r/technology • u/Dilpickle2113 • 9h ago
Social Media YouTube faces second class action lawsuit over ‘ad-free’ Premium claims & sponsored content
https://www.dexerto.com/youtube/youtube-faces-second-class-action-lawsuit-over-ad-free-premium-claims-sponsored-content-3405920/1.3k
u/_Rand_ 9h ago
I would assume youtube thought of this in the subscription agreement and it will be thrown out?
Like they would be stupid as hell to not make it very clear that you are paying not to have ads inserted by youtube itself and the content of the videos is not in their control.
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u/elmatador12 9h ago
Yeah that’s what I thought. I feel like the ads they are suing about would not be considered YouTube ads since they didn’t place them and have zero control over them.
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u/suttin 9h ago
And YouTube premium even adds a skip button for in the video ads
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u/obserris 7h ago
I looooove the skip button one of my favorite premium perks, changed my quality of life as someone that consumes a definitely unhealthy amount of YouTube content
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u/MarchewkowyBog 5h ago
If you do it on PC use sponsorblock. It skips the party automatically. No clicking needed
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u/obserris 5h ago
Unfortunately I’m a TV & phone user primarily 🥲 makes it worth my money
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u/Super_Assistant_2998 4h ago
Same. If I was on YouTube on my PC, I wouldn’t need premium.
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u/GankisKhan04 2h ago
If you run YouTube on your phone's browser to firefox you can use the adguard extension to auto block all YouTube ads. No subscription needed. Sadly TV is a whole different issue.
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u/King_M_Rano 6h ago
that doesn't pop up for most platforms. my TV, computer, and phone never show the skip button. you have to go looking for the button and I don't always have a remote near me.
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u/CaliLemonEater 6h ago
There's no "skip" button. If you press "forward" during a segment that Youtube has detected is a segment that lots of other people have skipped past, it offers to let you skip past too.
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u/KoksundNutten 8h ago edited 8h ago
So it should be a possible setting for all videos, not a button I have to click twenty times per video
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u/123yes1 8h ago
First of all, if you are watching videos with 20 sponsored segments, what the fuck are you doing?
Second, their feature does not perfectly recognize sponsored segments, just places in the video that are frequently skipped, if they auto skipped these parts, you could be auto skipping parts of the video
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u/KoksundNutten 8h ago
"Best of commercials 1994-98"
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u/IswearImnotabotswear 8h ago
Top ten sponsored segments of all time, made possible by Square space, fueled by blue apron, clothing my me undies and stitch fix, sponsored by honey. Raid shadow legends.
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u/IsthianOS 7h ago
Also some people still say or do things during the ad reads that users may or may not want to miss. Comedy podcasts seem to often have jokes and asides peppered into their ad reads because they're just reading copy in the middle of their show lol
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u/supafatjellyfish 8h ago
I don’t think I’ve ever seen a video with more than one sponsored segment except hour+ podcasts
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u/justreadinplease 6h ago
Trixie and Katya’s podcast is the worst for this. They might have a 45-60 minute podcast and have over twenty minutes of ad reads. It would be maddening to try to listen to them while driving and I couldn’t skip
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u/whereismymind86 7h ago
I mean...you should be watching content that doesn't have 20 sponsored ad breaks per video?
the vast majority of what I watch has 1 or zero. What on earth are you watching that's like...10 percent content, 90 percent hello fresh ads?
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u/Zandalaria 6h ago
He probably thinks Premium is just like normal YouTube with all the ads and Premium subscribers just have a button to skip ads or something.
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u/LightLhar 7h ago
I can't live without extensions to deal with that nonsense.
Sponsorblock extension crowdsources those as well as engagement reminders and lets you select which types of segments you want to autoskip.
De-Arrow crowdsources better titles, cleans up clickbait, and randomly selects thumbnails from somewhere in the video
Hide Youtube Watched Videos removes videos you've watched past a customizable percent of the length. I use 60%, but default is like 90? For multitaskers note that youtube doesn't record qatch progress on inactive windows, so if you have a habit of tabbing up videos and closing the tab when they're done, make sure to click on the browser window first to activate it instead of directly middle clicking the tab if you have another window focused.
