Adblocking Does Not Constitute Copyright Infringement, Court Rules

[Elijah Kamski]

On 1/30/2022 at 6:25 AM, RoseLuck462 said:

Good to hear, ad block for life!

We have the PC Master Race, and now we have the AdBlock Master Race.

It's official.

[leadeater]

On 2/5/2022 at 1:43 PM, Kisai said:

No, the issue is that "Linus said it's piracy" and then the nerds came out and nitpicked the definition of piracy to deflect away from the fact they are watching the content without paying for it. IT DOES NOT MATTER. YOU DIDN'T PAY THE PRICE OF ADMISSION

I am afraid you're just wrong on this one. At least when it comes to YouTube creators they have their own sponsorships and if they do those well, as they have the ability to do so, then I will watch them. Randomly generated piles of garbage thrown at me that have no relevance and will do zero to influence me have no place and never should.

 

And if you want to go down the small YouTube creator route then that's that dead argument because either they don't qualify for Ad revenue payouts, or it's pathetic and meaningless, or they are supported by other means like Patreon.  Creators already abide by the adapt or die requirement but you know who doesn't? YouTube, Google and Ad agencies. All 3 of whom have the funds, talents and capabilities to make wide sweeping changes to become not vile scourges, so if they ever do that then I might start caring about them and their business.

 

So stop trying to go down this route at all, Ads are for the purpose of attracting customers of which none of these do. As such anyone displaying doesn't deserve the money at all since they aren't achieving the contract at all, however the contract is between Google not the creator and it's to support Google and YouTube not the creator.

 

On 2/5/2022 at 1:43 PM, Kisai said:

The 7-11 calls the cops when you shop lift

7-11 doesn't stop me at the door, yell in my face with a megaphone then ask for 5 cents. Nice try but no. Whatever signs and advertisements they want to plaster on their windows or branding on their soft drink fridges is their business alone and they nor anyone can force me to look at them or care about them. The only price I have to pay is for the product and I will only purchase products I like, and possibly only from a store I am willing to shop at.

 

If 7-11 wants to become a cesspit then all the power to them, they have competition whereas YouTube in reality does not. 

 

This is why none of your examples are applicable or accurate to the situation and will forever not be if you try and use similar ones, your list of 10 included.

 

And for what it's worth I don't disagree with Linus's reasoning and arguments on the WAN show about this either, does not mean I overall agree with the situation. You can have a well thought out and reasoned position on something, be correct on your points, but still doesn't mean your position on a situation is more correct or correct at all on the situation. I don't and have never believed I'm 100% correct on this situation either but I know bad arguments, and bad situations when I see them.

[Moonzy]

On 2/4/2022 at 10:19 PM, Kisai said:

people are just looking for excuses for their own bad behavior.

Yes we are

Everyone draws the line differently, I used to not mind YouTube ads until it got so bad (to me) that I started blocking it

 

I did not install YouTube Vanced on my phone until very recently, tells you how tolerant I've been

 

I don't mind watching ads and going back to regular YouTube app, but only if they cut down on the ads, I am too stingy to pay for premium and would watch moderate amount of ads, this is me bargaining on the set "price" pretty much

[RedRound2]

2 hours ago, Moonzy said:

Yes we are

Everyone draws the line differently, I used to not mind YouTube ads until it got so bad (to me) that I started blocking it

 

I did not install YouTube Vanced on my phone until very recently, tells you how tolerant I've been

 

I don't mind watching ads and going back to regular YouTube app, but only if they cut down on the ads, I am too stingy to pay for premium and would watch moderate amount of ads, this is me bargaining on the set "price" pretty much

The number of ads directly sort of dictates the cost of service. You are just using a very premium service. That's the only conclusion here.

 

Its been said many times here and from Linus as well, by you not watching the ads (by blocking it) you have just reduced the chance to zero for YouTube as well as Linus to get any revenue from you. And all they sort of are asking is you to just get exposed to the ad (clicking it is another story)

 

I understand your frustration that the ads are annoying. It is. Hence why I have YT premium. Nothing in life is free. Ad blocking, is sort of equivalent to pirating it.

 

If all audience never had adblocking in the first place, maybe we wouldn't have this many ads and youtube creators would've made much more money without sponsorships and external support (just food for thought)

 

Disclaimer: I used adblock. But I have whitelisted all my regular sites. For youtube I have Youtube premium. While I adblock most of the rest of the web, I do admit, that there may be potentially lost revenue (however small it may be). But if you are a legit website that serves good content, I will do my part and turn off adblocking. YouTube is an amazing platform and honestly my premium membership is a bargain compared to Netflix, or prime or whatever streaming platforms that I usually find way too expensive for in terms of money spent and unproductive time we spend on it.

