3 ms·

I'm honestly surprised that Google hasn't directly injected the ads into the video itself, so it can't be skipped beyond some kind of AI looking for drastic sce

I'm honestly surprised that Google hasn't directly injected the ads into the video itself, so it can't be skipped beyond some kind of AI looking for drastic scene changes.

TheBozzCL 3y ago
Shhhh, don't give them ideas.
- Workaccount2 3y ago
  They definitely have had the idea for a long time. It is almost certainly a technical limitation stopping them. I'd guess that decoding, splicing, and then re-encoding is too compute intensive for it to be worth it.
  - waselighis 3y ago
    No need to re-encode the video. Just split the video at a keyframe and inject an ad at that point, no re-encoding required. Most video files have keyframes every few seconds or so. The proper term is I-frames, though they're commonly known as keyframes as well. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Video_compression_picture_types https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Video_compression_picture_type...
    - M95D 3y ago
      Not so easy with audio. With any variable bitrate audio codec, there will be sync problems.
fragmede 3y ago
Google doesn't do it but the creators already do. There's sponsorblock for that though. Paying for things is also on the table.
- Gigachad 3y ago
  Creators have already started interspersing the sponsor with the content so if you skip the sponsor section, you miss out on part of the video.
- latexr 3y ago
  SponsorBlock crowdsources the location to skip to. If YouTube spliced ads in the video that would no longer work, as timestamps would be different for each person/region/however they target ads.
latexr 3y ago
Right now they force you to watch for a number of seconds before you can skip ahead. If the ad were in the video, you could skip immediately. Perhaps not to the exact moment it ends, but you can scrub or jump in 10 second increments until there’s no ad. You check with your eyes, no AI necessary. It’s basically what we did decades ago with VCRs.

I'm honestly surprised that Google hasn't directly injected the ads into the video itself, so it can't be skipped beyond some kind of AI looking for drastic scene changes.

TheBozzCL 3y ago

Shhhh, don't give them ideas.

Workaccount2 3y ago
They definitely have had the idea for a long time. It is almost certainly a technical limitation stopping them. I'd guess that decoding, splicing, and then re-encoding is too compute intensive for it to be worth it.
- waselighis 3y ago
  No need to re-encode the video. Just split the video at a keyframe and inject an ad at that point, no re-encoding required. Most video files have keyframes every few seconds or so. The proper term is I-frames, though they're commonly known as keyframes as well. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Video_compression_picture_types https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Video_compression_picture_type...
  - M95D 3y ago
    Not so easy with audio. With any variable bitrate audio codec, there will be sync problems.

fragmede 3y ago

Google doesn't do it but the creators already do. There's sponsorblock for that though. Paying for things is also on the table.

Gigachad 3y ago
Creators have already started interspersing the sponsor with the content so if you skip the sponsor section, you miss out on part of the video.
latexr 3y ago
SponsorBlock crowdsources the location to skip to. If YouTube spliced ads in the video that would no longer work, as timestamps would be different for each person/region/however they target ads.

latexr 3y ago

Right now they force you to watch for a number of seconds before you can skip ahead. If the ad were in the video, you could skip immediately. Perhaps not to the exact moment it ends, but you can scrub or jump in 10 second increments until there’s no ad. You check with your eyes, no AI necessary. It’s basically what we did decades ago with VCRs.