YouTube tries to take-down FOSS Invidious

[kilésengati]

For those that don't know, Invidious is an alternative, free and open-source API for viewing YouTube videos without ads and what not. YouTube has been on a war-path with ad-blockers recently. I think Louis Rossmann does pretty well at giving his two cents to the situation:

https://youtu.be/PTmZv7-eMrE

Maybe SomeOrdinaryGamers, Mental Outlaw or others will release videos about this too, who knows.

Here is something interesting. The music industry tried something similar to the program youtube-dl a while back, but ultimately lost in court, and now go after the project's website's hoster. I'm no legal expert, but the way I understand the ruling in favour of youtube-dl was made since creating private security copies without re-distributing them is legal in Germany as long as no DRM is circumvented and YouTube as of now doesn't employ any DRM.

Now, I'm no legal expert, so I don't know the intricates, but going after a FOSS project is futile in principle. For every take-down there are a dozen forks - in particular with such prominent projects. This is not a threat or endorsement, just my observation and the way I see these corpos not living at the pulse of time.

What's evermore concerning is, that should YouTube and the other media corpos finally understand what FOSS is, could they end up going after their users?
Could there be a new Abmahnwelle looming?


What do you think of alternative YouTube players and APIs? Do you use them?

[Triple G]

Out Of Bubblegum eredeti hozzászólása:

Yes they do. For YT. That is their purpose. Always has been. YouTube gets money from the advertisers every time an ad plays. This is how USA broadcast TV and radio was always funded. We are not talking about if the ads increase sales for the advertiser.

Fun fact. YT gets more money if you click cancel while the ad is playing. That proves you saw the beginning of it and were paying attention. Otherwise you might have been in another room when the ad played. And never saw it.

Somehow if i watch German public broadcast content on Youtube it´s ad free. And i usually don´t watch longer content on Youtube any more, because of these ads, one unskippable, and another skippable one after it. I rather stop watching the content altogether.

And what i meant before was that the other companies wouldn´t have ads, if people wouldn´t buy products because of these ads. The ad money doesn´t come out of thin air, and simply is there to fund Youtube, or whatever entertainment thing there is. If it was that - it would be a charity act of the companies to fund these services, which in case of Youtube, make $30 billion revenue.

[Devsman]

Thermal Lance eredeti hozzászólása:

I think google created the problem themselves with the obscene amount of ads. The lenght, the unskippable ones and the fact that scammers advertise on Youtube. You literally get scam ads and by the time YouTube actually acts on it people might have fallen victim to it.

People are fed up of this ♥♥♥♥. And instead of doing the sensible thing and make the user experience better. They try to shoot down the other birds.

I dunno man back in the broadcast TV days, you had something like 90 seconds of commercials every ten or so minutes.

With YouTube today, you generally have one or two ads that can be skipped after five seconds, for a 15+ minute video.

Once in a blue moon you get one that can't be skipped and is a whopping ten seconds long but that's actually faster since you don't have to wait for loading twice.

[Out Of Bubblegum]

Devsman's Comet eredeti hozzászólása:

Thermal Lance eredeti hozzászólása:

I think google created the problem themselves with the obscene amount of ads. The lenght, the unskippable ones and the fact that scammers advertise on Youtube. You literally get scam ads and by the time YouTube actually acts on it people might have fallen victim to it.

People are fed up of this ♥♥♥♥. And instead of doing the sensible thing and make the user experience better. They try to shoot down the other birds.

I dunno man back in the broadcast TV days, you had something like 90 seconds of commercials every ten or so minutes.

With YouTube today, you generally have one or two ads that can be skipped after five seconds, for a 15+ minute video.

Once in a blue moon you get one that can't be skipped and is a whopping ten seconds long but that's actually faster since you don't have to wait for loading twice.

This. The current generation is way too entitled. OMFG! An ad!!!!!! This is fascism!

[tyl0413]

Out Of Bubblegum eredeti hozzászólása:

Triple G eredeti hozzászólása:

They have also subscriptions,

The subscription exists to disable the ads. You pay one way or the other. Pay by allowing the ads to play or pay directly. "Disabling" the ads without paying the subscription is stealing.

