server-first computational model of today is a direct result of the disastrous adoption of NAT, which killed peer to peer applications and from which the P2P market is still recovering from (uPnP was one such [failed] attempt to fix the problem, now WebRTC and its friends STUN/TURN are up next). Google Docs doesn't have to run on Google servers. It could run on any operating system and work from anywhere provided that you and whoever you want to work with have public IP addresses. But because everyone and everything is behind a corporate or residential router, this avenue is not available unless you are willing to work for it -- and in the case of a corporate network, you literally can't do anything except connect to a third party proxy (or a first party server) in order to be able to talk to your friends' computers. There's also no good way to handle the mobile phone problem, in which your IP address changes every so often as you pass between cell towers. Ultimately, having each client connect to a centralized server and shuttling data between them server-side ended up being the much better solution instead of the far more attractive option (to users anyways) of connecting to each other directly.
cgb223 5y ago
Has anyone used iOS browsers with adblocking built in? How do Firefox and Brave compare to Adguard or 1BlockerX? Any other browsers out there that do a better job?
- ameshkov 5y ago
  All those browsers have to use Safari (WKWebView) internally so they are close. There’s an important difference, these browsers can also run additional JS on web pages and partly compensate for missing content blocking capabilities. This could help to an extent, but I am not sure if the said browsers do that.
  - antonok 5y ago
    Brave on iOS does inject JS into YouTube and other sites. It uses exactly the same `+js(...)` injections as Brave on desktop and Android, as well as uBlock Origin, which is really helpful. Unfortunately, JS can't solve everything... the WKWebView restrictions are definitely a huge frustration. Brave for Android and desktop both build from a single codebase, but everything has to be reimplemented to work on iOS too.
- contriban 5y ago
  I’ve been trying Brave this week and unfortunately it performed absolutely uselessly on some busy websites, locking up for *several seconds* every time I open a new tab. It might be a temporary bug, but I moved to DDG as my secondary browser anyway. Safari and DDG handle those same pages effortlessly.
  - mp3geek 5y ago
    Which sites are causing issues?
    - contriban 5y ago
      I don’t remember which one exactly but Brave lags a lot if you open a video, scroll down, and open another video, in quick succession. It starts locking up for half a second or more once you reach the tenth video on YouTube. This is an iPhone 11 Pro, the whole UI stops being responsive
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
teekert 5y ago
I just switched from Android and I love iOS (iPhone 12 mini). But man do I miss Firefox (the real one, not the Safari skin) and man do I miss f-droid (specifically gems like GadgetBridge). If only I could have those 2 things.
- wffurr 5y ago
  There's Cydia: https://cydia-app.com/ https://cydia-app.com/ And if you have a Mac, you can build and install apps on your own device with Xcode. No Apple developer paid account required. AltStore does something similar by signing IPA files with your personal key: https://altstore.io/ https://altstore.io/.
  - easrng 5y ago
    The site you linked to (hxxps://cydia-app.com/) is unofficial, links to piracy and spyware sites, and should not be trusted. The official Cydia site is https://cydia.saurik.com/ https://cydia.saurik.com/ but it doesn't include much information about Cydia and jailbreaks. To find out what jailbreaks are available for your device, check the r/Jailbreak wiki. (https://www.reddit.com/r/jailbreak/wiki/ios/canijailbreak https://www.reddit.com/r/jailbreak/wiki/ios/canijailbreak)
    - judge2020 5y ago
      A better 'how to jailbreak' is https://canijailbreak.com/ https://canijailbreak.com/ which is ran by some well-respected community members https://justapengu.in/about https://justapengu.in/about
    - wffurr 5y ago
      Thanks, too late to edit. Wasn't obviously a scam when I first looked at it.
- kolom 5y ago
  As a long time AdAway (with Root) user on on my daily driver, I am struggling with ads after moving to iPhone (12 mini). Most Games (I have tried) are barely playable for ads. And I miss "NewPipe" sooo much :( I am keeping an old android device around just for using NewPipe.
ec109685 5y ago
At some point, YouTube is just going to stich these into the main video.
- tinus_hn 5y ago
  Either they allow skipping through the ads or they somehow signal that it’s a different segment.
- madeofpalk 5y ago
  Server-side dynamic ad inclusion is relatively not new tech. I’m surprised they don’t do it already tbh
  - throwaways885 5y ago
    I would assume Google would prefer to not piss off the millions of adblock using techies (including journalists) if that can be avoided.
    - wooger 5y ago
      Seriously, youtube is absolutely unusable for me with ads, they completely destroy the experience and I'd just do something else if forced to see them. In the UK, for TV we have limits on the number and total minutes of ads per hour, youtube needs to look at these.
- stemlord 5y ago
  This already exists on yt in the form of sponsored content in pro youtubers' videos, I use an extension called SponsorBlock that uses crowdsourced reporting to find and skip these portions... this crowdsourced approach will only work well for popular videos but unpopular vids are less often monetizable and thus not ad-ridden anyway
  - ehsankia 5y ago
    It also won't work for spliced ads that vary in length.
google234123 5y ago
If you don't want ads get Youtube Premium.
- matheusmoreira 5y ago
  Install uBlock Origin instead.
- crazypython 5y ago
  While I use adblockers, I agree with this sentiment. It's easy to forget that ads pay for YouTube content, they pay for web content. Google gets an overwhelming cut, sadly. Ads fund the creators that make the content. This revenue is not much and is often barely enough to survive.
- stemlord 5y ago
  If I'm gonna pay for a service it sure as shit isn't gonna be from a company with no customer support system
  - ehsankia 5y ago
    They have plenty customer support if you're a paying customer. Pay for Google One [0] for example and you get Customer Support for all Google services. [0] https://one.google.com/about/support https://one.google.com/about/support
    - hughrr 5y ago
      Have you actually tried Google customer support? I had more success out of staring at a banana for half an hour and waiting for an epiphany than paid GSuite support.
      - benhurmarcel 5y ago
        I've contacted Google's customer support for Stadia recently (by chat) and they were good and reactive.
      - 5y ago
happybuy 5y ago
Part of the problem – as AdGuard concedes in the post – is that Easy List (which AdGuard and many other ad blockers use) is a woefully inefficient rule list with over 50,000 entries. Many of which are out of date, redundant and not optimised for performance. This leads to excessive memory use and performance slowdowns and is one of the reasons why there is a 50,000 rule limit in the Safari Content Blocking API. As a developer of an alternate ad blocker[1] for the iPhone, iPad and Mac you can deliver a full featured, quality ad blocker with less than 5,000 core rules. This provides a faster and more efficient ad blocking experience. As they note however, YouTube ad blocking is a more difficult problem to solve, but can be done cleanly on macOS. At least at the moment it can't be done 100% on iOS without Apple rolling out some additional features to Safari on that platform. [1] https://www.magiclasso.co/ https://www.magiclasso.co/
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- _rs 5y ago
