Well, I've had ad-free access to YouTube for free since virtually forever using μBlock Origin.

Creators aren't getting paid if you use adblock.

You know what, that could be the solution to fix the internet.

Years ago before ads, the only people that published stuff were the ones who were legitimately interested. They were publishing out of love, not greed.

Today, all kinds of low quality content is published because they want ad-revenue. It makes it very hard to find the high quality content.

I say don't pay any of the creators. Then the only creators left will be the ones not doing it for money.

And without a profit motive, people will begin the true work of their lives and dreams! (Except that they still need to survive.) What is ethical about paying a plumber but not an artist?

That's lovely in theory, but the reality is that it just means the majority of the creators left will be the ones being paid directly because their content is primarily promotional, and some of the better creators will turn their hand to something else [or something more explicitly promotional or hard to find because it's behind a paywall] because everyone has to eat.

And what was left wouldn't be easier to find, because there wouldn't be a free platform to find them on.

I spend almost 30€ per month via Tipeee (an equivalent of Patreon in France). Creators whose work I value are getting more from me than from the ads that would otherwise track, profile, and brainwash me. Also, many content creators are getting paid more from partnership and product placement than from the shitty ads that YouTube and advertisers allow them to place on their videos except when they decide not to because well, that 20 minutes original content video is using a 1.5 seconds excerpt of some random movie which is the "intellectual property" of Big Corp for a joke, for example.

Doesn't really matter much, YouTube's payment scheme is too unreliable anyway (constantly changing rules, entire channels being demonetized because of one video, no actual support when unjustly demonetized or when someone copyright claims your video etc.). Most creators already ignore YouTube and base their funding on sites like Patreon.

Nor are they getting paid [fairly] if you don't :)

Not my problem though

I never asked them to produce the content in the first place

I don't want to give my money or my attention to YouTube and Google ads, simple as that

Yes, but you need a google account, which means you add to the google personnal stash.

Google has enough data about me, I'm not going to pay so it can get more of it.

So you don't want Google to monetize your data, you don't want to pay for the service and you also won't stop using the service?

????

I'm just explaining my motivations, not pretending to have the moral high ground.

This is the strategy I use purely because it's what's best for me, selfishly.

I think the issue is that Google takes your money and monetizes your data anyway.

> you don't want to pay for the service

I'd be happy to pay for YouTube, if it didn't mean signing a contract whereby they own my life. (Minor exaggeration – they don't get exclusive rights to it.)

Give it to me for free and sell merch on your store like everybody else, Goog

Plus you get youtube music which is just as good as spotify or amazon music - all this for Rs.129 / mo is unbelievable.

As a matter of fact I often find songs on yt music that are not on Spotify.

I was using YouTube music for about 4 months. Since it was a promotional offer with my phone, I figured I might as well use it. This was relatively early at launch, so things might have changed. But back when I tested it, the app was pretty bad, the desktop version didn't work properly in firefox (media keys were not working), there were no curated playlists and so on. It might be a nice addition if you want to use YT Premium, but its certainly not a 1:1 replacement for Spotify or Apple Music.

I think the price is different based on where you are. In the U.S. the cost is $11.99 USD which translates to ~Rs. 914

Man that is expensive and totally not worth it. I think they are offering special launch pricing for India? (1)

(1) https://www.google.com/search?q=youtube+premium+india+price

Yeah, and if you want to listen to music on the go, you just have to leave your screen on the entire time, or pay this ransom you speak of.

Is anyone using web without an ad blocker nowadays?

I am using Youtube (with Premium) and HN. Almost no other sites, only as links from HN. So here am I - not using adblock and not seeing lots of ads either.

How can I setup a trustworthy adblock solution for my iOS devices? I don’t want to re-configure or having to maintain my router settings etc.

I've been using Adguard Pro [1], which is paid (not subscription), but open source [2], on my iOS devices. It uses Safari's content blocker mechanism for blocking ads on the web. I went with it over other apps because it supports adding custom rules to block specific elements on a page, like with other desktop ad blockers. If you want to block ads outside of Safari, it can optionally set up a VPN on localhost to block the traffic.

[1] https://apps.apple.com/us/app/adguard-pro-adblock-privacy/id...

[2] https://github.com/AdguardTeam/AdguardForiOS

NextDNS

https://nextdns.io/

ABP? https://adblockplus.org/blog/adblock-plus-for-ios-9-finally-...

I have found that just refreshing the page (mobile view only) removes the ads.

Check with your parents or non-technical friends.

You will be definitely surprised.

Checked, they said adblockers were difficult to use and gave scary browser permission messages. One friend said he was afraid Google would shut down his account if they found out that he was "cheating youtube of their ads".

Might sound strange to some but when you teach users that their PC isn't really theirs to control (Windows EULA or Chromebook TOS) you get this kind of chilling effects and it's only getting worse.

That's the thing - we (technical people) help others, and this includes installing or recommending an ad blocker.

This. The first thing I do when setting up a computer for a non-technical family member is install Chrome and uBlock Origin. I personally use Firefox but it hasn't been worth the trouble to try and have them use that. When the only thing on your laptop is Chrome it usually runs without issue.

Guys I have one easier: You can get a Ferrari if you just pay for it.

The problem is that you're now providing validated billing details to an ad-tech company which is the worst thing you can do as far as privacy is concerned, and creators don't get paid fairly either.

You're much better off taking your $10/month and dividing it equally across the creators you watch regularly on Patreon, and using an ad-blocker on the videos themselves.

Creators get paid, adtech scum doesn't, and you get to keep a bit of privacy.