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> Are the sponsor parts really so bad? Yes. Some of us don't like being assaulted with sales pitches everywhere we look.

judge2020 5y ago
Sure, but creators don’t have many other avenues for revenue when you’re already using YouTube-dl(p) to download videos without watching ads. I imagine sponsor spots will be devalued over time as sponsorblock usage continues to grow, especially for creators with audiences that watch content on desktop more than mobile.
- Forbo 5y ago
  Is it apparent to the sponsor when someone is watching using youtube-dlp versus a regular view? I'd imagine most sponsored segments are negotiated based on subscriber count or view numbers.
  - crtasm 5y ago
    I don't believe the view counter gets incremented when using any unofficial front-end/downloader.
    - boolemancer 5y ago
      How would Google's backend know whether the traffic comes from their own frontend vs a utility like youtube-dl (assume for the sake of argument that the utility is trying to make the traffic look like normal YouTube traffic)?
      - judge2020 5y ago
        Youtube proper does a lot of JS, eg. a view is usually only counted after ~30 seconds[0] and does other things like logging the current timecode so that it can return to that time in case the user clicks off the video and returns to it later[1]. 0: https://www.tubics.com/blog/what-counts-as-a-view-on-youtube/#:~:text=The%20user%20watches%20it%20on%20the%20platform%20for%C2%A0at%20least%2030%20seconds https://www.tubics.com/blog/what-counts-as-a-view-on-youtube.... 1: https://i.judge.sh/rare/Cherry/chrome_H0p9bAoLgy.png https://i.judge.sh/rare/Cherry/chrome_H0p9bAoLgy.png the red line is how far in i've watched.
      - corobo 5y ago
        If the actual video URL is somehow grabbable from the API you might miss whatever triggers a +1 view from the website in theory
    - banana_giraffe 5y ago
      It does, it shows up as a "Other YouTube features" for the source. Though, YouTube seems to do some aggressive deduping here, if I download from 5 different IPs, excluding the IP I'm logged into YouTube's services, I see 5 views. If I download 50 times from one IP, I see one view.
      - crtasm 5y ago
        Good to know, thanks for the correction!
  - judge2020 5y ago
    Sponsors might ask for some of the creator's analytics, eg. raid: shadow legends probably isn't going to sponsor channels that have very low mobile viewership compared to desktop. There are also paid analytics tools, eg. VidIQ, which can make good guesses about some metrics.
- matheusmoreira 5y ago
  So what? Let creators figure out their business model. That's their job. We DO NOT want to look at ads. If their solution is ads, we'll block them. When are they gonna understand this?
kaladin-jasnah 5y ago
I think for some us pro-sponsor-segment people, I feel like regular ads are particularly dry and more of an "assault." But sponsor segments... can be creative, funny, and sometimes make me actually want to buy the product (...not the generic Raid: Shadow Legends ones... but even those if they're well done). I appreciate well-made ads, so I don't mind sponsor segments. Here's an example of one that is... nonsensical and perhaps a bit humorous (well, at least I liked it): https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=0jPLRtEEjhU https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=0jPLRtEEjhU
- Ansil849 5y ago
  > I appreciate well-made ads, so I don't mind sponsor segments. Then don't use the sponsor segment removal portion of the tool. Simple as that. Those of us who don't want "clever" advertising any more than "annoying" advertising can use it. And that's that.
- kelnos 5y ago
  I watch a video for whatever topic the video title and description leads me to expect I'm going to hear about. A sponsorship segment, no matter how "clever", is still an ad. > But sponsor segments... sometimes make me actually want to buy the product That's exactly what I don't want: more sophisticated psychological manipulation that gets me to buy more stuff.
- corobo 5y ago
  > sometimes make me actually want to buy the product Yes this is why we dislike them (other than time wasting) I don't want to be manipulated into buying crap, I'm good enough doing that myself
- BeFlatXIII 5y ago
  The only time I don’t smash the fast-forward button during podcast ads is during the Unmade Podcast. They actually manage to continue the show’s conversation while they promote Hover and Story Blocks. It also means that sometimes their ad slots (as defined by the time between “and now a word from this episode’s sponsor” and “thank you very much for supporting this episode”) can be over seven minutes at times.
nerdponx 5y ago
Maybe these creators should post sponsor-free versions of their videos on Patreon? If you are watching for free, and you're that annoyed by ads, then maybe you just feel entitled.
- deleted 5y ago
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- deleted 5y ago
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- Ansil849 5y ago
