In the last few months, maybe the last year, I have noticed adds on Youtube and to a lesser degree other sites getting worse, much worse. I have already fully dropped Facebook as it was almost unusable with the amount of crap on their I didn't want in my feed (Along with racist relatives).

I have seen no major media about it, but in the last week I was digging around on Reddit Adblock communities and googling, and there is a lot of background talk by people about YouTube trialing and pushing new add formats and putting more adds in.

I use add block and ublock generally, unless its a website I use a lot like a news site which I want to support in which case I will allow adds. But there are a few thresholds, that if the site crosses I will put addblock on again.

* A pop up add that covers the screen asking me to Subscribe or something, a add on the page is fine, pop ups can die.
* A constant bar/add asking me to download a app. Fuck you, I am fine reading the site I don't need another fucking app to steal and sell my data. Again have a add for it on the site, don't rub it in my face, and don't purposefully make your site shit on purpose to encourage app usage, I'll just stop using either.
* Any add with sound, a very hard no.
* Adds that are a full proper video, and especially any video that scrolls down with you.
* While I generally hate animation in adds, if it is just clicking between some images, or basic text scrolling that is fine.
* Shouldn't take up more than 40-50% of screen at absolute most. I swear I see sites that seem to be 85% add space.
* While I guess its not a deal breaker, if you show me adds, mix it up a bit, I swear sometimes I see the same add play twice each video, several videos in a row. Showing me the same thing 40 times will not make we want it, it pisses me off and insures that even if I did want it, I don't anymore.

Basically I feel adds should be similar to a Newspaper of Magazines, fixed in place, can be what ever they want to be, and have limited animations to them (Obviously just for websites).


Have you noticed your internet add content change in the last year? How do you handle it? How do you see things changing in the next years?

 

Ads on YouTube have definitely got worse recently, whether it's an increase in the number of them, an increase in the number of unskipable ones, or the length of the adverts themselves - a few times recently, I've had half hour long adverts show up on 10 minute videos (thankfully skippable, but jesus).

Can't say I've particularly noticed it elsewhere on the Internet, but I did recently put Adblock on for the first time, and was surprised at how many ads it was apparently blocking; seems like they just kinda fade into the background for me, which I'm not entirely sure is a good thing.

 

I haven't noticed anything particularly egregious about ads in recent times, but it may be the way I tend to browse the net. I run ublock as the standard adblock thing, and if I end up on a site where there's ads big/intrusive enough to notice (and I like the site enough), I'll go looking for a subscription to the website and pay them to not have any ads. If there's no ad-remove sub option for a reasonable price, or I don't care about the site, I bounce and never go back to it.

End result is that the most I have to deal with for ads are the occasional banner ad that is extremely easy to ignore.

 

I do sometimes watch a YT video on my phone (where I have no adblock installed) and the difference between ads on my phone and no ads on the laptop (adblock) is staggering. I've seen 15 minute videos with 10 of those fucking yellow ad break marks on the progress bar.

 

I put ublock on mobile, what a fucking life changer!

 

Not gonna lie, I actually pay for Youtube Premium. Mostly so I can have it playing with my phone locked, but a decent percentage of the reason is to avoid ads.

 

If you have an android look into Youtube Vanced, works like premium

 

The only ads I see these days are sponsored posts on Reddit and Facebook. I used to cop it on Spotify, so I stopped using it and found other ways of getting a large music library. Been using AdblockPlus for so long that I was shocked when I used a friend's computer and saw that YouTube was putting ads mid video.

 

Youtube vanced for phones and Sponsor skip for those damn in video ads.

There is no reason to complain about ads, as they are something you subject yourself to.

 

What pisses me off the most is that I distinctly remember when that functionality was free, then they removed it from the app so it could Premium only.

Worst part of course being that it goddamn worked and I've been paying them 10 bucks a month since. Congrats and fuck you Google.