  I've tried using this ad blocker before (I'm sure I saw a mention of it on DF or HN a while ago) but disabled it and went back to AdGuard. It misses too many ads for me and doesn't give me enough control (I like specifying which lists to use or if I want to just block social media widgets vs ads vs analytics/trackers.)
- Farow 5y ago
  > you can deliver a full featured, quality ad blocker with less than 5,000 core rule. I guess that depends on how far you stray from the top [x] sites of alexa?
whywhywhywhy 5y ago
Removing whatever Ublock Origin needed to exist in Safari is one of the dumbest moves Apple has made. To get most of the battery advantages of Macs you're forced to use Safari. But when it comes down to having to see YouTube ads I'm willing to make the tradeoff and switch to Chrome.
- babypuncher 5y ago
  Frankly I just hate the idea of YouTube creators getting paid for their work. /s
  - VRay 5y ago
    I'd pay half a cent per video or whatever it works out to be, but I'm not going to pay by letting Google or any other corporations track my every move and action
    - babypuncher 5y ago
      I don't think blocking ads on YouTube prevents Google from being able to track you on YouTube
    - manigandham 5y ago
      There is Youtube Premium which is a flat fee: https://www.youtube.com/premium https://www.youtube.com/premium
      - benhurmarcel 5y ago
        It's a shame that they bundle it with a music subscription.
      - wooger 5y ago
        A laughably high flat fee. In the UK, 11.99 GBP per month. For no new video content I want, no new features (they still block picture in picture on iOS app & web). They bundle the crappy youtube music service which I also don't want. It's a non-starter & overpriced by a factor of 5x.
asimpletune 5y ago
If anyone wants to join my YouTube premium family plan, send me an email! It’s ~$4/mo.
- fomine3 5y ago
  Or become Turkish
DoingIsLearning 5y ago
On side note on this topic, I am pretty sure I am being A/B tested on youtube with some form of dynamic ad inclusion. A friend sent me a youtube link, I opened it on Firefox for Android (with the latest ublock lists), it immediately served me an ad. This had never happened to me before, I actually assumed I opened it by mistake on Android's youtube app. The only way I found that I could block it was using the older embedded videos url (www.youtube.com/embed/<video-id>) Anyone has more info on what are they doing exactly? I found a reddit post with similar complaints but everyone was equally clueless. Seems like they decided to point artillery at ublock.
- judge2020 5y ago
  Might or might not be what you’re describing, but it’s probably inevitable that YT will someday bake ads and mid-rolls into the videos themselves, especially if they have racks of super-fast video encoding hardware to play with[0]. Gotta pay the bills (and shareholders). 0: https://blog.youtube/inside-youtube/new-era-video-infrastructure/ https://blog.youtube/inside-youtube/new-era-video-infrastruc...
dcdc123 5y ago
I have Brave on my iPhone for the sole purpose of watching YouTube ad-free. It works flawlessly.
tipoftheiceberg 5y ago
For iOS YT users: hit refresh when the ad starts playing. Watch the ad go away. Voila.
gigaftp 5y ago
Brave on iOS still blocks YouTube ads.
jb1991 5y ago
This one single problem is why I switched to Firefox. Even the FF mobile app does a much better job.
- speedgoose 5y ago
  You can't switch to Firefox on iOS. It's Safari,or Safari with Firefox' UI. Apple forbids other web browser engines on iOS.
  - jb1991 5y ago
    I realize that, but it doesn’t change the fact that with Firefox I don’t get ads on YouTube, whereas with Safari I do (ipad). FF probably just has additional content blocking features by default. Even when I install other content blockers on my device, safari still shows ads on YouTube.
exikyut 5y ago
Maybe slightly tangential since this is about Safari - but have 𝗬𝗼𝘂𝗧𝘂𝗯𝗲 𝗮𝗱𝘀 𝗿𝗲𝗰𝗲𝗻𝘁𝗹𝘆 𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗽𝗽𝗲𝗮𝗿𝗲𝗱 𝗶𝗻 𝗖𝗵𝗿𝗼𝗺𝗲? The declarativeWebRequest YouTube adblocker I threw together in half an hour a few months ago recently stopped working on my end too. Opting out of targeted ads serves you the bottom of the barrel, which was enough motivation to waste a day of JS spelunking (YouTube's changes "conveniently" make declarative blocking nonviable). Here's what works for me... and here's hoping it still works tomorrow :) ▶ manifest.json: { "name": "ytadblock", "description": "(license: CC0)", "version": "2.0", "manifest_version": 2, "declarative_net_request": { "rule_resources": [{ "id": "1", "enabled": true, "path": "ytadblock.json" }] }, "permissions": [ "declarativeNetRequest", "*://youtube.com/*", "*://www.youtube.com/*" ], "content_scripts": [ { "matches": ["https://*.youtube.com/*"], "js": ["contentscript.js"], "run_at": "document_start" } ], "web_accessible_resources": ["inject.js"] } ▶ ytadblock.json: [{ "id": 1, "priority": 1, "action": { "type": "block" }, "condition": { "regexFilter": ".*\\.googlevideo\\.com/.*ctier=", "resourceTypes": [ "main_frame", "sub_frame", "script", "image", "xmlhttprequest", "media", "other" ] } }] ▶ contentscript.js: console.log('hi from contentscript'); var s = document.createElement('script'); s.src = chrome.runtime.getURL('inject.js'); s.onload = function() { this.remove(); } document.documentElement.prepend(s); ▶ inject.js: 'use strict'; (function() { var parse = JSON.parse; JSON.parse = function(input) { var data = parse(input); if (typeof data['playerResponse'] !== 'undefined') { data.playerResponse.adPlacements = []; data.playerResponse.playerAds = []; } return data; } var fetch_ = fetch; fetch = async function(...args) { let response = await fetch_(...args); let text = await response.text(); if (response.url.match(/\/player\?/)) { try { var json = JSON.parse(text); if (typeof json['playerAds'] !== 'undefined') { json.adPlacements = []; json.playerAds = []; } text = JSON.stringify(json); } catch (e) {} } return new Response(text, { status: response.status, statusText: response.statusText, headers: response.headers }); }; var trap = { get(target, key) { if (key == 'create' || key == 'createAlternate') { return function(...args) { args[1].args.raw_player_response.adPlacements = []; args[1].args.raw_player_response.playerAds = []; return target[key](...args); } } else if (typeof target[key] === 'object' && (key == 'player' || key == 'Application')) { return new Proxy(target[key], trap); } else { return target[key]; } } }; var yt = new Proxy({}, trap); })(); Notes: - Ad video requests can actually be distinguished by the "ctier" parameter in the xxx.googlevideo.com URL. (I presume "c" is related to the "CSI" that seems to be everywhere on Google properties.) The sole declarative block is intended as a fallback in case the JavaScript hooks fail; you'll know if you hit these, because ad videos will spin for 5 seconds before they fail - and there might be MoRe ThAn OnE - and this may drive you very, very crazy. :) - Initial page loads now contain a JavaScript blob with content and ad video info. After a lot of stumbling around I got the idea to turn the `yt` object into a Proxy and intercept the yt.player.Application.createAlternate() function, which said blob is passed into as an argument. - YouTube seems to be using a mixture of requests to ".../player?" via Fetch and XHR POSTed requests to ".../watch?.*pbj=1" to fetch next-video-info when you click video links. Hooking XHR proved... depressingly tricky (...wow...), so I got the idea from https://greasyfork.org/en/scripts/32626-disable-youtube-video-ads/code https://greasyfork.org/en/scripts/32626-disable-youtube-vide... to hook JSON.parse instead (koooool). Hooking Fetch, or at least YouTube's use of Fetch, was thankfully not that hard. The above is quite brittle, depends on how YouTube works now, and may get caught in the crossfire of unrelated site changes. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯*
perryizgr8 5y ago
If you are using Android, be sure to check out Youtube Vanced. It cuts out all the ads very effectively, allows you to set a preferred video quality, and recently it has started blocking even in-video ads and product placement! Truly some next gen ad blocking tech.
villgax 5y ago
I just fast forward them lol