  > If you are watching for free, and you're that annoyed by ads, then maybe you just feel entitled. If the the content is there, I'll watch it; if it's not, I won't. I certainly don't feel entitled to it. If anything, the sense of entitlement seems to be emanating firmly from the people who upload the videos: they seem to think that because they upload videos, they are entitled to make money from them. Sorry, no.
JKCalhoun 5y ago
I'll add another wrinkle: I like content-creators that create for the love of doing it and not to try and turn it into a business. When I follow a YouRuber (I'm borrowing that typo, I like it) and have seen them descend into the paid/promotional arena, I have been turned off and stopped subscribing to their channel. Advertising tends to naturally weed out, for me, the ones who are not as passionate about what they do. Sorry if this model is counter to YT's business model. Better: if you want to make a business out of it, sell plans like WoodenGears guy, or kits like Ben Eater.
- AkBKukU 5y ago
  Preface: I am a Youtuber who prefers not to do sponsored segments but has done some in the past. > Advertising tends to naturally weed out, for me, the ones who are not as passionate about what they do. This is a remark I see over and over again, basically "You're only in it for the money" once you do sponsors. Here's the thing that no one really gets, Youtube is not a hobby. I don't care what the channel topic is, building cars, lathe projects, tech reviews, pets, etc. The hobby for the creator is the subject, not the video production platform or process. Youtube is not social media, we're not posting videos so our friends can see what we're up to. The entire system is built completely differently from something like facebook, twitter, instgram, etc. It requires actual work. Planning videos, making thumbnails, responding to comments from strangers, making business connections, and more when you get larger. "Making videos" themselves isn't just waving a camera around while you do something either and requires it's own thought and effort. Anyone who has reasonable success on Youtube can be monetarily rewarded for that. That alone creates an expectation that it could possibly be a source of income from the outset. If you can achieve making it a sustainable income source capable of being lived off of, why wouldn't you? You can continue to do and build upon your actual hobby, whatever it is. But instead of working a different "conventional" job you do video production, PR, marketing, and potentially advertising. The problem is that the on platform advertisement revenue is not enough to cover the effort and resources required to make videos as you become more serious about it. Part of this is on viewers because Youtube knows if you are using adblock. I can see this on the back end, on average for my channel less than 50% of views are monetized. So if nobody used adblock I could make literally double the amount on just the on platform ads alone. But that's not how it is and it's not going to change. So you have to do something else as well. Personally, as a Youtuber, I see two revenue paths. You either go crowd funded with something like Patreon or do sponsors. You can do both but unless it's well done and relevant it feels like double dipping to me. But the in video sponsors aren't any different than the other advertisements on platform on youtube, except they aren't blocked by adblock. (Youtubers properly disclosing the ads is a completely separate issue that should not besmirch everyone who does it.) Youtubers don't get to choose their sponsor partners unless they are gigantic and have to take what they can get. We get tons of spam offers that try to screw us, taking real ones from even slightly reputable companies can make a big impact. Youtubers should do a better job of picking them, but not everybody understands something like what a VPN actually is and how is just moves your endpoint to a different set of private hands. But advertising is tied to media and not new at all. Complaining about a slightly more effective version of it is just naivety about how the service works and what the people who make the videos do. TL;DR: Youtube is not a hobby, the subject Youtubers talk about is. Youtube is a job that takes real work, but it can't pay well enough, partly because of adblock. In video sponsors are just a different ad method that directly pays bypassing the adblock problem. PS: I do not use adblock, partly because it feels hypocritical to make money on ads and then block them for others. The internet is indeed annoying without it, but I manage just fine.
matheusmoreira 5y ago
Yeah! Why do people think this is acceptable? It boggles my mind.
puchatek 5y ago
You conveniently skipped the rest of his comment which was really the important part... There is no need to state the obvious. Nobody would miss any kind of advertisement in the media they consume but that doesn't answer how content creators are supposed to be compensated for the effort they put in.

judge2020 5y ago

Sure, but creators don’t have many other avenues for revenue when you’re already using YouTube-dl(p) to download videos without watching ads. I imagine sponsor spots will be devalued over time as sponsorblock usage continues to grow, especially for creators with audiences that watch content on desktop more than mobile.

