YouTube is running an experiment asking some users to disable their ad blockers or pay for a premium subscription, or they will not be allowed to watch videos.
I do understand that if companies running ad-supported models, they need to make sure users are actually watching those ads. Seems logically to me - no ads mean no money, and no money means no sustainable business model.
On the other side, as a user, I just can’t browse the internet without an ad-blocker any more. They just got so annoying and sometimes even break the actual website.
But to be honest, I don’t see an alternative to ad-supported models except paying money directly via subscriptions plans etc. But this also will not work in the long term. I just can’t pay afford to pay a subscription for each website I visit during the day.
I think many large corporations like Alphabet/Google are making their money as brokers of peoples personal data more so than ads directly on their sites.
Not that I don’t believe ads are a big source of revenue, but YT has been chugging along just fine (and squashing its competitors) for decades without much trouble despite everyone and their grandmother having an ad blocker by now, so I find it hard to buy that they’re suddenly struggling to make ends meet.
If it were a smaller site without much reach I might be more predisposed to believe it.
I’m pretty sure YouTube has always operated at a net loss (strictly in terms of revenue and expenses). But of course, the value of the data Google owns makes up for it.
Most people don’t use ad blockers. Link below says 43% use them world wide, as per user reports. Ad blocking is (only) detected in 18% of web sessions on computers among American users.
https://backlinko.com/ad-blockers-users
The biggest issue, I guess, is the amount and obnoxiousness of the ads. I could live quite well with seeing one ad banner per page-worth of scrolling, if it’s for example off to the side in a specific “your ad here” place.
Or if the ads would be thematically related to the topic at hand. I don’t want to be reminded of how much our devices listen in on us by seeing ads for diapers on a website for posting news about the Ukraine War, just because I happened to talk with my gf about how my step mom has another child now. But seeing ads for a website to buy camping tools, on a website for hiking backpacks, is fine by me.
Unfortunately those types of non-intrusive ads probably aren’t what’s raking in the most money.
I do understand that if companies running ad-supported models, they need to make sure users are actually watching those ads. Seems logically to me - no ads mean no money, and no money means no sustainable business model.
On the other side, as a user, I just can’t browse the internet without an ad-blocker any more. They just got so annoying and sometimes even break the actual website.
But to be honest, I don’t see an alternative to ad-supported models except paying money directly via subscriptions plans etc. But this also will not work in the long term. I just can’t pay afford to pay a subscription for each website I visit during the day.
I think many large corporations like Alphabet/Google are making their money as brokers of peoples personal data more so than ads directly on their sites.
Not that I don’t believe ads are a big source of revenue, but YT has been chugging along just fine (and squashing its competitors) for decades without much trouble despite everyone and their grandmother having an ad blocker by now, so I find it hard to buy that they’re suddenly struggling to make ends meet.
If it were a smaller site without much reach I might be more predisposed to believe it.
I’m pretty sure YouTube has always operated at a net loss (strictly in terms of revenue and expenses). But of course, the value of the data Google owns makes up for it.
Most people don’t use ad blockers. Link below says 43% use them world wide, as per user reports. Ad blocking is (only) detected in 18% of web sessions on computers among American users. https://backlinko.com/ad-blockers-users
Interesting, most striking is that ad blockers are most prevalently used among age 16-24, I would’ve expected millenials to be a bit more savvy too.
The biggest issue, I guess, is the amount and obnoxiousness of the ads. I could live quite well with seeing one ad banner per page-worth of scrolling, if it’s for example off to the side in a specific “your ad here” place.
Or if the ads would be thematically related to the topic at hand. I don’t want to be reminded of how much our devices listen in on us by seeing ads for diapers on a website for posting news about the Ukraine War, just because I happened to talk with my gf about how my step mom has another child now. But seeing ads for a website to buy camping tools, on a website for hiking backpacks, is fine by me.
Unfortunately those types of non-intrusive ads probably aren’t what’s raking in the most money.