212 points by taxyovio 5y ago

The battle between ad platforms and users is going to be never ending. For YouTube, the _right_ thing to do is to pay for the premium option which removes ads. Otherwise as difficult as it is to say, you are getting something for nothing and people do make a living from YouTube videos. Ok, maybe you can contribute to a patreon outside of YouTube, but you’re not going to do that for everyone and those videos are not served for free (even if Google is not short on cash)

afavour 5y ago
[deleted]
- FriendlyNormie 5y ago
  $15.99
- weird-eye-issue 5y ago
  They didn't say they don't have a premium option. They said that for users buying Premium is the right thing to do if you don't want ads.
FriendlyNormie 5y ago
No. Fuck your corporation worshipping lunacy. Youtube should be forcibly nationalized and transformed into an ad-free taxpayer-funded instrument of the first amendment with zero censorship. All youtube data centers should be raided and seized by the US military. Hand a golden parachute to anyone at google who might be upset about this. If they’re still upset after the privilege of retiring wealthy and early then it proves they had treasonous intent all along and they should be hanged.
anticristi 5y ago
I would, but: 1. I feel a 45% cut to YouTube is too big. Compare that to Patreon, which takes 5%. Granted YouTube offers a lot more for their cut, but the difference feels too big, especially given point 2 below. 2. YouTube is extremely untransparent about revenue sharing, so it feels like I'm paying Google, not the creators. So give me more transparency and take a smaller cut, and I'll be happy to disable my ad blocker and start paying membership.
- heavyset_go 5y ago
  > I feel a 45% cut to YouTube is too big. Compare that to Patreon, which takes 5%. Granted YouTube offers a lot more for their cut, but the difference feels too big, especially given point 2 below. Agreed. If we look at the Bandcamp model, they only take 10% to 15%, and that's still high compared to Patreon.
  - JohnTHaller 5y ago
    Bandcamp starts at 15% and goes down to 10% after you cross $5,000 per year in digital sales. Payment processing fees are separate and an additional 4-6% according to Bandcamp. So fees start at 19%-21% and go down to 14%-16% once you exceed $5,000 in sales per 12 month period.
- falcolas 5y ago
  YouTube subscription views are worth far more to the creator (some 10x (I've even heard 100x from some creators) more) than full ad views within the same video. So, regardless of YouTube's cut, it's much more valuable to the creator, and valuable to you (no embedded ads). Win win, at least until an alternative arises.
  - londons_explore 5y ago
    I suspect in the big picture this is not true. The kind of people with disposable income to give for paid subscriptions are far better targets for nearly all adverts, since they are far more likely to buy the premium products that have a far larger and budget, and therefore give the creator more per impression. I don't think YouTube reveals to creators enough information about which audience members generated which revenue for them to make that connection.
heavyset_go 5y ago
> For YouTube, the _right_ thing to do is to pay for the premium option which removes ads. Even if you pay for premium, you'll still get sponsored ads in the content.
- falcolas 5y ago
  That's on the creator, and no ad blocker will stop sponsored content.
  - heavyset_go 5y ago
    Google could certainly detect when sponsored ads start in YouTube content and skip them to honor their "no ads" agreement with YouTube Premium customers. That, or they could pay content creators fairly so that they don't have to shill for NordVPN in every video they release.
    - falcolas 5y ago
      I'm not confident any automated system could properly detect a sponsored segment. Some creators are quite sly with how they're worked in. > pay content creators fairly so that they don't have to shill for NordVPN in every video they release. I'm with you on that.
      - heavyset_go 5y ago
        > I'm not confident any automated system could properly detect a sponsored segment. Some creators are quite sly with how they're worked in. SponsorBlock does it, and Google could make it part of their policy for content creators to mark sponsored ad segments in their videos so that they can be skipped.
  - Dah00n 5y ago
    SponsorBlock will. It does require someone to flag the ads first though but so does most ads on adblocker lists.
- 5y ago
wayneftw 5y ago
I would pay to get rid of ads. The only problem is that I would need to log into YouTube to take advantage of that. If I log into YouTube, that requires me to be logged into Google everywhere and I do not want that at all. The only solution is to use Firefox containerization or use separate browsers or separate browser profiles for things and I'm not going to do any of those because all of those options are annoying to me. If my ad blocker stops working on YouTube and/or if they require me to login, I'll simply stop visiting YouTube. There's plenty of other things to do!
- londons_explore 5y ago
  Google Contributor allowed exactly this, and after setting it up you did not need to be logged in to use it. It's closed down now due to internal politics.
- rchaud 5y ago
  > If I log into YouTube, that requires me to be logged into Google everywhere and I do not want that at all. You can use Firefox Containers to sandbox Google logins. Alternatively, you can use a different browser when accessing Google-owned websites.
  - TedShiller 5y ago
    If you click on a YouTube link now will the browser know what container to open that in?
    - wasmitnetzen 5y ago
      Yes, you can configure it in a way that every Youtube link opens in the Youtube container.
- sharps1 5y ago
  I have a separate profile that is set-up for Google (In Brave). You could also use a container tab if using Firefox (Or even a profile, but FF profiles don’t work as well as Brave ones). You can also see the YouTube creators who have BAT accounts set-up. I do pay for YT premium family as well as I don’t want other family members to see ads. Regarding FF profiles - if using more than one at a time, you need to set the others to -no-remote, and then opening links only ever opens up in the main windows. In chromium browsers when opening outside links whatever browser profile that had focus last opens the links).
ziml77 5y ago
I think even with YouTube taking a large cut, people should really consider Premium if they use it a lot. It means that there will actually be something to back up the claim people make that they would pay to not have sites serve them ads. Also Premium views are worth more to content creators than ad supported views, so it does help the people you love to watch. Not as much as through something like Patreon obviously, but it's a bit unreasonable to support every creator that way.
