Re:YouTube artificially slows down video load times when usi...
by ascagnel_ on Monday November 20, 2023 @11:19AM
(#38349987)
The 5-second wait is the issue, not the means it was obtained -- a fixed wait time either wastes the user's time (by making it take longer than necessary) or is prone to bugs (if the awaited task takes >5 seconds, then the end of the timer will likely break). The better question is _why_ a 5-second wait was necessary, and there's almost certainly a better way to handle that need without the fixed wait time.
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Re:YouTube artificially slows down video load times when usi...
by saynay on Monday November 20, 2023 @12:27PM
(#38351063)
OPs point, I think, is that wasting the user's time is part of the point of the code. This specific code seems partially meant as a punishment of the user for using an adblocker.
Re:YouTube artificially slows down video load times when usi...
by snvzz on Monday November 20, 2023 @01:41PM
(#38352378)
*for using firefox instead of google's own browser.
Re:YouTube artificially slows down video load times when usi...
by saynay on Monday November 20, 2023 @01:58PM
(#38352676)
That's somewhat in debate, the last I saw. The initial report was it affected a user using Firefox, and it didn't when they switched useragents. Since then, there have been reports of users not seeing it in Firefox, but seeing it in other (even chromium-based) browsers. So it seems likely they are A/B testing it, but less clear if they are intentionally targeting non-Chrome browsers.
Their goal, quite clearly, is to prevent (or at least heavily discourage) adblockers. This is one attempt to detect them, and maybe in Chrome they have a different detection mechanism so it doesn't show the same behavior.
It would be a particularly foolish move on their part to push Chrome by punishing everything else right now, while they are in the middle of multiple anti-trust lawsuits. It makes me think that is unlikely to be the intent of this change.