Google warns users of these apps that their experience may deteriorate soon. They may “experience buffering issues” or see errors such as “the following content is not available on this app” when trying to watch videos.
Similar to Google Search, ads have become insufferable for many users of the service. There are too many of them, they may break the viewing experience, and they may show inappropriate content.
YouTube Premium is expensive. What weights more for some users is that its functionality is severely limited when compared to third-party apps.
The cat and mouse game continues.
For those looking to avoid ads or improve privacy, here are some options for free, open source, privacy-friendly frontends to YouTube without advertisements:
Just 10mins ago I was thinking how great the digital age started. I liked that when I bought something I can store it anywhere, play/listen (don’t remember if digital movies was a thing) it without any internet connection etc. Then we got Netflix and eventually Spotify and we got even more options, do you want to pay a reasonable price a month and watch/play essentially anything or do you want to keep your stuff forever and pay more? But then other companies wanted that piece of pie and started their own services, neutered existing services, raise prices often, got more aggressive with drm and other limitations. My point is, when things start and they seem good in this tech world of ours, just think a bit outside of the box about how bad it can get, because believe me, you are likely correct with that. When this digital age started, people were fearful too, and most of their fears came true.
Thing is, what you’re describing is a logical fallacy. That because things got worse they’re going to continue to get worse. The slippery slope fallacy.
Yes, you used to have dozens and even hundreds of songs that nobody could take away from you. You were your own server. However, now that we have a service like Spotify where you can listen to most of the world’s music, not be required to store it, not have to buy each album, each track, but instead pay $15 and listen to anything, anytime, make nearly unlimited playlists of nearly unlimited tracks… it doesn’t make me miss the old days. I don’t feel nostalgia for the days when my disk walkman skipped because I walked too fast or the headphones on my head were $3 and I couldn’t even hear the lyrics properly. Now we have lossless compression, headphones that would cost thousands just a few years ago being only a couple hundred, devices that don’t skip, don’t lag, don’t buffer, but instead of you fronting the cost all at once you make payment plans. You take for granted the things we dreamt of and demand improvement, not stagnation, and god forbid a decline.
You can still live in the past. Download and store entire discographies from any of the dozens of pirate sites, force them onto your device, then play them as if we still lived in 2009. But the artist doesn’t see a dime for that. The pirate site doesn’t see a nickel. So you either support the people who make things you like in a system you don’t, or you fuck them over to try and stick it to the system itself. Thing is, I think the system will survive even when the things you like, don’t.
Sorry, I think I worded it poorly. I was saying that Netflix and Spotify were good, but Netflix got a bit neutered after other companies came in. Spotify is still amazing though.
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