Well then good luck to them because they're gonna have to actually do their job and figure out how to offer a better service than the competition you know like everyone else had to if they wanna stay in business?
They got only themselves to blame for all the destructive changes they've done from insane amount of ads, loads of spyware, censorship, terrible UI, dislike removal,broken search, scam subscription, shorts and many more. They've turned one of the best sites into the biggest ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ imaginable.
I've spent more on storage already out of spite than a lifetimes worth of Red and I couldn't be more proud of it, trash like google needs to fall and I'll do the little part that I can to increase the chances of that happening sooner rather than later. The only thing more disgusting than them is the likes of you who willing spend their free time defending the anti-consumer actions of multi-billion dollar corporations, if that's not incredibly sad idk what is. Corporations don't need devils advocates, if they do they can pay for it at the very least.

[Triple G]

I mean when i posted a song in the "post long songs which You like", i tried to listen to it on youtube, but it had like 4 ad breaks - in 10 minutes. If it was two ads in the beginning of the video - maybe ok. But this is overdone. Shorter songs usually don´t have ad breaks. Longer? Why even listening to a song, which has ad breaks in them?

But if that counts as entitlement - so be it.

[LQIM]

Who cares if adblocking is piracy? YouTube is owned by Google, they've got money to spare

[Boblin the Goblin]

Out Of Bubblegum eredeti hozzászólása:

Devsman's Comet eredeti hozzászólása:

I dunno man back in the broadcast TV days, you had something like 90 seconds of commercials every ten or so minutes.

With YouTube today, you generally have one or two ads that can be skipped after five seconds, for a 15+ minute video.

Once in a blue moon you get one that can't be skipped and is a whopping ten seconds long but that's actually faster since you don't have to wait for loading twice.

This. The current generation is way too entitled. OMFG! An ad!!!!!! This is fascism!

Haven't you unironically called anything right-wing fascism before?

[tyl0413]

Devsman's Comet eredeti hozzászólása:

Thermal Lance eredeti hozzászólása:

I think google created the problem themselves with the obscene amount of ads. The lenght, the unskippable ones and the fact that scammers advertise on Youtube. You literally get scam ads and by the time YouTube actually acts on it people might have fallen victim to it.

People are fed up of this ♥♥♥♥. And instead of doing the sensible thing and make the user experience better. They try to shoot down the other birds.

I dunno man back in the broadcast TV days, you had something like 90 seconds of commercials every ten or so minutes.

With YouTube today, you generally have one or two ads that can be skipped after five seconds, for a 15+ minute video.

Once in a blue moon you get one that can't be skipped and is a whopping ten seconds long but that's actually faster since you don't have to wait for loading twice.

There were devices for cable that let you record the footage or fast forward the ads, no one (remotely sane) likes ads, never did, never will.
Google has 0 legal ground to go after these projects.

[Out Of Bubblegum]

SlowMango eredeti hozzászólása:

Out Of Bubblegum eredeti hozzászólása:

This. The current generation is way too entitled. OMFG! An ad!!!!!! This is fascism!

Haven't you unironically called anything right-wing fascism before?

True. And it is NOT ironic at all. 90% of their beliefs and goals are. You/they do want to recreate 1939 Germany.

[tyl0413]

Out Of Bubblegum eredeti hozzászólása:

SlowMango eredeti hozzászólása:

Haven't you unironically called anything right-wing fascism before?

True. And it is NOT ironic at all. 90% of their beliefs and goals are. You/they do want to recreate 1939 Germany.

Not wanting corpo propaganda forced down your throat makes you a nazi. Yeah maybe I'll keep my adblock.

[Out Of Bubblegum]

tyl0413 eredeti hozzászólása:

Out Of Bubblegum eredeti hozzászólása:

True. And it is NOT ironic at all. 90% of their beliefs and goals are. You/they do want to recreate 1939 Germany.

Not wanting corpo propaganda forced down your throat makes you a nazi. Yeah maybe I'll keep my adblock.