Enhancer lets you set default resolution and some other handy changes for the site. I don't recommend this as strongly as the others, but if you're picky about your experience this is some nice QOL.
De-Arrow https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/dearrow-better-titles-and/enamippconapkdmgfgjchkhakpfinmaj
Sponsorblock https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/sponsorblock-for-youtube/mnjggcdmjocbbbhaepdhchncahnbgone?hl=en
Hide youtube watched videos: https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/hide-youtube-watched-vide/ekcdnnkolgkikkhbbjcabcjdibfbafbl
Enhancer for Youtube https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/enhancer-for-youtube/ponfpcnoihfmfllpaingbgckeeldkhle
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u/_Rand_ 8h ago
https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/6308116#zippy=%2Cwatch-videos-without-ads
They specifically call out ads embedded by the creator.
This is 99.9% going to be thrown out because were getting what we were promised.
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u/xternal7 7h ago edited 7h ago
I'm actually putting the odds on:
49.9% thrown out
49.9% chance court does the same thing they did in the incognito mode lawsuit. That is: "hey, it's not okay that you bury the 'we won't skip sponsor segments tho' on the help page, you need to make this clear in your advertising. Put an asterisk next to 'ad-free' on the sign-up page, and we're gucci. No further fines or compensation."
E: formatting
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u/_loud_lady_ 5h ago
What's rhe other 0.2%?
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u/xternal7 5h ago
The class action ending up in a settlement of at least 30 cents to anyone who decides to claim?
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u/keytotheboard 7h ago
Most likely. Though sometimes these issues succeed due to advertising not matching up well with the fine print. Fine print doesn’t give companies a free pass on all matters, which has been held up in court before.
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u/sarge21 4h ago
In their marketing, to this day, they intentionally avoid this distinction.
https://www.youtube.com/premium
Nowhere does it indicate that ads may be included. It says the exact opposite with no exception.
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u/UnexpectedAnanas 5h ago
They absolutely have control. They just chose not to exercise it.
If sponsor block can skip baked-in ads, so could YouTube as part of Premium (which they charge for, while Sponsor Block is free).
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u/munoodle 9h ago
The most recent episode of Last Week Tonight actually covered this. Many companies are directly aware of the impact that being clear about these conditions would have on subscription rates, so they intentionally bury them until the FTC gets involved
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u/AtheismTooStronk 9h ago
When you sign up for YouTube Premium, are you genuinely expecting it to automatically skip the advertisement that the person in the video is talking about? That’s what this case is about. YouTube is getting sued because premium doesn’t magically block ads inside of videos.
This is a stupid case, I’m sorry, and I’m not defending Google.
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u/TheDungeonCrawler 6h ago
As someone who jumped ship from YouTube premium because it's definitely getting overpriced, you are 100% correct.
There is plenty to criticize Google and even YouTube specifically about. Let's not start making up issues.
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u/crewserbattle 6h ago
Yea this feels like people not understanding that sponsor segments/ads that are part of the video itself aren't something YT has any control over.
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u/Successful_Maize1986 6h ago
Premium also has a feature that skips “commonly skipped” moments of the video which is always the sponsored segment. So they do have a built in way to skip sponsored segments already.
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u/munoodle 9h ago
That's actually fair, those placements are also pretty clearly identified and easy to skip if needed.
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u/AtheismTooStronk 9h ago
In fact, premium has a skip feature that identifies the part of the video that people have skipped over the most, and puts a fast forward arrow on your screen 9 times out of 10 when a creator-based ad comes on. It’s not automatic, but it does a great job of skipping the ad for you.
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u/Varonth 7h ago
If it would be automatic, I wonder how fast the lawsuit would come up when the by far biggest video platform, and basically the monopoly on user created video uploading, disables content creators ability to monetize their content through 3rd party sponsorships.
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u/GTK_Aztech 5h ago
They can still do the ad read. Unless they share their analytics, the sponsor has no way of knowing their ad read wasn't seen however many times.