- that_guy_iain 5y ago
  One of the reasons I justify spending money on Premium is that it supports the creators. I get a bunch of people who think it's silly I pay for Premium, but I really hate watching ads so for me that alone makes it worthwhile. One channel I really like I have the youtube membership and pateron subscriptions. It's a UK true crime podcast that does every recording with professional camera and audio in a recording studio. Seems like it's expensive to do and I get a lot of entertainment out of them so seems fair to help them out a bit more, especially since most of their videos probably get demonetized.
  - adamcstephens 5y ago
    How do I find out what portion of a subscription goes to a creator?
    - SpelingBeeChamp 5y ago
      It's not clear to me what you are asking, but if your question has a definite answer and it relates to Youtube as a business, I can probably help answer. Youtube has been my full-time job for years. About Premium generally, if you can afford it and you are considering it, there is no reason to hesitate. I say that both as a channel owner and as someone who pays for Premium every month. You never see an AdSense ad again, and you make that happen while still supporting the channels you enjoy. Pretty win-win, IMO. Two things that most people don't know about Premium: 1. On a per-view basis, Premium views are actually 'worth more' than ad-watching views. We're talking tiny fractions of a cent, but they add up. 2. Most so-called "demonetized" views remain eligible for Premium revenue.
decasteve 5y ago
Serving videos without ads was how YouTube's monopoly was built. It became an ad platform later. That created an expectation that YouTube was a library in the public interest. Pre-2010 Google marketing had that public interest and internet stewardship angle to it. Serving content over the web assumes that the content will be downloaded by a browser for rendering. Control over what and how that content gets rendered is controlled by the user. I think this aspect made, and still does make in the present tense, the web what it is. That's why the browser is called a user-agent--an agent that acts on behalf of the user. YouTube could also move to another protocol, or develop a proprietary one to protect its interests. Otherwise it feels like they want to have their cake and eat it too.
- topicseed 5y ago
  You're mentioning the end user's learned expectation to get videos for free. But what about the creator's expectation to get paid for their hard-earned views, to then pay for the gear purchased and the production of the entire video, including team members? If you're really anti ads, don't take the content for free, find another piece of content that answers your ad-free philosophy.
  - decasteve 5y ago
    I'm saying platforms can't have it both ways. If they want to avoid ad-blockers and video downloaders then pick another medium, or invent one and create a new thing that achieves this objective. The web is not TV. Public content on the web is public and user-rendered. That's what made the web and YouTube what it is today. YouTube has every right to create a proprietary YouTube client (which they do on mobile devices) and prevent browsers from accessing it. Don't serve files to my browser if you don't want me to use them. Creators, for better or worse, are putting themselves at the mercy of YouTube, as serfs to feudal lords. I'm sympathetic, and happy to pay (and do) for your goods directly, but don't complain to me if your lord mismanages your affairs. Even TV users had VCRs to save content "offline".
    - topicseed 5y ago
csunbird 5y ago
But Google is going to use my data for advertising, with or without premium. An adblocker gives me the luxury of not seeing ads while keeping my data private.
- sofixa 5y ago
  Maybe it's only for the EU, but on adsettings.google.com you cab tell it not to use personalised data for ads.
  - matheusmoreira 5y ago
    Google still has the data though.
  - csunbird 5y ago
    Unfortunately, I do not trust this setting at all. They still have the data and they will hoard them, and use it for unknown purposes.
- babypuncher 5y ago
  I don't think any adblocker could realistically stop Google from tracking what you do on YouTube.
  - cm2187 5y ago
    Flushing browsing data regularly should, except of course if you have to login to youtube.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
cpeterso 5y ago
I watch YouTube on my TV and the ads are annoying enough that I actually looked into subscribing to YouTube Premium to make the ads go away (and better support the content creators I follow). But I'm not ready to pay YouTube $12/month just to make ads go away. I would probably pay $5/month. Netflix's basic plan only costs $9/month.
- luma 5y ago
  YT Premium also includes YT music, and the creators you want to support get extra from Google when Premium users subscribe. For me, it’s worth the price and has almost entirely replaced TV for me (still need my F1 races...)
  - wooger 5y ago
    A totally unrelated service that you have to pay for ( and more expensive than rivals) is not a positive.
- a1369209993 5y ago
  > I actually looked into subscribing to YouTube Premium to make the ads go away Please don't; this gives money to (and thus rewards and encourages) advertisers; use something like http://youtube-dl.org/ http://youtube-dl.org/ instead.
- benhurmarcel 5y ago
  The price of Youtube Premium is high because it's bundled with a music subscription. That's a shame and is also the reason I don't subscribe.
  - wooger 5y ago
    Me too. And the fact that even with premium, PiP on iOS is still deliberately broken on web & in their app.
- shultays 5y ago
  I am using https://github.com/yuliskov/SmartTubeNext https://github.com/yuliskov/SmartTubeNext and it is pretty good.
_Algernon_ 5y ago
YouTube has the right to send or not send the file to my computer. My browser has the right to process the video on my behalf, including not showing it to me if it is an ad. My right to decide what my purchased computer does trumps YouTube's right to make a few cents by showing me ads.
cm2187 5y ago
It also enables tracking of what I watch by the company I trust the least in the world with tracking me.
wooger 5y ago
THen the right thing to do is not bundle that premium feature with other youtube music bullshit and inflate the price to 5x what it should be. And also, stop user-hostile behaviour on iOS to block OS level features (PiP, background audio) from working, even if you pay up. I would rather block ads and use Firefox exclusively than pay that much for a still-compromised experience.

