10 ms·

I am not sure why this is a bug? Youtube is tracking people, this blocks them tracking people. A side effect of a view not being counted on Youtube, is 100% You

I am not sure why this is a bug? Youtube is tracking people, this blocks them tracking people. A side effect of a view not being counted on Youtube, is 100% Youtube's problem, and doesn't effect the user in any way.

cluckindan 1y ago
Sounds like YT is trying to mobilize creators and influencers against adblocking.
- avian 1y ago
  I don't think YouTube needed to do anything. The change influenced creators' bottom line so they are motivated on their own to mobilize their viewers against this change.
  - cluckindan 1y ago
    It was YT that changed the ad delivery mechanism to prevent view counting, not adblockers.
    - kllrnohj 1y ago
      It was an easylist change (so adblockers) that caused the issue: https://github.com/easylist/easylist/commit/2d39de407dc96904f00ec91b89d5fa91d29fbfa0 https://github.com/easylist/easylist/commit/2d39de407dc96904... Whether or not you consider that an issue shrug but it's not directly YT's fault.
- mustyoshi 1y ago
  Ads are how they get paid until they're big enough for alternative revenue generation.
  - zelphirkalt 1y ago
    This actually hints at a way out of the YouTube monopoly. Make creators' business model no longer work on YouTube, by blocking the tracking. Make it so that creators are forced to go to other, paid video platforms, instead of them feeding the YouTube monopoly. This might temporarily lead to a collapse in video creator business, but in the long run might result in more viable businesses for creators, without them having to push shit onto their viewers. Make videos and enjoy them being seen, or make paid content and have people pay for that, but don't try to shoehorn it into viewing videos that are accessible for anyone running a Youtube search.
- reddalo 1y ago
  > against adblocking And extensions such as SponsorBlock [1], which help user skipping sponsored sections or useless intros in videos. [1] https://sponsor.ajay.app/ https://sponsor.ajay.app/
  - MattBearman 1y ago
    YouTube premium actually has its own version of sponsorblock called skip ahead, it works really well, so they’re not ideologically opposed to skipping sponsored segments
    - delecti 1y ago
      I've got Youtube premium and have never noticed that popping up. Is this platform or browser dependent? Is it only on some videos?
      - Wohlf 1y ago
        It isn't automatic for me unless I try to skip a sponsored segment myself, then it will kick in and skip me to the end of that segment with a popup above the scroll bar saying they did so.
      - bogtog 1y ago
        Might just be the channels you're viewing. This video should have a "Jump ahead" appear around 0:19: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rs5PfanIkC0&t=1s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rs5PfanIkC0&t=1s
      - SchemaLoad 1y ago
        On the TV app, if you hit the forward button it instantly skips over the entire "commonly skipped section".
    - humpty-d 1y ago
      That doesn't just target sponsor segments. It's for stuff commonly skipped. Like annoying parts of videos. Some video game guy I occasionally watching thinks he needs to sing for some reason, very useful for skipping those sections.
- marcosscriven 1y ago
  This was my exact thought when I read about it. YouTube clearly has a record of what I’ve watched, because it’s in my watch history. What they are missing is proof I’ve watched the ads - which I haven’t.
  - natebc 1y ago
    They may in fact not know what you watched. I was having an issue with my youtube recommendations becoming generic to the point of irrelevance, when i went and looked at my watch history and it hadn't been updated in MONTHS despite me watching youtube daily. Turns out that pi-hole was blocking the endpoint that records the watch history! IIRC allowing queries for something like s.youtube.com made my watch history start working. I agree that they should know w/o all this client based nonsense but :shrug:. They don't, somehow!
- tomrod 1y ago
  Morally indefensible. Adblockers are used as a response to Google externalizing/ignoring the cost of proper ad platform curation.
- alkonaut 1y ago
  Sounds fair? Both creators and YouTube have the same goal of having people watch ads (or pay not to).
andrewmcwatters 1y ago
A lot of people clearly didn’t like Yuki’s response, but he’s entirely right.
- ecshafer 1y ago
  The thumbs downs on Yuki's responses are baffling. It is a privacy filter, improving privacy. There is a strong para-social relationship with many younger internet users, so maybe people really do feel strongly about affecting their favorite youtube star's view count? Or it could be youtube creators who are worried. I can't think of any other reasons a user would be on the side of youtube here.
  - philipallstar 1y ago
    Picking sides is silly. Just don't use YouTube, or pay for it with money or ad time and data.
    - lupusreal 1y ago
      I'll use it and I'll not pay.
    - zelphirkalt 1y ago
      I think, if that was YouTube's goal, they should close their platform tomorrow, and put everything behind a paid login. That would be the honest move. Instead they are trying to sneakily profit from viewers, by sneaking in ads in whatever way possible. They are employing dark pattern after pattern and are extorting "consent". It is entirely reasonable to block their dark patterns and just watch videos without ads. If it bothers them, go ahead, hide everything behind paid access. See how quickly their monopoly will evaporate then.
    - barnabee 1y ago
      I’d rather actively hurt their business model, thanks
  - NewsaHackO 1y ago
slightwinder 1y ago
It's a problem for the Creators. Their stats are lower than they should be, which could have negative effects on their business, like YouTubes recommendation-system not working as efficient as it should be. Similar, would they have a weaker selling-point for companies advertising on their channel. It should be noted that YouTube income is unaffected by this, as Ads are still shown and counted to people without AdBlockers. So this is only harmful to the creators, and not YouTube.
- rapind 1y ago
  > So this is only harmful to the creators, and not YouTube. Pretty sure this is harmful to youtube as well as it lowers the value (less personalization data) for advertisers. Also the knock-on effect of impacting creators, meaning less investment in creating content. That being said, I've always hated this business model. It's created so many other problems in our society. Resulting in a shift to authoritarian leadership in many countries.
  - DoctorOW 1y ago
    Adblock users already have no value for advertisers.
- ecshafer 1y ago
  But why would I, as a user of Easy Privacy, care about this? It is protecting my own privacy. Someone trying to get more money on the internet isn't really my concern.
  - Workaccount2 1y ago
    The correct approach is to not use these services. Ad-blocking and using the service just sends the message that you are leeching, not that the service is bad.
    - mhuffman 1y ago
      It seems to be sending the same message either way, no? Either not watching them or the ad-blocking reducing their count seems to be the same in the end.
deleted 1y ago
[deleted]
marklubi 1y ago
Might be a problem with Adblock, but also, Firefox just released an update that blocks social networks. I run a couple different privacy add-ons for various different levels of blocking things, but the Firefox update has seriously broken a lot of stuff
swiftcoder 1y ago
It seems like a YouTube bug, that they are performing view tracking on the client, when they own the whole server backend and could just as well track them server side (which wouldn't be blockable in the first place)
- nonameiguess 1y ago
  It seems like server-side would suffer from issues due to buffering lookahead and autoplay. A client can request a video that is skipped within seconds, but if buffering causes it to request five minutes worth, the server only sees five minutes were requested, whereas the client can clearly tell how much of that was actually watched.
- paxys 1y ago
  Server-side tracking would be the easiest thing in the world to spoof.
  - swiftcoder 1y ago
    How is it any easier to spoof than client-side tracking? In the server-side case I can certainly increase views by fetching the video multiple times, but in the client side case I can hit the analytics endpoint directly just as easily
    - paxys 1y ago
      Bot detection systems all work client side. What browser are you using, what cookies do you have, how is your mouse moving, how much time are you taking between clicks, how many captchas have you solved. All this and more is collected and passed to the server, which can then determine if the view was valid or not. Plus you can do this multiple times during a watch session rather than just in the beginning when the video is requested. If the adblocker is blocking this data then the server has nothing to go on.
paxys 1y ago
It doesn't really affect YouTube either, it affects creators who rely on view counts to monetize their channels.