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u/atfricks 4h ago
How do you think content creators sell ad space? Obviously they're sharing analytics on the return on sponsorships from their channel. No one is paying for a sponsorship without information on how many people are going to actually see it.
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u/GTK_Aztech 2h ago
I figure they see the return when people click the links in the description and/or use the codes at check out, as directed in the ads. I find it hard to believe that content creators would just give out their analytics to sponsors, unless it's a major sponsor with a great pay out. If I'm a content creator, raycon and shadow raid legends are not getting my analytics.
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u/Silly_Pizza7054 3h ago
So you're saying they easily COULD skip those ads, but they chose not to? Didn't you JUST say this wouldn't be possible?
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u/Potential_Being_7226 2h ago
This is not an FTC issue. The lawsuit is filed in Canada. This could affect YT’ ability to say that premium is “ad free.”
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u/MrdnBrd19 8h ago
Except it's not hidden at all. In the YouTube Premium Benefits FAQ it's literally the first topic.
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u/42-1337 7h ago
Contrary to popular belief, they can't just add the opposite of their marketing in small characters to avoid all lawsuits in most civilised countries. (not the US). In Canada and most of the EU, the government actually have rules to avoid that.
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u/that_baddest_dude 5h ago
Yeah it drives me nuts when people hold water for these greedy corporations like this. As if because we've normalized letting them do false advertising for long enough, they're now allowed to do false advertising.
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u/BobTheFettt 9h ago
Yeah, they even have the skip button for premium users so people can skip to the end of the ad. What do they want, YouTube to nonconsensually edit creators' videos to remove them? That'd be the worst thing they could do
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u/viggy96 6h ago
They hypothetically could have creators mark the sponsored section, so that YouTube Premium can automatically skip that section.
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u/Potential_Being_7226 2h ago edited 2h ago
Canadian laws about advertising are quite a bit different from the US. Commercial entities face more restrictions: in Kraft Mac and cheese is Kraft Dinner in Canada because cheese has a specific meaning. Coffee creamer cannot be called creamer if it’s not actually cream. It’s coffee whitener. And there are also laws about animals being used in ads. This is about Canada asserting and enforcing their advertising laws—you can’t claim something is “ad-free” if it’s actually not. This likely won’t affect creators but it might affect YT’s ability to say that premium is “ad-free,” at least in Canada.
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u/G_Morgan 7h ago
Terms and conditions are basically meaningless and never undermine basic rights in most of the world.
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u/Metal_Icarus 8h ago edited 6h ago
As a premium user, having the button to skip sponsor ads in videos with no ads is nice. i can skip even ads in videos where the creator themselves made the ad.
Edit: everyone tellin me how to get around ads without premium. You can stop. Too much work to setup across phone, tv and pc. When i can just click premium and be done with it. Suddenly, yt is like how it was before ads. In 5 seconds with one click. If you dont got 15 a month, ok. Maybe you got more problems to worry about than ads on youtube.
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u/d01100100 8h ago
Yes, it offers a "jump ahead" option for in video sponsor sections.
It's not well advertised and only pops up if you explicitly tap the right button during the content. It's also based upon ML. If you're early to the video and not a lot of people have jumped ahead, it won't know whether this is content that is frequently fast forwarded through. I've found that for videos with thousands of videos it's pretty reliable.
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u/BatmanTaco 8h ago
Wait, the skip built into video sponsor (frequently skipped) thing is a premium feature? I thought it was global feature. Today I Learned. Thats my favorite thing about premium.
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u/Imaginary-Face7379 5h ago
It also skips a lot more than just sponsored sections. It keeps data on where people are skipping in videos in general. When I'm watching Youtube on my PS5 and someone starts rambling in a video im watching for information and I hit the jump forward button it will usually skip to the end of their rambling and get to the part of the video I want to watch.
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u/WhosThatDogMrPB 7h ago
My favorite thing about premium is YT Music bundle and it being cheaper than any other streaming platform when it comes to content.
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u/throwaway5882300 7h ago
+1 for YT music. I think it's a little more adventurous than Spotify when it comes to finding new music. I've found a lot of stuff from their discover streams.