yliu 5y ago

Despite the title being about YouTube, this is fundamentally about Safari's declarative Content Blocker API being totally inadequate in the face of modern ad delivery technologies. Yes, it's fast and relatively more secure compared to old ad blocking techniques (which requires granting full access to effectively arbitrary JS), but ad tech has evolved since 2015 and Safari's Content Blocking API has not evolved with it. With other browsers showing varying degrees of interest in declarative content blocking, it's worth looking at Safari as a warning of what declarative content blocking, if unmaintained, will do to cripple ad blocking for users.

Flow 5y ago
I use Wipr as a content blocker on both macOS and iOS. I never see ads on YouTube. But I've always felt that it might not be enough some day. Perhaps that day is nearly here.
- js2 5y ago
  This is a recent change by YouTube. Wipr uses the same content blocking API as Adguard and has the same limitations: https://giorgiocalderolla.com/wipr-faq.html#youtube https://giorgiocalderolla.com/wipr-faq.html#youtube
- ameshkov 5y ago
  Note that YT changes aren’t yet rolled out everywhere. Also, if you’re not authorized there’ll be no issues, but it won’t stay like that forever.
  - Ballas 5y ago
    I'm not authorized and started getting the new ads about a week ago (with wipr).
- cuddlybacon 5y ago
  I've been using Wipr. I've been getting the white placeholder screen for just about a year now. Every one in a while I get actual ads getting thru, before a new update fixes it.

floatingatoll 5y ago

Would migrating to the modern Safari extension API, which permits JavaScript injection into pages, be a better path forward here for this website modification tool?

ameshkov 5y ago
Safari on macOS supports executing custom JS on web pages since forever, regardless of what version of API is used. It’s not supported on iOS, though.
- floatingatoll 5y ago
  Ah. Thanks!
- dwaite 5y ago
  More accurately, it is not supported automatically. You can do Safari App Actions, but who wants to hit a menu on every navigation?

tambeb 5y ago

It's because of things like this—not to mention the added overhead/middleman—that I think ad blocking at the DNS level is the best way to go. With both Android and iOS supporting encrypted DNS system-wide, blocking at the DNS level is more convenient than ever (mobile & wifi are covered, no need to set DNS for each wifi network, etc.). I realize of course, though, that DNS level blocking is mostly a non-starter with regards to YouTube since the ads are served up from the same domains as the videos (mostly? generally? not certain here).

tyingq 5y ago
If, at some point, all we have is hostnames and url lists to block with, the ad folks will figure out how to unblock themselves.
- tambeb 5y ago
  I run my own little ad blocking DNS service and the thing I'm probably most concerned about is websites/publishers/etc. deciding to serve their ad and user tracking assets from their own domains. Though most would probably need—or choose—to use subdomains and be easily blockable all over again.
  - bozzcl 5y ago
    Same here, I can think of a million ways to circumvent DNS blocking. The good thing is, most sites are not gonna adopt them very quickly. Besides, DNS blocking would have value even if all sites started doing that: there's plenty of malware/phishing domains to be blocked and I don't think those have better alternatives!
ascagnel_ 5y ago
I run a Pi-Hole on my local network, and I still see YouTube ads -- they're served from the same CDN as the videos. The way in which YT delivers ads (pre-, mid-, and post-roll videos on the same CDN/domain as the content) seems, on the surface, to thwart any type of static ad detection.

viktorcode 5y ago

There's some misconceptions being put forth in the article which I, as a developer of a Safari ad blocker, would like to address. Content blockers are limited by design to ensure privacy and speed, but they may work together with other kinds of Safari extension. So, when AdGuard guys say that the only debugging tool you can use is Console, know that this isn’t true. There’s SFSafariExtensionHandler API which you can use with blockers as another extension with higher privileges to track who blocked what. Very handy in debugging (and informative for the user). Should I say that converting something like EasyList to Safari content blocker json is trivial? It is. Granted, ABP has more capabilities in its extended syntax, so you won’t be able to convert everything. There's also some rules that don’t match 1 to 1, but it isn’t something that can’t be solved. Compiling speed, for the process that happens once the blocker rules json is changed, is irrelevant for the users, unlike battery life. Thanks to the compilation, content blockers have less overhead. The number of rules limit is a non-issue. As explained in the original, EasyList has lot of mergeable rules. I may add that it has some overlapping rules too. And if for whatever reason you hit 50k limit, you can add another content blocker extension to your app. And the most important thing. It seems that AdGuard guys don’t get why content blockers in Safari don’t run scripts. It’s privacy. But Safari itself doesn’t prevent you from doing that, only not as a part of content blocker extension that is privacy-safe. Speaking of YouTube ads, yeah, it’s a pain point. By blocking resources you can get to the point where an ad will be a white screen or a video loading delay. To get around those you have to get beyond what content blockers are offering. I’m thinking about adding that capability into my blocker, but it isn’t a priority.