 

And my justification for *pirating (or privateering ) rest of the web is that provider probably dont care about the 0.0001 USD he/she may could have potentially earned from me, if I hadn't used adblock. But as I said before, if its a website I regularly use (ie visit hundreds of times in a year), then that value becomes significant, and I have to do my part to support them

 

But seriously you all filthy adblock pirates, just admit to yourself on what you're doing is pirating and get over it. Make up for it when you start earning reasonably enough and maybe get yourself YT Premium (or if you only watch LMG, get some merch from LTTstore.com)

[WereCat]

I wonder if blocking ads = getting more views = higher likelihood of getting sponsored. 

 

But then again... we've got Sponsorblock as well but that one does not affect the income in the same way as adblock does since the creator gets paid regardless. 

[leadeater]

22 minutes ago, RedRound2 said:

by you not watching the ads (by blocking it) you have just reduced the chance to zero for YouTube as well as Linus to get any revenue from you

I can assure you Google/YouTube is not forming advertising contracts that require views to get money from the advertising agencies, they absolutely are not that silly to sign such a weak and one sided agreement. There may be other metrics that Google report on to receive higher rate etc, who knows Google doesn't and will never make the information public.

 

Blocking Ads on YouTube basically only cuts out the Ad revenue of the creator not Google.

 

Obliterating all YouTube Ad revenue overnight would obviously be catastrophic but lets not for a single second think that there isn't a different way, one already being done, for companies to do advertising on YouTube, or even a different way entirely.

 

I personally think that lack of control and zero bargaining power the creators have with both Google and their Advertising partners is horrible and abusive, there are countless examples of this and in many different ways.

 

Any sensible large YouTube creator should be trying to get the revenue percentage of YouTube Ads to as near 0% as possible, just my opinion. Vast majority do anyway.

[joaopt]

They would have to make changing DNS illegal, that's how stupid the other side of this argument is.

[jagdtigger]

12 minutes ago, WereCat said:

we've got Sponsorblock as well

Sponsor spots most of the time are tolerable, at least those are related to the channel's content and not some dumb junk....

[joaopt]

1 minute ago, leadeater said:

I can assure you Google/YouTube is not forming advertising contracts that require views to get money from the advertising agencies, they absolutely are not that silly to sign such a weak and one sided agreement. There may be other metrics that Google reports on to receive higher rate etc, who knows Google doesn't and will never make the information public.

 

Blocking Ads on YouTube basically only cuts out the Ad revenue of the creator not Google.

 

Obliterating all YouTube Ad revenue overnight would obviously be catastrophic but lets not for a single second think that there isn't a different way, one already being done, for companies to do advertising on YouTube, or even a different way entirely.

 

I personally think that lack of control and zero bargaining power the creators have with both Google and their Advertising partners and horrible and abusive, there are countless examples of this and in many different ways.

 

Any sensible large YouTube creator should be trying to get the revenue percentage of YouTube Ads to as near 0% as possible, just my opinion. Vast majority do anyway.

 

Linus is also not getting sponsors, freebies from tech companies, YT buttons, connections on the industry, based on how many people watch without adblocks but on views and subscriptions. It's a two way street.

[leadeater]

20 minutes ago, RedRound2 said:

But seriously you all filthy adblock pirates, just admit to yourself on what you're doing is pirating and get over it.

Why not admit to yourself the advertising industry is predatory and abusive and needs to be completely reformed. I refuse to support it. I refuse to support "criminals".

[mr moose]

5 minutes ago, leadeater said:

Why not admit to yourself the advertising industry is predatory and abusive and needs to be completely reformed. I refuse to support it. I refuse to support "criminals".

I haven't showered for a week and I now have an eye patch.  It all started when I installed ABP. 

[RedRound2]

1 hour ago, leadeater said:

I can assure you Google/YouTube is not forming advertising contracts that require views to get money from the advertising agencies, they absolutely are not that silly to sign such a weak and one sided agreement. There may be other metrics that Google report on to receive higher rate etc, who knows Google doesn't and will never make the information public.

I dont know where you get your facts from

https://www.webfx.com/social-media/pricing/how-much-does-youtube-advertising-cost/

The advertiser pays youtube per view or per action.

