Inside the ‘arms race’ between YouTube and ad blockers / Against all odds, open source hackers keep outfoxing one of the wealthiest companies.::YouTube’s dramatic content gatekeeping decisions of late have a long history behind them, and there’s an equally long history of these defenses being bypassed.
the “open source hackers” are always going to win this one, for a simple reason. if the data of the youtube video is handed to a user at any point, then the information it contains can be scrubbed and cleaned of ads. no exceptions.
if google somehow solves all ad-blocking techniques within browser, then new plugins will be developed on the operating system side to put a black square of pixels and selectively mute audio over the advert each time. if they solve that too? then people will hack the display signal going out at the graphics card level so that it is cleaned before it hits the monitor. if they beat that using some stupid encryption trick? well, then people will develop usb plugin tools that physically plug into the monitors at the display end, that artificially add the black boxes and audio mutes at the monitor display side.
if they beat that? someone, someone will jerry rig a literal black square of paper on some servos and wires, and physical audio switch to do the same thing, an actual, physical advert blocker. i’m sure once someone works that out, a mass produced version would be quite popular as a monitor attachment (in a timeline that gets so fucked that we would need this).
if that doesn’t work? like, google starts coding malware to seek and destroy physical adblockers? then close your eyes and mute your headphones for 30 seconds, lol. the only way google is solving that one is with hitsquads and armed drones to make viewers RESUME VIEWING
as long as a youtube video is available to access without restriction, then google cannot dictate how the consumer experiences that video. google cannot win this.
And if Google went nuclear and starts embedding the ad into the videos themselves?
the current solution for that would be similar to the current “sponsor block” plugins, here’s an example
crowdsourced start and endpoints for embedded sponsorships
something like this tool, but for future embedded google adverts
Without talking about the resources it would require, youtube could totally only serve the ad until it has been “watched”. And no amount of sponsor block or similar software would help. These software only work because youtube allow you to navigate the video. If they decide that you have to fully download a 30s ad video, and that you can’t ask for the video for the first 30s, then you wouldn’t be able to do anything (or at the very max, just hide the ad and wait 30s on a blank screen).
i would choose the blank screen over watching an ad, every single time
Even if they did that it’s not impossible to find some exploits. No software is free of bugs which can be exploited, especially networked ones which are often finicky because they have many systems in place to pretend flawless execution. Just look at the TCP protocol, it’s dropping packets left and right but users usually don’t notice because they get spammed till one gets through
How do those extensions that skip download countdown timers work then?
Those are usually handled by JavaScript being run on the client side, I think, so it just speeds that up
Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
RESUME VIEWING
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I’m open-source; check me out at GitHub.
good bot