ameshkov 5y ago
As someone who contributed to the post we're discussing, let me please respond. > There’s SFSafariExtensionHandler API which you can use with blockers as another extension with higher privileges to track who blocked what. I am not sure what you mean here. This API (available only on macOS) does allow injecting scripts and stylesheets, it does not provide any feasible debugging tools. Granted, you may inject a script that will get some information about what's blocked, but it's far from what's required. Just compare what Safari provides with AdGuard's filtering log on any other platform or with uBlock Origin's log. The lack of such tool is the main reason filters maintainers avoid dealing with Safari. > Compiling speed, for the process that happens once the blocker rules json is changed, is irrelevant for the users Compiling speed is the reason for the rules limitation. > There's also some rules that don’t match 1 to 1, but it isn’t something that can’t be solved. Unfortunately, there is something that cannot be solved, and YT is a great example of that something. > The number of rules limit is a non-issue I have to disagree here. We're not dealing with EasyList alone, there're many other lists (regional lists for instance). You may say - okay, let's split them all to different content blockers. There's a serious problem with that, though. Different content blockers are completely independent. However, that's not how those lists are being developed - there're lists that are supposed to influence each other. Let's take the simple example - unblocking something. For instance, here is the most obvious example that happens all the time. There may be a regional list that unblocks something blocked by EasyList (or EasyPrivacy) because this "something" breaks an important website in that region. Putting EasyList into one content blocker and the regional list into another breaks the regional list. > And the most important thing. It seems that AdGuard guys don’t get why content blockers in Safari don’t run scripts. It’s privacy. But Safari itself doesn’t prevent you from doing that, only not as a part of content blocker extension that is privacy-safe. We accept that argument despite me being literally sick of hearing it (so there's privacy on iOS, but no privacy on macOS since scripts are allowed to extensions there, okaay). What's important is that we do not propose allowing running arbitrary scripts. We propose extending the declarative API in a controlled manner and it does not conflict with Safari vision. Also, that's just one of the feature requests (and bug reports) reported over the years. edit: typos

Labo333 5y ago

Unfortunately, the web gets everyday closer to some kind of "interactive TV". Computations are moving to the server side and clients are merely there to get input and display information. An illustration is the very controversial Mighty browser. As a result, programs will shortly become dependent on having an internet connection. Today, people use more Google Docs than Notepad. This removes a lot of freedom because computing now comes at the price of a subscription (for internet but also for other services be it SaaS, data monetization or server costs for self hosting).

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
judge2020 5y ago
Only if you want to use google docs’ features and optionally share it with someone later down the line easily. Save that, you can simply send them your .rtf file over email and ask them to make changes then send it back to you once they’ve done that. Did I mention you can’t work on it at the same time?
nexuist 5y ago
The entire server-first computational model of today is a direct result of the disastrous adoption of NAT, which killed peer to peer applications and from which the P2P market is still recovering from (uPnP was one such [failed] attempt to fix the problem, now WebRTC and its friends STUN/TURN are up next). Google Docs doesn't have to run on Google servers. It could run on any operating system and work from anywhere provided that you and whoever you want to work with have public IP addresses. But because everyone and everything is behind a corporate or residential router, this avenue is not available unless you are willing to work for it -- and in the case of a corporate network, you literally can't do anything except connect to a third party proxy (or a first party server) in order to be able to talk to your friends' computers. There's also no good way to handle the mobile phone problem, in which your IP address changes every so often as you pass between cell towers. Ultimately, having each client connect to a centralized server and shuttling data between them server-side ended up being the much better solution instead of the far more attractive option (to users anyways) of connecting to each other directly.

cgb223 5y ago

Has anyone used iOS browsers with adblocking built in? How do Firefox and Brave compare to Adguard or 1BlockerX? Any other browsers out there that do a better job?

ameshkov 5y ago
All those browsers have to use Safari (WKWebView) internally so they are close. There’s an important difference, these browsers can also run additional JS on web pages and partly compensate for missing content blocking capabilities. This could help to an extent, but I am not sure if the said browsers do that.
- antonok 5y ago
  Brave on iOS does inject JS into YouTube and other sites. It uses exactly the same `+js(...)` injections as Brave on desktop and Android, as well as uBlock Origin, which is really helpful. Unfortunately, JS can't solve everything... the WKWebView restrictions are definitely a huge frustration. Brave for Android and desktop both build from a single codebase, but everything has to be reimplemented to work on iOS too.
contriban 5y ago
I’ve been trying Brave this week and unfortunately it performed absolutely uselessly on some busy websites, locking up for *several seconds* every time I open a new tab. It might be a temporary bug, but I moved to DDG as my secondary browser anyway. Safari and DDG handle those same pages effortlessly.
- mp3geek 5y ago
  Which sites are causing issues?
  - contriban 5y ago
    I don’t remember which one exactly but Brave lags a lot if you open a video, scroll down, and open another video, in quick succession. It starts locking up for half a second or more once you reach the tenth video on YouTube. This is an iPhone 11 Pro, the whole UI stops being responsive

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

teekert 5y ago

I just switched from Android and I love iOS (iPhone 12 mini). But man do I miss Firefox (the real one, not the Safari skin) and man do I miss f-droid (specifically gems like GadgetBridge). If only I could have those 2 things.