 

You yourself, making sure your exposure to the ad in none, means zero revenue from you. Its math.

58 minutes ago, leadeater said:

Why not admit to yourself the advertising industry is predatory and abusive and needs to be completely reformed. I refuse to support it. I refuse to support "criminals".

What is predatory about this situation? Care to elaborate? Too many ads is just a direct result of many people blocking ads, and YouTube trying to compensate

 

Ah and by your thinking, then we could go chaining the blame on monopolistic positions of some companies, human greed for preserving margins, capitalistic world we operate in, the billionaires, the human nature, why we we exist and you will finally end up blaming the universe for existing that caused all this to happen

 

Fix one problem at a time. Admit it, that you're trying to get free lunch. Google is letting you go, Linus is also letting you go. All we are asking is to just be aware about what you are doing.

 

TBH, t would be very easy for google to just serve you ad through the same channel the video stream is getting delivered. Or bake the ad into the video from server side right after you click the video. Honestly, they can easily force ad blockers to watch the ads if they wanted to. But they're just letting it slide.

[jagdtigger]

12 minutes ago, RedRound2 said:

Or bake the ad into the video from server side right after you click the video.

Guess why they arent doing it? (https://www.comskip.org/)

 

Its pretty much pointless to fight against the symptoms while ignoring the underlying issue.....

Edited February 6, 2022 by jagdtigger

[joaopt]

33 minutes ago, jagdtigger said:

Guess why they arent doing it? (https://www.comskip.org/)

 

Its pretty much pointless to fight against the symptoms while ignoring the underlying issue.....

there is no need to go that hitech, sponsorblock is the most low tech thing out there and works pretty good.

[IPD]

So Axel Springer is the German equivalent of Jack Thompson?

[leadeater]

2 hours ago, RedRound2 said:

What is predatory about this situation? Care to elaborate? Too many ads is just a direct result of many people blocking ads, and YouTube trying to compensate

Do you remember Adpocalypse? If you do not then go have a read around that and why it was a thing. Advertisers should not have, get or be allowed to have the control over creative freedom they have and that is highly problematic regardless of if I supported those most affected by that or not.

 

And that's just one issue and one instance of it.

 

Also the comment was more just in jest of the reverse side of a dumb "gotcha" point. But cling on to the word "Pirate" as much as you like, repeated misusage of it won't actually change that it's simply not actually that. But I'd be more than happy to meet you on the high seas for a round of boat jousting and to the victor goes the spoils. So I propose those that are currently clinging on the hardest are the ones throwing around the word "pirating", none of you seem to care just how not even related it is.

 

2 hours ago, RedRound2 said:

I dont know where you get your facts from

https://www.webfx.com/social-media/pricing/how-much-does-youtube-advertising-cost/

The advertiser pays youtube per view or per action.

 

You yourself, making sure your exposure to the ad in none, means zero revenue from you. Its math.

Oh I know about that but I'm not naïve enough to think large corporates like Coca-Cola or Pepsi are using that agreement model for their advertising.

 

2 hours ago, RedRound2 said:

Fix one problem at a time. Admit it, that you're trying to get free lunch. Google is letting you go, Linus is also letting you go. All we are asking is to just be aware about what you are doing

Point to where I have ever not been aware of what I am doing? Go on. With that out of the way sorry but unless you've read all my posts and have something more constructive around the points I have raised in those then there is little to talk about. I support channels in other more effective ways than YouTube Ads.

 

I ask you to be more aware of what YOU are supporting.

 

And by many people own admissions the people that run Adblock are the minority so don't go blaming that for the reason for too many Ads, either this is minor and insignificant or it's not. If Adblock is therefore that widespread then that is evidence of an underlying issue.

 

2 hours ago, RedRound2 said:

Or bake the ad into the video from server side right after you click the video

They should, along with a massive overhaul of YouTube advertising and actually grant some power to the creators. Is it fair only large creators will ever get direct access to sponsorships, no it is not. So how about we start there and YouTube facilitates that along with baking in advertising in to the videos, in an actually high quality relevant way.

 

If you had read much of what I have written in this topic you would already know I'm not anti-advertising, I'm just anti shoveling crap that is ineffective and degrades user experience. 

[Dracarris]

3 hours ago, RedRound2 said:

Too many ads is just a direct result of many people blocking ads, and YouTube trying to compensate

Hahahaha.

 

No.