Naw. That is not what we are talking about at all. Mango went off-topic with his strawman. I was replying to just his one comment.

[Boblin the Goblin]

Out Of Bubblegum eredeti hozzászólása:

tyl0413 eredeti hozzászólása:

Not wanting corpo propaganda forced down your throat makes you a nazi. Yeah maybe I'll keep my adblock.

Naw. That is not what we are talking about at all. Mango went off-topic with his strawman. I was replying to just his one comment.

I asked to show how ironic your mocking comment was.

[kilésengati]

Triple G eredeti hozzászólása:

Kamiyama eredeti hozzászólása:

Where is the line in the sand that causes the next exodus?

When there´s a more popular alternative, which is hard to do, when "meta" has like 50+% market share, and around 3.74 billion users.

Else something really bad would need to happen, and many people would need to agree to go to the same other platform. It´s just easier to use those platforms, which have the most users, most content, most anything - instead of doing research and use another alternative, which may be better for the personal interests, but perhaps also can´t have as much potential (if it´s about creating content).

And usually most things on social media aren´t that important anyway, and people just use it to do time, while existing social networks keep the people there where they are.

What would cause people to actually consider alternatives? Like FOSS federated networks?

Digital literacy and a widespread free-thinking mindset. Digital literacy can be fixed by education campaigns, but takes time and funding. However, not just blindly following the masses isn't the most comfortable way in the short run and isn't wanted by the nomenclature anyway.

Also laws in many countries making using these pretty dangerous, since many are peer-to-peer. If I were to use a peer-to-peer video platform and the video is found to be violating copyright or I accidentally click on an illegal video, are the corpos going to enslave me and my family for seeding the video I assumed to be perfectly legal?

tyl0413 eredeti hozzászólása:

Devsman's Comet eredeti hozzászólása:

I dunno man back in the broadcast TV days, you had something like 90 seconds of commercials every ten or so minutes.

With YouTube today, you generally have one or two ads that can be skipped after five seconds, for a 15+ minute video.

Once in a blue moon you get one that can't be skipped and is a whopping ten seconds long but that's actually faster since you don't have to wait for loading twice.

There were devices for cable that let you record the footage or fast forward the ads, no one (remotely sane) likes ads, never did, never will.
Google has 0 legal ground to go after these projects.

Corpos tried to ban VCRs, too, but failed.
A fair bunch of VCRs now come with DRM, so you don't dare to play back your private backup on a more convenient device or gift your friends a mixtape of your favourite recordings.

Who knows, maybe YouTube will soon DRM videos on their platform. But if they do, I'm sure they will mess up and restrict libre content, too.

Besides, as Gabe Newell said: “One thing that we have learned is that piracy is not a pricing issue. It’s a service issue. The easiest way to stop piracy is not by putting antipiracy technology to work. It’s by giving those people a service that’s better than what they’re receiving from the pirates.” https://www.geekwire.com/2011/experiments-video-game-economics-valves-gabe-newell/

These wise words still hold true today. The man made a fortune by not forcing ♥♥♥♥ down people's throat, instead by providing a platform that is a genuine good alternative. Also not without flaws, but probably the best there is.

YouTube, just like many social media platforms, isn't the best alternative. It is centralised, it is proprietary, it isn't the users who are in charge. That's true for Steam, too, but Steam isn't social media but primarily a store and marketplace. Although of course, I regard those as one of the major flaws of this platform as well.

[Barney, from Black Mesa.]

Google—and other corporations like it—need to learn to bite the bullet with dignity (if they had any) because these perpetrators collectively are often an open-source and decentralised syndicate project that is individually hosted and contributed to by everyday people who have just become sick of the rancid ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ that has infested these everyday services with data collection, advertisement spam, politics, etc.

You cannot kill the power process of an audience once they have turned against you; forced integration and legal binding do not work when you are facing the hypothetical Greek mythology of Hydra; they may cut off the head of one, yet only two more heads shall take its place. There are many such examples I could cite (that are even still around today), yet I don't want to get banned. Google 'will never' win this fight, even through a million lawsuits.

[Candyy]

FOSS??