cluckindan 1y ago

Sounds like YT is trying to mobilize creators and influencers against adblocking.

avian 1y ago
I don't think YouTube needed to do anything. The change influenced creators' bottom line so they are motivated on their own to mobilize their viewers against this change.
- cluckindan 1y ago
  It was YT that changed the ad delivery mechanism to prevent view counting, not adblockers.
  - kllrnohj 1y ago
    It was an easylist change (so adblockers) that caused the issue: https://github.com/easylist/easylist/commit/2d39de407dc96904f00ec91b89d5fa91d29fbfa0 https://github.com/easylist/easylist/commit/2d39de407dc96904... Whether or not you consider that an issue shrug but it's not directly YT's fault.
mustyoshi 1y ago
Ads are how they get paid until they're big enough for alternative revenue generation.
- zelphirkalt 1y ago
  This actually hints at a way out of the YouTube monopoly. Make creators' business model no longer work on YouTube, by blocking the tracking. Make it so that creators are forced to go to other, paid video platforms, instead of them feeding the YouTube monopoly. This might temporarily lead to a collapse in video creator business, but in the long run might result in more viable businesses for creators, without them having to push shit onto their viewers. Make videos and enjoy them being seen, or make paid content and have people pay for that, but don't try to shoehorn it into viewing videos that are accessible for anyone running a Youtube search.
reddalo 1y ago
> against adblocking And extensions such as SponsorBlock [1], which help user skipping sponsored sections or useless intros in videos. [1] https://sponsor.ajay.app/ https://sponsor.ajay.app/
- MattBearman 1y ago
  YouTube premium actually has its own version of sponsorblock called skip ahead, it works really well, so they’re not ideologically opposed to skipping sponsored segments
  - delecti 1y ago
    I've got Youtube premium and have never noticed that popping up. Is this platform or browser dependent? Is it only on some videos?
    - Wohlf 1y ago
      It isn't automatic for me unless I try to skip a sponsored segment myself, then it will kick in and skip me to the end of that segment with a popup above the scroll bar saying they did so.
    - bogtog 1y ago
      Might just be the channels you're viewing. This video should have a "Jump ahead" appear around 0:19: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rs5PfanIkC0&t=1s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rs5PfanIkC0&t=1s
    - SchemaLoad 1y ago
      On the TV app, if you hit the forward button it instantly skips over the entire "commonly skipped section".
  - humpty-d 1y ago
    That doesn't just target sponsor segments. It's for stuff commonly skipped. Like annoying parts of videos. Some video game guy I occasionally watching thinks he needs to sing for some reason, very useful for skipping those sections.
marcosscriven 1y ago
This was my exact thought when I read about it. YouTube clearly has a record of what I’ve watched, because it’s in my watch history. What they are missing is proof I’ve watched the ads - which I haven’t.
- natebc 1y ago
  They may in fact not know what you watched. I was having an issue with my youtube recommendations becoming generic to the point of irrelevance, when i went and looked at my watch history and it hadn't been updated in MONTHS despite me watching youtube daily. Turns out that pi-hole was blocking the endpoint that records the watch history! IIRC allowing queries for something like s.youtube.com made my watch history start working. I agree that they should know w/o all this client based nonsense but :shrug:. They don't, somehow!
tomrod 1y ago
Morally indefensible. Adblockers are used as a response to Google externalizing/ignoring the cost of proper ad platform curation.
alkonaut 1y ago
Sounds fair? Both creators and YouTube have the same goal of having people watch ads (or pay not to).