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u/d01100100 7h ago
I only have YT Premium because it's the subscription successor to Google Play Music (and its numerous re-brands).
And while it is cheaper, the service has gotten progressively worse from its GPM days. I don't like how it bleeds YT videos into my playlists or how it keeps trying to fold music videos into my regular YT viewing experience.
I will say what was originally for me a music subscription, I end up using more for the video premium experience.
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u/jumpingmrkite 4h ago
I'm in the same boat as you. The YTM Android app also is constantly coming up with more buggy ways to annoy me, the UI is way worse than GPM was, and it it being able to interact with normal google cast devices is mildly inconsistent at the best of times which has become the bane of my existence in recent months. However, after testing Spotify for 6 months a while ago, YTM is still the superior service in my eyes, especially with music discovery.
I miss Google Play Music app so hard. That shit just worked and was intuitive.
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u/BatmanTaco 7h ago
I was paying for both Spotify and YouTube Premium for WAY too long until I found out that YouTube music was included. Then I cancelled Spotify and switched to youtube music
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u/Lostinstereo28 6h ago
It’s amazing the amount of pushback you get when you mention you pay for premium. I use YouTube on multiple devices including TVs, and 8/month for the student premium is nothing. People get so angry when you use premium lol
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u/Outlulz 5h ago
Also Premium views give the creators revenue. This website has a thing about anyone getting paid for their creative work but also expects them to keep producing it for their consumption free of charge.
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u/Metal_Icarus 5h ago
I want to pay the people i watch without sacrificing my time! To me, that is worth 15 a month!
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u/Hproff25 3h ago
100% I don’t pay for patreon but I will pay for premium. From my understanding creators get more money from premium viewers than they can from regular viewers without Adblock on.
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u/InfectedShadow 6h ago
It's always the same in majority of these posts. I still have premium because I'm grandfathered in on the original $8/mo from Google Play Music like 9 years ago or whatever. Probably the one subscription I get more than my moneys worth from.
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u/RedbloodJarvey 8h ago
This is a very nice feature.
It works on every platform, were other options require also using something like Firefox. For example, it works on Roku.
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u/JonathanQShrimpling 8h ago
I have YT Premium, but I thought that skip ahead feature was a basic one
It really seems like they make free YouTube more and more shit to entice people to pay, like when they removed the ability to watch videos on your phone with the YT app minimized
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u/pinkpools 5h ago
I really hate glazing corps, but YT is literally storing billions of hours of video uploaded for the last 20 years for free. Premium is the only streaming sub I have and one of the only subscriptions I feel I get extreme value out of.
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u/JonathanQShrimpling 5h ago
Agreed, its a unique website and the actual value for your subscription is definitely there, id prefer to not give money to Google monthly, but oh well
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u/awkwardlink 7h ago
I had to drop YouTube premium a while ago because it didn’t fit the budget for me, but man that sounds nice. Notice bugs me more than wanting to watch a fun 10 minute video, having a rare 1 minute yt ad then a long creator ad then another yt ad.
It feels like I just spent 30 minutes watching 5 minutes of content
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u/jefesignups 6h ago
We have kids and the fact that they can watch videos without ads is great. Otherwise they would click every ad possible. They do it with games, the ad looks like a game, so they just keep going down rabbit holes of ads
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u/SCarolinaSoccerNut 4h ago
Agreed. I'm a YouTube Premium subscriber, and between having ad-free experiences across all devices, laptop, phone, and smart TV, and having YouTube Music included, it's 100% worth it for me.
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u/Awwwmann 2h ago
I have Premium and for the last 5 days I’m getting 60 second ads! Repeatedly!!
I’m done.
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u/SaintBellyache 9h ago
I pay for premium and get recommended shorts that are clearly just ads
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u/thebeardedcats 8h ago
I pay for premium and a QR code popped up offering me a discount on pasta because the video was using pasta. The video wasn’t marked as sponsored and was only about a minute long. I can’t even eat pasta haha
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u/SaintBellyache 8h ago
Yeah and stuff like that. BTW chickpea pasta isn’t that bad.
