Topic: The Chit-Chat Thread

The YouTube app on Android has really stepped up the ads lately. They used to be mostly at the beginning or end of videos; now most of them have random ads stuck in the middle.

@Anti-Matter Cool. You're exactly twelve hours ahead of here. It was 5:52 AM here when you posted that.

@ThanosReXXX Happy Remembrance of The Day You Smashed Into The World!

The Runaway Guys Colosseum starts tomorrow. I'm so excited! Last year's Colosseum was a blast and now they have even more people involved and more content coming. For those who don't know what I'm talking about, it's a charity live stream event that lasts the next 4 days and has lots of great YouTube and Twitch people playing games and music together. Last year consisted of things such as playing video games with oven mitts and mirrors, Captain Falcon amiibo tournament, trivia game show, D&D, races and praising the lamp.

<Laughs in YouTube premium>

@AlohaPizzaJack fair enough. I almost bought it at laugh. When it's on sale for maybe 30 or less I'll snag it

@Tyranexx I've noticed right after they started converting YouTube Music into the GPM replacement, and raised the price of YouTube Red, now YT Premium to $14 (must buy $10 YT Music then add $4 on top of it), and right after they just announced YouTube TV is getting a 40% price hike and it applies to all users, they've started HEAVILY advertising YTTV at the top of YT pages, popups for YT Premium. And more ads in general (just after I was getting ads in front of videos as a paying YT Red customer, grandfathered in at the old GPM pricing (for now.)

It seems like in the last few months Google has decided to rebrand from the "everything is free" company to the "now that we have the market cornered, pay up for monthly subscriptions on each service individually, but if you refuse you can use services behind walls of ads still." model.

To all the people that have supported and promoted Google's conquest of all industry for the past decade because "everything is free, they're so great!", I hope they enjoy the new Google where everything costs monthly fees and they randomly raise the prices with 20 days notice. Maybe everyone's vaunted Chrome will become pay-for like Opera by the time they're done. Don't worry, Google Docs will still be 20% cheaper than MS Office 365, so everyone will still be glad to have it!

So after another hour on lunch playing cuphead, i finally beat king dice. Only took a whopping 3.5 -4 hours to beat one guy. I actually rage quit, Exited the game, reopened and said 1 more try. Beat him on that last try thankfully. Think im finally to the devil( last boss), hopefully .....

@NEStalgia I mean, I didn't really mind an ad or two before; they have to get money somehow. XD But the amount of ads for just a 10-20 minute video is starting to get ridiculous. I suppose I don't have a lot of room to complain since I use YT for free, but some services are starting to include ads even if you pay now. In my opinion, if you're already forking over money, you deserve to not be bombarded by ads for the latest skin care products or razor that'll give you a close shave and somehow make you sexier in the process.

The amount of ads that come on normal TV networks alone when you pay for bloated TV services makes me wonder why some don't just transition over to paying for streaming, but then I remember some areas of the planet like where my parents live don't have streaming as a valid option due to cruddy internet.

And then the videos themselves usually have ads built in now.

@Tyranexx The whole point of YT was "free." Selling subscriptions was bad enough. I paid by coincidence since it was included with music. Turning it into a subscription video service, only after forcing out all competition by being "free" is the whole problem with the tech oligarchies to begin with.

And commercials with subscriptions is obscene. I don't understand how people bother. I have zero patience, and zero tolerance for advertising of any kind. I surely wouldn't waste time on anything force feeding me ads while paying!

Streaming costs are rivaling cable now. And have all the ugly ads included. I don't understand how advertising has any value at all today. Don't people just tune it out since it's a constant bombardment unless it's a big ad like the Switch superbowl commercials?

@Anti-Matter You can't "set a number" on your fingers. You probably meant "how many fingers do I have?" (or "how many fingers am I holding up?"), seeing as your comment related to Bruce Almighty...

@NEStalgia So, you're a tech nerd, can't snowboard to save your life AND you don't like cheesy, over the top comedy? Oh, man...

@Tyranexx Why, thank you very much ma'am. Much appreciated. Really working on those social skills,
I see.

P.S.

Are we talking YouTube on a smart TV here, or on PC/laptop? If it's the latter, then I have the solution to your problems...

@AlohaPizzaJack Your car trouble story is very typical, and familiar. Stuff like that happens here as well.
Or people at the garage/work shop deciding on their own to fix extra stuff, or deciding to do a check of other parts of the car, you know, now that they're working on it anyway...

And wouldn't you know it? They ALWAYS find something else. Whether it's a meter/gauge that's slightly off, the airco that was too dirty to function well enough, they found that your spare tire needed replacing, or just the leather covers on the seats who weren't completely covering the metal frame anymore, and needed to be reseated...