andrewmcwatters 1y ago

A lot of people clearly didn’t like Yuki’s response, but he’s entirely right.

ecshafer 1y ago
The thumbs downs on Yuki's responses are baffling. It is a privacy filter, improving privacy. There is a strong para-social relationship with many younger internet users, so maybe people really do feel strongly about affecting their favorite youtube star's view count? Or it could be youtube creators who are worried. I can't think of any other reasons a user would be on the side of youtube here.
- philipallstar 1y ago
  Picking sides is silly. Just don't use YouTube, or pay for it with money or ad time and data.
  - lupusreal 1y ago
    I'll use it and I'll not pay.
  - zelphirkalt 1y ago
    I think, if that was YouTube's goal, they should close their platform tomorrow, and put everything behind a paid login. That would be the honest move. Instead they are trying to sneakily profit from viewers, by sneaking in ads in whatever way possible. They are employing dark pattern after pattern and are extorting "consent". It is entirely reasonable to block their dark patterns and just watch videos without ads. If it bothers them, go ahead, hide everything behind paid access. See how quickly their monopoly will evaporate then.
  - barnabee 1y ago
    I’d rather actively hurt their business model, thanks
- NewsaHackO 1y ago

slightwinder 1y ago

It's a problem for the Creators. Their stats are lower than they should be, which could have negative effects on their business, like YouTubes recommendation-system not working as efficient as it should be. Similar, would they have a weaker selling-point for companies advertising on their channel. It should be noted that YouTube income is unaffected by this, as Ads are still shown and counted to people without AdBlockers. So this is only harmful to the creators, and not YouTube.

rapind 1y ago
> So this is only harmful to the creators, and not YouTube. Pretty sure this is harmful to youtube as well as it lowers the value (less personalization data) for advertisers. Also the knock-on effect of impacting creators, meaning less investment in creating content. That being said, I've always hated this business model. It's created so many other problems in our society. Resulting in a shift to authoritarian leadership in many countries.
- DoctorOW 1y ago
  Adblock users already have no value for advertisers.
ecshafer 1y ago
But why would I, as a user of Easy Privacy, care about this? It is protecting my own privacy. Someone trying to get more money on the internet isn't really my concern.
- Workaccount2 1y ago
  The correct approach is to not use these services. Ad-blocking and using the service just sends the message that you are leeching, not that the service is bad.
  - mhuffman 1y ago
    It seems to be sending the same message either way, no? Either not watching them or the ad-blocking reducing their count seems to be the same in the end.

deleted 1y ago

[deleted]

marklubi 1y ago

Might be a problem with Adblock, but also, Firefox just released an update that blocks social networks. I run a couple different privacy add-ons for various different levels of blocking things, but the Firefox update has seriously broken a lot of stuff

swiftcoder 1y ago

It seems like a YouTube bug, that they are performing view tracking on the client, when they own the whole server backend and could just as well track them server side (which wouldn't be blockable in the first place)

nonameiguess 1y ago
It seems like server-side would suffer from issues due to buffering lookahead and autoplay. A client can request a video that is skipped within seconds, but if buffering causes it to request five minutes worth, the server only sees five minutes were requested, whereas the client can clearly tell how much of that was actually watched.
paxys 1y ago
Server-side tracking would be the easiest thing in the world to spoof.
- swiftcoder 1y ago
  How is it any easier to spoof than client-side tracking? In the server-side case I can certainly increase views by fetching the video multiple times, but in the client side case I can hit the analytics endpoint directly just as easily
  - paxys 1y ago
    Bot detection systems all work client side. What browser are you using, what cookies do you have, how is your mouse moving, how much time are you taking between clicks, how many captchas have you solved. All this and more is collected and passed to the server, which can then determine if the view was valid or not. Plus you can do this multiple times during a watch session rather than just in the beginning when the video is requested. If the adblocker is blocking this data then the server has nothing to go on.

paxys 1y ago

It doesn't really affect YouTube either, it affects creators who rely on view counts to monetize their channels.