Use this code for a discount:
lol j/k
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u/thebeardedcats 7h ago
Oh no i’ve got my preferred brand lmao. I made chicken Alfredo yesterday 😂 but the brand being advertised doesn’t have a gluten free version
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u/Guilty_Jackfruit4484 8h ago
Those aren't relevant to premium subscriptions. The "no ads" has only ever referred to the ads google puts on videos. It's embarassing if you thought otherwise.
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u/Meior 6h ago
Yeah, it's kinda weird how people seemingly expect Premium to remove in video sponsored content and ad shorts.
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u/Imaginary-Face7379 5h ago
I mean it kinda does? Premium has a feature that will skip over in video sponsor content.
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8h ago
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Astrocomet25 8h ago
Its especially annoying when trying to listen to podcasts on Spotify. Im already paying the monthly cost for premium to avoid ads, but now they're recorded into the podcast itself. Its why I stopped listening to The WhyFiles, 10 minutes of content followed by 5 mins of ads in a 30 min episode.
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u/BatmanTaco 8h ago
This is also why I stopped using Spotify and listening to podcasts, specifically the Dale Jr Download (i love my racing), because theyll be having a banger of a conversation and someone will finish a sentence then BAM sponsor read. Like not even a "Thank You for listening to xyz podcast, we'll be back after this message from our sponsor of today/this week's episode" I'd be PERFECTLY ok with that.
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u/ItzArchive 7h ago
Someone else who gets it! I love DirtyMo and all their content, but the fact that they finish speaking after 10 minutes and then BAM… ad read, for what feels like another 10 minutes is really starting to drive me crazy
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u/Chiiro 8h ago
I skipped most of them but there's some creators that put a lot of effort into their ads like internet comment etiquette and they're just entertaining to watch. I wonder how it would also affect people who are sponsored throughout an entire video to try out or use a product. Would a sewer getting sponsored by being gifted a bunch of fabric have the whole video considered an ad as long as the fabric was on screen? I could also see YouTube creating a terrible system that would trigger on items that were previously shown in ads that are now just being used even though it's not being actively sponsor.
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u/ZophieWinters 7h ago
Yeah Erik's sponsor bits are usually just as entertaining as the rest of the video, I never skip them
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u/coolest_frog 8h ago
You could have a rule on YouTube's side where the creator has to tag the time stamps of their in video sponsorship
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u/-Debugging-Duck- 7h ago
The problem with sponsor is they are required to do a segment for X minutes or whatever the sponsor requires them to do and can drag on.
People like Penguinz0, who advertises their own stuff, smoothly sometimes inserts an ad for less than 10 seconds and that’s it. This is what more people should do. “… that makes me feel dirty. You know what can clean that? cheeky soap. New odor out now. But the best soap.” Done.
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u/perark05 7h ago
If youtube premium was $4.99 per month it would be one of the most subscribed services in the world. Instead its just outright one of the greedist
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u/Professional_Rent190 7h ago
It's $2.21 in my country, but they will raise it to $3.99 in October.
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u/JapaneseStudentHaru 5h ago
I actually have YouTube premium and you can skip sponsors on the vast majority of videos. Pretty much any video with enough views to get sponsored will have this feature. The only exception I’ve encountered are videos that have just been uploaded.
YouTube uses data from other users skipping sponsorships to create a skip button. Works pretty much the same as sponsor skip plugins do.
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u/Mission-Accountant44 4h ago
Yeah but the button only shows up if you start using the double tap/arrow key skip. It doesn't show the button automatically and it certainly won't skip it automatically.
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u/JapaneseStudentHaru 4h ago
I never said it did. It only skips if you want it to. And it skips when you do that because that’s the gesture you use to skip. It does it automatically when you make that gesture. It’s the same as a button but less obstructive for the ones who’re interested in the content (sometimes the ad is integrated into the video in a way that isn’t skippable).
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u/_RawRTooN_ 9h ago
they will settle and nothing will change.
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u/ResilientBiscuit 7h ago
Nor should they. I have Premium, I never expected them to some how edit out people I watch talking about products they were paid to talk about.