Forbo 5y ago
Is it apparent to the sponsor when someone is watching using youtube-dlp versus a regular view? I'd imagine most sponsored segments are negotiated based on subscriber count or view numbers.
- crtasm 5y ago
  I don't believe the view counter gets incremented when using any unofficial front-end/downloader.
  - boolemancer 5y ago
    How would Google's backend know whether the traffic comes from their own frontend vs a utility like youtube-dl (assume for the sake of argument that the utility is trying to make the traffic look like normal YouTube traffic)?
    - judge2020 5y ago
      Youtube proper does a lot of JS, eg. a view is usually only counted after ~30 seconds[0] and does other things like logging the current timecode so that it can return to that time in case the user clicks off the video and returns to it later[1]. 0: https://www.tubics.com/blog/what-counts-as-a-view-on-youtube/#:~:text=The%20user%20watches%20it%20on%20the%20platform%20for%C2%A0at%20least%2030%20seconds https://www.tubics.com/blog/what-counts-as-a-view-on-youtube.... 1: https://i.judge.sh/rare/Cherry/chrome_H0p9bAoLgy.png https://i.judge.sh/rare/Cherry/chrome_H0p9bAoLgy.png the red line is how far in i've watched.
    - corobo 5y ago
      If the actual video URL is somehow grabbable from the API you might miss whatever triggers a +1 view from the website in theory
  - banana_giraffe 5y ago
    It does, it shows up as a "Other YouTube features" for the source. Though, YouTube seems to do some aggressive deduping here, if I download from 5 different IPs, excluding the IP I'm logged into YouTube's services, I see 5 views. If I download 50 times from one IP, I see one view.
    - crtasm 5y ago
      Good to know, thanks for the correction!
- judge2020 5y ago
  Sponsors might ask for some of the creator's analytics, eg. raid: shadow legends probably isn't going to sponsor channels that have very low mobile viewership compared to desktop. There are also paid analytics tools, eg. VidIQ, which can make good guesses about some metrics.
matheusmoreira 5y ago
So what? Let creators figure out their business model. That's their job. We DO NOT want to look at ads. If their solution is ads, we'll block them. When are they gonna understand this?

kaladin-jasnah 5y ago

I think for some us pro-sponsor-segment people, I feel like regular ads are particularly dry and more of an "assault." But sponsor segments... can be creative, funny, and sometimes make me actually want to buy the product (...not the generic Raid: Shadow Legends ones... but even those if they're well done). I appreciate well-made ads, so I don't mind sponsor segments. Here's an example of one that is... nonsensical and perhaps a bit humorous (well, at least I liked it): https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=0jPLRtEEjhU https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=0jPLRtEEjhU

Ansil849 5y ago
> I appreciate well-made ads, so I don't mind sponsor segments. Then don't use the sponsor segment removal portion of the tool. Simple as that. Those of us who don't want "clever" advertising any more than "annoying" advertising can use it. And that's that.
kelnos 5y ago
I watch a video for whatever topic the video title and description leads me to expect I'm going to hear about. A sponsorship segment, no matter how "clever", is still an ad. > But sponsor segments... sometimes make me actually want to buy the product That's exactly what I don't want: more sophisticated psychological manipulation that gets me to buy more stuff.
corobo 5y ago
> sometimes make me actually want to buy the product Yes this is why we dislike them (other than time wasting) I don't want to be manipulated into buying crap, I'm good enough doing that myself
BeFlatXIII 5y ago
The only time I don’t smash the fast-forward button during podcast ads is during the Unmade Podcast. They actually manage to continue the show’s conversation while they promote Hover and Story Blocks. It also means that sometimes their ad slots (as defined by the time between “and now a word from this episode’s sponsor” and “thank you very much for supporting this episode”) can be over seven minutes at times.

nerdponx 5y ago

Maybe these creators should post sponsor-free versions of their videos on Patreon? If you are watching for free, and you're that annoyed by ads, then maybe you just feel entitled.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
Ansil849 5y ago
> If you are watching for free, and you're that annoyed by ads, then maybe you just feel entitled. If the the content is there, I'll watch it; if it's not, I won't. I certainly don't feel entitled to it. If anything, the sense of entitlement seems to be emanating firmly from the people who upload the videos: they seem to think that because they upload videos, they are entitled to make money from them. Sorry, no.