@ThanosReXXX Haha, yeah I avoid those nickel and dime shops. This one knows I’m frugal and DIT capable, so they know they have to show me what needs fixin

@NEStalgia Ads generally annoy me and rarely work for me. As for the cost of cable....I don't know about where you live, but here the prices for the basic packages for Dish and Direct TV start at a somewhat comparable rate to streaming services (though streaming is usually cheaper), but those prices mysteriously start inching up after so long. "Surcharge fees" and all that.

I use Spotify premium since I think it's fair and is ad-free. I don't bother with radio services like Sirius XM since I'm so picky when it comes to music/my mood. I like control over my playlists. I don't bother with
streaming TV/shows at all since I find enough to fill up my spare time already. I DO have low-tier Hulu, but that came free with Spotify premium recently. I haven't really used it but thought "Eh, why not?"

@ThanosReXXX I have that problem taken care of on my laptop. I tend to watch stuff on my phone while eating though; my current case has a handy kickstand. I don't know of any way to stop ads in the YouTube app.

@ThanosReXXX I despise cheesy over the top comedy, and generally loud, obnoxious people. Like whatshisname from Crackdown 3. Though I am pretty much the total opposite personality of the majority of "tech nerds". While I love nerd tech toys, I mostly cringe at "nerd culture"

@Tyranexx Your preferences sound pretty close to mine. Though as a self diagnosed audiophile, I currently have too many music services. Might actually ditch Spotify - a decision I'd made a few days before they announced the free ad-supported Hulu (grrr.) It's not the high quality output of Tidal and Deezer, and it's still lesser in catalogue depth than Apple. So much as I hate Apple, I think Apple and either Tidal or Deezer (plus Youtube, no longer for the music but for the video.....) win. I do hate having to buy an Apple product, but they have content, particularly Japan content that no other service has....Spotify tries to get close, but still misses the mark. They have the better radio though. One service for the high quality audio, one for the deep library, and one for video. But no TV service. Dropped YT TV like a nuclear hot potato when they jacked up the pricing. For $35 it was cool getting "cable." For $50, no.

@NEStalgia Hisses and bats the word "Apple"

Spotify has most of the normal music content that I enjoy barring the occasional weird song, but I do admit that they seem to have few video game OSTs. There are some excellent covers out there, but it just isn't the same, y'know? I sometimes listen to YouTube at work since there are a lot of extended video game soundtracks out there. (Also, no ads because of Adblock Plus. <3 )

...I knew about the $35 YT tier but was unaware of anything beyond that. It's been ages since I've looked at pricing.

@Tyranexx Android or iOS?

On Android, just watch YouTube through your browser, with AdBlock installed.

Since I don't have an iOS phone or tablet, I had to look this one up, but apparently, it works like a charm:

How to block ads on your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch

• Download your Content Blocker of choice from the App Store. (We like Crystal You may not see the Content Blocker option in the Settings app without an applicable app installed.
• Open the Settings app.
• Go to Safari > Content Blockers.
• Enable the blockers of your choice.

Here's an additional video that might help explain:

@NEStalgia That's Terry Crews you're talking about, and I hate, hate, HATE that guy. Carrey isn't even half the loudmouth that Crews is, so I'd hardly call that a good comparison.

P.S.

If you detest nerd culture so much, you might wanna give picking up snowboarding a try...

@ThanosReXXX to me, carrey is as bad!

Lol. Given the state and cost of American healthcare, i think I'll skip the snowboard. Much fun as $30k debt, unemployability, and years trapped in incomplete care while developing crippling depression sound, it's easier to just use the PSVR for such thrills and otherwise stay inside a bubble wrapped foam enclosure

@Tyranexx

P.S.

For PC/laptop, uBlock Origin is a FAR superior adblocker compared to Ad Block Plus.
Ad Block Plus still allows for "friendly and/or non-intrusive ads", whatever that may mean, since ALL ads are by default unfriendly AND intrusive...

Besides that, there's add-ons for browsers, that work even better to remove ads in videos, such as the excellent Clean YouTube:
https://mybrowseraddon.com/clean-youtube.html
Also available for other browsers and smart phones.

@NEStalgia I think I might have to start calling you NEStalgia Jackson, if you go even further with the weirdness, so you might wanna tone it done a notch...

@ThanosReXXX I have an Android phone. I used to watch YT through the browser on a previous phone and had weird issues with it. I got into the habit of using the YT app since it seems to work better in most cases.

uBlock Plus....I'll have to look into that. I've been relatively happy with ABP though. I'm not against giving some sites their ad revenue (I have ABP turned off here for example), but I also don't want to deal with the spammy popup ads that may or may not contain something nasty. ABP has been good about turning those off at least. I practice safe browsing, but you can never be too careful.

@ThanosReXXX just lazy and yeah that's it.😂😂 was wanting a fans opinion.anyways thanks.like your grammar spotting .like my girlfriend 👍👍il Try not be so lazy with it.who is thanos ?😲