wffurr 5y ago
There's Cydia: https://cydia-app.com/ https://cydia-app.com/ And if you have a Mac, you can build and install apps on your own device with Xcode. No Apple developer paid account required. AltStore does something similar by signing IPA files with your personal key: https://altstore.io/ https://altstore.io/.
- easrng 5y ago
  The site you linked to (hxxps://cydia-app.com/) is unofficial, links to piracy and spyware sites, and should not be trusted. The official Cydia site is https://cydia.saurik.com/ https://cydia.saurik.com/ but it doesn't include much information about Cydia and jailbreaks. To find out what jailbreaks are available for your device, check the r/Jailbreak wiki. (https://www.reddit.com/r/jailbreak/wiki/ios/canijailbreak https://www.reddit.com/r/jailbreak/wiki/ios/canijailbreak)
  - judge2020 5y ago
    A better 'how to jailbreak' is https://canijailbreak.com/ https://canijailbreak.com/ which is ran by some well-respected community members https://justapengu.in/about https://justapengu.in/about
  - wffurr 5y ago
    Thanks, too late to edit. Wasn't obviously a scam when I first looked at it.
kolom 5y ago
As a long time AdAway (with Root) user on on my daily driver, I am struggling with ads after moving to iPhone (12 mini). Most Games (I have tried) are barely playable for ads. And I miss "NewPipe" sooo much :( I am keeping an old android device around just for using NewPipe.

ec109685 5y ago

At some point, YouTube is just going to stich these into the main video.

tinus_hn 5y ago
Either they allow skipping through the ads or they somehow signal that it’s a different segment.
madeofpalk 5y ago
Server-side dynamic ad inclusion is relatively not new tech. I’m surprised they don’t do it already tbh
- throwaways885 5y ago
  I would assume Google would prefer to not piss off the millions of adblock using techies (including journalists) if that can be avoided.
  - wooger 5y ago
    Seriously, youtube is absolutely unusable for me with ads, they completely destroy the experience and I'd just do something else if forced to see them. In the UK, for TV we have limits on the number and total minutes of ads per hour, youtube needs to look at these.
stemlord 5y ago
This already exists on yt in the form of sponsored content in pro youtubers' videos, I use an extension called SponsorBlock that uses crowdsourced reporting to find and skip these portions... this crowdsourced approach will only work well for popular videos but unpopular vids are less often monetizable and thus not ad-ridden anyway
- ehsankia 5y ago
  It also won't work for spliced ads that vary in length.

google234123 5y ago

If you don't want ads get Youtube Premium.

matheusmoreira 5y ago
Install uBlock Origin instead.
crazypython 5y ago
While I use adblockers, I agree with this sentiment. It's easy to forget that ads pay for YouTube content, they pay for web content. Google gets an overwhelming cut, sadly. Ads fund the creators that make the content. This revenue is not much and is often barely enough to survive.
stemlord 5y ago
If I'm gonna pay for a service it sure as shit isn't gonna be from a company with no customer support system
- ehsankia 5y ago
  They have plenty customer support if you're a paying customer. Pay for Google One [0] for example and you get Customer Support for all Google services. [0] https://one.google.com/about/support https://one.google.com/about/support
  - hughrr 5y ago
    Have you actually tried Google customer support? I had more success out of staring at a banana for half an hour and waiting for an epiphany than paid GSuite support.
    - benhurmarcel 5y ago
      I've contacted Google's customer support for Stadia recently (by chat) and they were good and reactive.
    - 5y ago

happybuy 5y ago

Part of the problem – as AdGuard concedes in the post – is that Easy List (which AdGuard and many other ad blockers use) is a woefully inefficient rule list with over 50,000 entries. Many of which are out of date, redundant and not optimised for performance. This leads to excessive memory use and performance slowdowns and is one of the reasons why there is a 50,000 rule limit in the Safari Content Blocking API. As a developer of an alternate ad blocker[1] for the iPhone, iPad and Mac you can deliver a full featured, quality ad blocker with less than 5,000 core rules. This provides a faster and more efficient ad blocking experience. As they note however, YouTube ad blocking is a more difficult problem to solve, but can be done cleanly on macOS. At least at the moment it can't be done 100% on iOS without Apple rolling out some additional features to Safari on that platform. [1] https://www.magiclasso.co/ https://www.magiclasso.co/

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
_rs 5y ago
I've tried using this ad blocker before (I'm sure I saw a mention of it on DF or HN a while ago) but disabled it and went back to AdGuard. It misses too many ads for me and doesn't give me enough control (I like specifying which lists to use or if I want to just block social media widgets vs ads vs analytics/trackers.)
Farow 5y ago
> you can deliver a full featured, quality ad blocker with less than 5,000 core rule. I guess that depends on how far you stray from the top [x] sites of alexa?

whywhywhywhy 5y ago

Removing whatever Ublock Origin needed to exist in Safari is one of the dumbest moves Apple has made. To get most of the battery advantages of Macs you're forced to use Safari. But when it comes down to having to see YouTube ads I'm willing to make the tradeoff and switch to Chrome.

babypuncher 5y ago
Frankly I just hate the idea of YouTube creators getting paid for their work. /s
- VRay 5y ago
  I'd pay half a cent per video or whatever it works out to be, but I'm not going to pay by letting Google or any other corporations track my every move and action
  - babypuncher 5y ago
    I don't think blocking ads on YouTube prevents Google from being able to track you on YouTube
  - manigandham 5y ago
    There is Youtube Premium which is a flat fee: https://www.youtube.com/premium https://www.youtube.com/premium
    - benhurmarcel 5y ago
      It's a shame that they bundle it with a music subscription.
    - wooger 5y ago
      A laughably high flat fee. In the UK, 11.99 GBP per month. For no new video content I want, no new features (they still block picture in picture on iOS app & web). They bundle the crappy youtube music service which I also don't want. It's a non-starter & overpriced by a factor of 5x.

asimpletune 5y ago

If anyone wants to join my YouTube premium family plan, send me an email! It’s ~$4/mo.