JKCalhoun 5y ago

I'll add another wrinkle: I like content-creators that create for the love of doing it and not to try and turn it into a business. When I follow a YouRuber (I'm borrowing that typo, I like it) and have seen them descend into the paid/promotional arena, I have been turned off and stopped subscribing to their channel. Advertising tends to naturally weed out, for me, the ones who are not as passionate about what they do. Sorry if this model is counter to YT's business model. Better: if you want to make a business out of it, sell plans like WoodenGears guy, or kits like Ben Eater.

AkBKukU 5y ago
Preface: I am a Youtuber who prefers not to do sponsored segments but has done some in the past. > Advertising tends to naturally weed out, for me, the ones who are not as passionate about what they do. This is a remark I see over and over again, basically "You're only in it for the money" once you do sponsors. Here's the thing that no one really gets, Youtube is not a hobby. I don't care what the channel topic is, building cars, lathe projects, tech reviews, pets, etc. The hobby for the creator is the subject, not the video production platform or process. Youtube is not social media, we're not posting videos so our friends can see what we're up to. The entire system is built completely differently from something like facebook, twitter, instgram, etc. It requires actual work. Planning videos, making thumbnails, responding to comments from strangers, making business connections, and more when you get larger. "Making videos" themselves isn't just waving a camera around while you do something either and requires it's own thought and effort. Anyone who has reasonable success on Youtube can be monetarily rewarded for that. That alone creates an expectation that it could possibly be a source of income from the outset. If you can achieve making it a sustainable income source capable of being lived off of, why wouldn't you? You can continue to do and build upon your actual hobby, whatever it is. But instead of working a different "conventional" job you do video production, PR, marketing, and potentially advertising. The problem is that the on platform advertisement revenue is not enough to cover the effort and resources required to make videos as you become more serious about it. Part of this is on viewers because Youtube knows if you are using adblock. I can see this on the back end, on average for my channel less than 50% of views are monetized. So if nobody used adblock I could make literally double the amount on just the on platform ads alone. But that's not how it is and it's not going to change. So you have to do something else as well. Personally, as a Youtuber, I see two revenue paths. You either go crowd funded with something like Patreon or do sponsors. You can do both but unless it's well done and relevant it feels like double dipping to me. But the in video sponsors aren't any different than the other advertisements on platform on youtube, except they aren't blocked by adblock. (Youtubers properly disclosing the ads is a completely separate issue that should not besmirch everyone who does it.) Youtubers don't get to choose their sponsor partners unless they are gigantic and have to take what they can get. We get tons of spam offers that try to screw us, taking real ones from even slightly reputable companies can make a big impact. Youtubers should do a better job of picking them, but not everybody understands something like what a VPN actually is and how is just moves your endpoint to a different set of private hands. But advertising is tied to media and not new at all. Complaining about a slightly more effective version of it is just naivety about how the service works and what the people who make the videos do. TL;DR: Youtube is not a hobby, the subject Youtubers talk about is. Youtube is a job that takes real work, but it can't pay well enough, partly because of adblock. In video sponsors are just a different ad method that directly pays bypassing the adblock problem. PS: I do not use adblock, partly because it feels hypocritical to make money on ads and then block them for others. The internet is indeed annoying without it, but I manage just fine.

matheusmoreira 5y ago

Yeah! Why do people think this is acceptable? It boggles my mind.

puchatek 5y ago

You conveniently skipped the rest of his comment which was really the important part... There is no need to state the obvious. Nobody would miss any kind of advertisement in the media they consume but that doesn't answer how content creators are supposed to be compensated for the effort they put in.