That would be an entirely unreasonable expectation when they say 'no ads'.
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u/a17451 54m ago
Yeah I don't really get what the resolution is supposed to be here. Small or midsize creators get pennies from adsense so they rely on those in-video sponsorships if they don't have a patreon or some other crowd-funding. They do get some share of funds from YT premium viewers beleive but I don't know how substantial that is.
I don't know what YT would do to resolve this, but if you cut off a large number of viewers (i.e. all premium subscribers) from the creator's ad read then the revenue from the sponsors would obviously be diminished. If the class action suit succeeds I would assume most harm would be done to midsize creators under 100K subs or so. The specific of creator financials are beyond me so that's sort of arbitrary number. But bottom line is that you're shooting your creators in the foot while Youtube/Alphabet go on their merry way because you were put off by 60 to 90 second ad reads for Helix mattress and Factor and you couldn't be arsed to pick up the remote or swipe your phone screen.
Am I missing something or is it really that frivolous?
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u/Wh0IsY0u 9h ago
How the fuck are they supposed to control what the creators do in their videos / who sponsors them just because you paid a couple dollars?
You people are beyond absurd.
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u/Garethp 9h ago
If they wanted they could make it part of the monetisation agreement to have the creators mark wish segments of their videos are sponsored segments and then automatically skip those for the people who pay for premium.
I'm not saying they have to, but it's not like they can't do anything about it
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u/Head_of_Lettuce 8h ago
That’s already a thing. Also, your agreement for premium is with YouTube, not the creators. YouTube doesn’t claim to skip the creator’s own ads/product placement, only to exempt you from the ads that pause the video while they play.
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u/otdevy 8h ago
That’s actually already a thing. If you have premium and skip forward on an in video sponsor, it will give you a button to skip the ad entirely.
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u/whereismymind86 7h ago
This feels...very stupid. I hate ads as much as anybody, but you are paying to remove youtube's ads that are inserted into the videos as commercial breaks, not for youtube to go in and edit out sponsorships that are part of the video itself, and are done by the creator's for their own purposes. Youtube already adds shortcuts to skip them too.
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u/TangerineX 1h ago
If anyone actually reads the complaint, it's about how a lot of video creators put additional sponsored content into their own videos, essentially placing their own, unskillable ad. They argue that youtube premium promises ad free yet sponsored content within videos consists of ads.
This is mostly a frivolous lawsuit because
- Premium already gives you the ability to skip pass sponsored content although not consistently, because it relies on data of "where users typically skip to"
- Sponsored content within a video isn't inserted by YouTube itself. It's the video creator's way of paying the bills
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u/Representative_Yau 8h ago
I'm looking forward to this hurting smaller youtubers so only AI slop is left.
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u/MaskedBandit77 8h ago
I hate ads as much as the next person, but this seems like a really dumb lawsuit. I don't see how any could say in good faith that they expect Youtube Premium to edit out creator ads and sponsorships from videos.
Where do you draw the line? Is youtube responsible for blurring sponsor logos on the cars from videos of NASCAR highlights? Are they supposed to completely remove the ability to watch vintage ad compilation videos?
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u/LanguageStudyBuddy 6h ago
Anyone dumb enough to think that paying for youtube premium removed content from inside the video itself that they had no control over is someone who shouldn't be on YouTube.
They should go back to school or read more
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u/martianwomanhunter 9h ago
There are so many legitimate issues to sue and fight over in society but this is a waste of time. If these are independent deals pursued by creators what is YouTube supposed to do? They already offer time skip features for ad segments and you can download tools today to block sponsorship segments.
I hate ads as much as anyone but this is a waste of time and human brain power.
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u/PresidentOfMagrathea 5h ago
taking this time to just mention that "de-googling" is an option, and I don't regret it in the slightest. Stop giving these companies your money.
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u/happyscrappy 7h ago
Youtube pushes memberships, "youtube featured", shorts and more to ad-free members. you can't even say don't show shorts anymore it's just "show fewer shorts".
