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For the longest time I use:
I donate or buy merch from creators directly. Many of them voiced that majority of the revenue doesn't come from ads, but from sponsorships and direct donations/purchases.
I used to on my phone, but then i started using foss apps and disabling JavaScript, so i never see ads unless sponsors are in a yt vid i watch
I use AdBlock because I don't want to sacrifice 70% of my viewport to obxonious and intrusive targetted ads. I never click on ads anyway.
As Louis Rossmann said, supporting a creator directly via patreon Kofi or other means has way more impact than watching ads.
On my phone I use personalDNSfilter to block most ads on Android, as well as the Mull browser with the Ublock Origin plugin added. I have always enabled ad block for as long as I can remember being annoyed by ads and I have no plans to stop anytime soon.
yes :) if i like something, i will pay for it. as opposed to giving google 97% of the creator’s ad revenue
Yeah, I use ublock origin. I don't like the ad model and many ads on the web are privacy invasive. I'm not averse paying for content (something I'm doing for some of it) but I won't watch ads to fund creators.
Yes, I do. And I do since I don't want to watch ads and being interrupted with the video. I also have a sponsorblock extention. I use those since ads are always the same. I know what NordVPN is and I won't sign up for that thing. Also, ad revenue on YouTube is near zero for creators but fir YouTuve itself I imagine it's pretty huge. So I'm bit damaging my creators. If I want to support them, I'd rather sign up for Patreon.
I use uBlock Origin on individual devices and a Pi-Hole on a network level.
My reasoning:
As such, by using an ad blocker, I'm not expecting anything of others that I wouldn't do, myself.
As someone with both ADHD and autism, I will never require someone to pay me using their attention. Some of us have a limited supply of that, and have to ration it as-is.
I have never once seen an ad on a website, banner or otherwise, and thought "Wow, I should buy that."
They are a waste of my screen space, CPU cycles, network bandwidth, patience, attention, and time.
I don't want to be tracked.
They often reduce performance of the content they are meant to compliment and support, which will make me less likely to stick around. A while back, I encountered some ads on a web game was built using WebGL. Any time ads would load, there was a half-second pause in the game, even on my rather substantially-spec'd PC (Ryzen 9 5950X, 64GB DDR4-3600, GTX 3080).
yes of course i use adblock it is like the condom of internet at this point.
the money that the creators earn from ads per user is such a low amount that my time and attention are not worth it, like for youtube we are talking $0.001-0.002 per video view for an average creator. it is beneficial for both parties if you simply donate and use adblock.
i also find the data hoarding personalised ad model predatory and privacy invasive
uBlock Origin or the built-in adblocker, depending on the browser I use. On iOS I use AdGuard.
I treat adblockers the same as an antivirus at this point, there have been multiple times that I've seen ads for scams and malware, so I save myself the headache and use an adblocker. I believe it was Linus from Linus Tech Tips who said adblocking YouTube ads is piracy, if so then call me a filthy pirate.
Probably close to 20 years ago at this point, when visiting the official forums for a game I loved, my computer was infected by malware delivered by a malicious ad. This was not some seedy part of the internet, but a website hosted by a major game publisher whose product I enjoyed.
Try as I might, I could not revert the damage caused by the virus, so the only recourse I had was to just blank slate wipe it clean and start over.
Today, I acknowledge that most websites more tightly control the ads they host, but the trust is forever broken. As soon as the option became available to me, I installed the best adblocker I could find and never looked back. No exceptions.
The truth is that every ad is malicious, to small degrees. They want to commodify your eyeballs and take up space in your mind. They're trying to create a need where one does not exist, and will use whatever tactic they can to try to part you from your hard-earned money. They're a barrier between you and the content you want to enjoy—in many cases content that you paid to enjoy.
Even if it's in the name of supporting a website/service I enjoy, I can't confidently turn off my ad blocker anymore. It only takes one malicious ad to sneak through the cracks to cause disaster.
There has got to be a better way of running an online business without having to completely fill the space with ads.
i block a lot of the excessive tracking, but not all ads specifically. i think its better to not go to the site at all and find a competitor that does not have as many ads. going to the site when you have that bad of an issue with it sends a bad signal to the people running the site.
I use ublock origin on desktop. For YouTube I love Sponsorblock and started to use dearrow to remove gaping mouth thumbnails and modify click bait thumbnails.
On mobile I do not usually have an ad blocker set up so I just don't browse the Internet much at all from it. I do always use some kind of ad blocking YouTube player though. I really love sponsorblock.
I most certainly feel fine about it.
Especially since most of what I want to see is by people passionately showing off their hobby. When nobody tried to get paid for content I found I enjoyed it more. Nowadays I costume less and less content.
Yes, AdGuard Home running network wide, then on my web browsers uBlock Origin on top of that.
Many websites are a cluttered ugly mess with ads and I dislike them. And don't don't me started on trackers.
Ads are mental poison, so yes.
Every now and then I turn off my ad-blockers (Pi-Hole, ABP, uBlock Origin, and Ghostery) for a particular site that I feel bad for blocking...and then re-enable them all once all the adverts -- and sheer volume of trackers -- spew data left, right, and centre. Unfortunately ad-blockers are just like condoms: they keep your machine virii-safe[r]. Much better use of your time, and likely better for a creator's pocket, is supporting them via Pateron or whatever gubbings they offer.
I also have an alternative use for uBlock Origin too -- blocking webpage elements on certain sites (such as WRC) that like to spoil things on their landing page when all you want to do is login and watch the event without being spoiled...!
I don't use ad blocker while at work, except to block YouTube ads.
If you use adblock, you don't care about creator's point blank
This sounds a lot like not tipping being a bad thing.
Ads and tipping denigrate my daily experience. So I'm not going to suffer either.
Blocking ads is also just more secure as it's a vector for so many exploits.
In conclusion, I don't agree with them at all.
If I really like a creator, I’ll donate to them. Ads are an intrusion on privacy, and everybody has the right to block them without moral backlash.
Not all creators are influencers, but all influencers are one-person ad distrubutor agencies. Most of the influencers business model is based on ad revenue and making ads themselves (collabs).
I don't, because I know that ads are part of free content "agreement"
Yes, because most sites are completely unreadable without it. I also don't want to be loading megabytes of garbage with all the ads, trackers, and whatever other shit people stick on commercial websites nowadays.
I do everything under the sun pretty much. Ublock origin, NoScript, chameleon extensions on Librewolf (and others). I “subscribe” to YouTube channels via rss feeds. Open up the newsboat feed reader from my terminal and an extension called “Alter” redirects me to an invidious instance. NoScript blocks everything pretty much as I just need the url. Then I use yt-dlp with the sponsorblock flag.
I only visit YouTube when I have a bunch of new “subs” that I found through word of mouth (reading blogs, HN, Mastodon, Lemmy, etc). I could just use invidious rss feeds, but if the instance goes down I would have to start all over again. There are other ways of achieving this same effect, but this is how I choose to consume yt now.
i do not use adblock on content creation sites like youtube
its a small effort for what i assume is a small bit of support for the content im watching
i just never had an issue with ads, theyre unobtrusive and i can just do something else while theyre playing