YouTube has been spotted testing server-side ads, which could pose a problem to ad blockers.

  • Pyr_Pressure@lemmy.ca
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    93
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    5 months ago

    I would settle for something that simply turns the screen black and turns audio off whenever ads play. I don’t care if YouTube gets paid for it, I just want to decrease the value of ads and prevent myself from seeing them.

    • dan@upvote.au
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      36
      ·
      edit-2
      5 months ago

      I don’t care if YouTube gets paid for it

      Legally, YouTube have to detect if ads were blocked and and mark the impression as non-billable. They can’t charge advertisers for blocked ads.

      • DerisionConsulting@lemmy.ca
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        40
        ·
        5 months ago

        They can only tell that something is blocked because the ad wasn’t loaded from a server. If it’s not loaded, then they can’t count it as “viewed.”

        If the ad is just blacked over, it is still loaded, and they wouldn’t know.

        • dan@upvote.au
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          17
          arrow-down
          1
          ·
          edit-2
          5 months ago

          If the ad is just blacked over, it is still loaded, and they wouldn’t know.

          If it became a common thing, they’d have to add detection for it. Not necessarily to stop people doing it, but to ensure advertisers aren’t charged for invalid impressions. Practically every major ad network has adblocking detection; they just don’t always make it obvious (e.g. they might silently log it).

          • CileTheSane@lemmy.ca
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            10
            ·
            5 months ago

            If they were effectively able to detect it they would be able to block you watching the rest of the video.

        • RecluseRamble@lemmy.dbzer0.com
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          5
          arrow-down
          1
          ·
          5 months ago

          Well they also infest the client side since they likely developed the main part of your web browser, so they can still know there’s a black cover in the DOM.

      • Pyr_Pressure@lemmy.ca
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        12
        arrow-down
        1
        ·
        5 months ago

        I already put my phone down on my desk and turn the audio down whenever an ad pops up, they can’t tell it isn’t being viewed.