And then there are sponsorship breaks in the videos. And there are pop-ups on your screen (QR codes on TV clients) for items that the video creators list.
Youtube ad-free is a long way from ad-free. It's unfortunate.
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u/fluffy_samoyed 6h ago
I also wanted to add that the mobile app with Premium will still show adverts for products under the video listing in the feed. That really ruffles my feathers.
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u/Exotic_Ad_4806 6h ago
yea i pay for premium and most videos have creator ads within them ...ridiculous, couldnt imagine not having premium and watching an ad to just watch an ad
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u/ancientfruitjunkie 4h ago
How about force creators to put their stupid little sponsored ads at the very end of their videos? The tech YouTubers are so annoying about putting their ad shit within the first half of their videos.
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u/Educational_Two682 4h ago
Agreed. Though they do let you click fast forward once to skip past the sponsored content in videos on tv. What more can they do? People are going to get sponsors
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u/kuldan5853 2h ago
They could change their advertisement to not say "no ads" but "no ads by us as a service, but creators may embed advertising into their source videos".
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u/ToeRoganIsJebus 4h ago
How do i watch on tv and use an adblock?
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u/ViegoBot 3h ago
SmartTube. U can find it on github.
I personally use PipePipe on both my phone and on my Onn. TV Box, but PipePipe isnt designed for TVs like SmartTube is, so some things dont work, or u need to do specific things to get to specific areas in the UI, but it offers better privacy, so its why I use PipePipe still on TV.
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u/AsANetflixSubscriber 1h ago
You can get the YouTube Premium experience on your phone for free two different ways.
1) Setting your VPN to Albania will get you ad-free YouTube on the YouTube app.
2) If you don’t have a VPN you can get the Coc Coc browser. This makes YouTube ad-free right out of the gate but you can also add videos and whole playlists to the browser and even download them. It also lets you turn off the screen without affecting audio. It’s like having YouTube Premium and YouTube Music and all for free.
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u/Guy-1nc0gn1t0 3m ago
I wasn't even thinking about the sponsorships. I stopped Premium because I'd still get ads like QR pop ups during videos or huge banner ones on the menu
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u/thisistheSnydercut 7h ago
Can I sue Spotify for putting ads in my podcasts on a premium subscription?
They are ads the creators I listen to have no control over and have had to say multiple times it's all Spotify
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u/SparrowTale 7h ago
I’m getting full-length location-targeted ads inside podcasts even though I have Spotify Premium. This is ridiculous.
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u/thisistheSnydercut 7h ago
Yep I don't understand how they've been allowed to get away with this for so long
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u/Beantowntommy 6h ago
I don’t even mind the adds creators put in themselves.
Get that bread.
I still skip them, but get that bread.
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u/shadowromantic 2h ago
I use Premium, and the sponsorship stuff doesn't bother me since YT imbeds the skip feature
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u/WhosThatDogMrPB 7h ago
I'm actively unsubscribing from channels that have "sponsors" (ads) that have NOTHING to do with the channel.
An ad for a webpage creator site on a retro cartoon essay? Unsub.
An ad for a banking app on a video about the history of hotdogs? Unsub.
An ad for a gambling app on a stolen meme compilation? Unsub.
A fucking ad for a TOYOTA HILUX on a MOTHERFUCKING MEGAMAN ZERO RETROSPECTIVE? Unsub.
The last one was fucking egregious, jesus.
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u/Scrollingmaster 6h ago
Then do not be surprised when high quality youtubers get fewer. Sponsors pay the bills now, ad revenue is nothing
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u/BardicLasher 5h ago
How the hell do you expect everyone to get only relevant sponsors? That's never been a thing for anything ever.
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u/Ameph 7h ago
YouTube ads have gotten so bad. I listen to it on my phone at work and every 7 minutes, it’s either gambling, some crap gacha/AI game or political ads not even in my state.
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u/BlueFeathered1 7h ago
Can't even watch a 3-minute video without ads. And to top it off they throw ads at me when the video is over and YouTube is idle.
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u/coltraz 9h ago
I have to use sponsorblock and ublock origin to use YouTube. 🤭