fomine3 5y ago
Or become Turkish

DoingIsLearning 5y ago

On side note on this topic, I am pretty sure I am being A/B tested on youtube with some form of dynamic ad inclusion. A friend sent me a youtube link, I opened it on Firefox for Android (with the latest ublock lists), it immediately served me an ad. This had never happened to me before, I actually assumed I opened it by mistake on Android's youtube app. The only way I found that I could block it was using the older embedded videos url (www.youtube.com/embed/<video-id>) Anyone has more info on what are they doing exactly? I found a reddit post with similar complaints but everyone was equally clueless. Seems like they decided to point artillery at ublock.

judge2020 5y ago
Might or might not be what you’re describing, but it’s probably inevitable that YT will someday bake ads and mid-rolls into the videos themselves, especially if they have racks of super-fast video encoding hardware to play with[0]. Gotta pay the bills (and shareholders). 0: https://blog.youtube/inside-youtube/new-era-video-infrastructure/ https://blog.youtube/inside-youtube/new-era-video-infrastruc...

dcdc123 5y ago

I have Brave on my iPhone for the sole purpose of watching YouTube ad-free. It works flawlessly.

tipoftheiceberg 5y ago

For iOS YT users: hit refresh when the ad starts playing. Watch the ad go away. Voila.

gigaftp 5y ago

Brave on iOS still blocks YouTube ads.

jb1991 5y ago

This one single problem is why I switched to Firefox. Even the FF mobile app does a much better job.

speedgoose 5y ago
You can't switch to Firefox on iOS. It's Safari,or Safari with Firefox' UI. Apple forbids other web browser engines on iOS.
- jb1991 5y ago
  I realize that, but it doesn’t change the fact that with Firefox I don’t get ads on YouTube, whereas with Safari I do (ipad). FF probably just has additional content blocking features by default. Even when I install other content blockers on my device, safari still shows ads on YouTube.

exikyut 5y ago

Maybe slightly tangential since this is about Safari - but have 𝗬𝗼𝘂𝗧𝘂𝗯𝗲 𝗮𝗱𝘀 𝗿𝗲𝗰𝗲𝗻𝘁𝗹𝘆 𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗽𝗽𝗲𝗮𝗿𝗲𝗱 𝗶𝗻 𝗖𝗵𝗿𝗼𝗺𝗲? The declarativeWebRequest YouTube adblocker I threw together in half an hour a few months ago recently stopped working on my end too. Opting out of targeted ads serves you the bottom of the barrel, which was enough motivation to waste a day of JS spelunking (YouTube's changes "conveniently" make declarative blocking nonviable). Here's what works for me... and here's hoping it still works tomorrow :) ▶ manifest.json: { "name": "ytadblock", "description": "(license: CC0)", "version": "2.0", "manifest_version": 2, "declarative_net_request": { "rule_resources": [{ "id": "1", "enabled": true, "path": "ytadblock.json" }] }, "permissions": [ "declarativeNetRequest", "*://youtube.com/*", "*://www.youtube.com/*" ], "content_scripts": [ { "matches": ["https://*.youtube.com/*"], "js": ["contentscript.js"], "run_at": "document_start" } ], "web_accessible_resources": ["inject.js"] } ▶ ytadblock.json: [{ "id": 1, "priority": 1, "action": { "type": "block" }, "condition": { "regexFilter": ".*\\.googlevideo\\.com/.*ctier=", "resourceTypes": [ "main_frame", "sub_frame", "script", "image", "xmlhttprequest", "media", "other" ] } }] ▶ contentscript.js: console.log('hi from contentscript'); var s = document.createElement('script'); s.src = chrome.runtime.getURL('inject.js'); s.onload = function() { this.remove(); } document.documentElement.prepend(s); ▶ inject.js: 'use strict'; (function() { var parse = JSON.parse; JSON.parse = function(input) { var data = parse(input); if (typeof data['playerResponse'] !== 'undefined') { data.playerResponse.adPlacements = []; data.playerResponse.playerAds = []; } return data; } var fetch_ = fetch; fetch = async function(...args) { let response = await fetch_(...args); let text = await response.text(); if (response.url.match(/\/player\?/)) { try { var json = JSON.parse(text); if (typeof json['playerAds'] !== 'undefined') { json.adPlacements = []; json.playerAds = []; } text = JSON.stringify(json); } catch (e) {} } return new Response(text, { status: response.status, statusText: response.statusText, headers: response.headers }); }; var trap = { get(target, key) { if (key == 'create' || key == 'createAlternate') { return function(...args) { args[1].args.raw_player_response.adPlacements = []; args[1].args.raw_player_response.playerAds = []; return target[key](...args); } } else if (typeof target[key] === 'object' && (key == 'player' || key == 'Application')) { return new Proxy(target[key], trap); } else { return target[key]; } } }; var yt = new Proxy({}, trap); })(); Notes: - Ad video requests can actually be distinguished by the "ctier" parameter in the xxx.googlevideo.com URL. (I presume "c" is related to the "CSI" that seems to be everywhere on Google properties.) The sole declarative block is intended as a fallback in case the JavaScript hooks fail; you'll know if you hit these, because ad videos will spin for 5 seconds before they fail - and there might be MoRe ThAn OnE - and this may drive you very, very crazy. :) - Initial page loads now contain a JavaScript blob with content and ad video info. After a lot of stumbling around I got the idea to turn the `yt` object into a Proxy and intercept the yt.player.Application.createAlternate() function, which said blob is passed into as an argument. - YouTube seems to be using a mixture of requests to ".../player?" via Fetch and XHR POSTed requests to ".../watch?.*pbj=1" to fetch next-video-info when you click video links. Hooking XHR proved... depressingly tricky (...wow...), so I got the idea from https://greasyfork.org/en/scripts/32626-disable-youtube-video-ads/code https://greasyfork.org/en/scripts/32626-disable-youtube-vide... to hook JSON.parse instead (koooool). Hooking Fetch, or at least YouTube's use of Fetch, was thankfully not that hard. The above is quite brittle, depends on how YouTube works now, and may get caught in the crossfire of unrelated site changes. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯*

perryizgr8 5y ago

If you are using Android, be sure to check out Youtube Vanced. It cuts out all the ads very effectively, allows you to set a preferred video quality, and recently it has started blocking even in-video ads and product placement! Truly some next gen ad blocking tech.

villgax 5y ago

I just fast forward them lol