[jagdtigger]

3 hours ago, RedRound2 said:

Too many ads is just a direct result of many people blocking ads

Not really, its the other way around, adblocking is the result of too many and/or irritating ads....

[pythonmegapixel]

Just now, jagdtigger said:

Not really, its the other way around, adblocking is the result of too many and/or irritating ads....

It's both, no? Sort of vicious circle.

 

Everyone has a threshold at which the ads will become so annoying that they block them. If that is 1% of the user base to start with for example, then there will have to be more ads to get the same amount of revenue, which will push the next 1% to their threshold where they will block the ads, and it keeps going round and round like this until everyone is blocking ads and they have to find another revenue source.

[jagdtigger]

12 minutes ago, pythonmegapixel said:

It's both, no? Sort of vicious circle.

Id say no, adblocking is just a valid response. The main culprit is the action that provokes this response out. To put it simply the ad industry is currently digging its own grave and they have only themselves to blame....

[RedRound2]

3 hours ago, leadeater said:

Do you remember Adpocalypse? If you do not then go have a read around that and why it was a thing. Advertisers should not have, get or be allowed to have the control over creative freedom they have and that is highly problematic regardless of if I supported those most affected by that or not.

 

And that's just one issue and one instance of it.

 

Also the comment was more just in jest of the reverse side of a dumb "gotcha" point. But cling on to the word "Pirate" as much as you like, repeated misusage of it won't actually change that it's simply not actually that. But I'd be more than happy to meet you on the high seas for a round of boat jousting and to the victor goes the spoils. So I propose those that are currently clinging on the hardest are the ones throwing around the word "pirating", none of you seem to care just how not even related it is.

 

Point to where I have ever not been aware of what I am doing? Go on. With that out of the way sorry but unless you've read all my posts and have something more constructive around the points I have raised in those then there is little to talk about. I support channels in other more effective ways than YouTube Ads.

 

I ask you to be more aware of what YOU are supporting.

 

If you had read much of what I have written in this topic you would already know I'm not anti-advertising, I'm just anti shoveling crap that is ineffective and degrades user experience. 

Uhh, what are you even going on about?

 

First, my original post had nothing to do with you. All I replied was in context of Linus's tweet and the immediate fallout after. "Piracy" may not be the right word here, but everyone understands what piracy means in this context, or pretend not to. Consuming content for free that you are supposed to either pay in as cash or your time. Its as simple as that.

 

Now the broader issue of advertisement ethics and how much control they have on what kind of content is not on topic, at least in my reply. Nor have I made any references to any of the issues or Adpocalypse you're talking about. And tbc, I dont support advertisers or anyone in that situation. I am just talking about blocking/non-blocking any ads on any video

 

Again, the same typical thing you do. Drag my opinion out of context and furiously force it to some random narrative that you have preemptively convinced yourself that I'm stating here.

 

No I did not read your previous replies in this thread, nor do I know where you exactly stand (and hence never engaged with you until you did, for whatever reason).  

 

Also, I'm also not here to talk about quality of ads, number of ads, etc. Just making a cause and effect obvious to people here. Youtubers make amazing content for folks like us and their lives depends on those few seconds of annoying ads. You blocking it means your cutting their revenue. Simple. Adblocking si equivalent to pirating a movie from torrents, instead of paying streaming service, or renting it, or buying blu ray. In case of youtube they ask some of your time as payment instead of money (they offer this as well called Youtube premium),

 

Quote

Oh I know about that but I'm not naïve enough to think large corporates like Coca-Cola or Pepsi are using that agreement model for their advertising.

Unless you have proof I have no reason to doubt Youtube does it any other way. And other than view and CTA, what else do advertisers want?

 

Quote

And by many people own admissions the people that run Adblock are the minority so don't go blaming that for the reason for too many Ads, either this is minor and insignificant or it's not. If Adblock is therefore that widespread then that is evidence of an underlying issue.

Adblock is something installed by default for many people. I dont know who installs it but it seriously was already installed in my grandparents computer, even though he really didnt know what it was. Similar situation with a lot of people

 

Quote

They should, along with a massive overhaul of YouTube advertising and actually grant some power to the creators. Is it fair only large creators will ever get direct access to sponsorships, no it is not. So how about we start there and YouTube facilitates that along with baking in advertising in to the videos, in an actually high quality relevant way.

What are you even trying to say here? Youtube is a middleman here. Why and even how would a small youtuber want to have direct access to sponsorships? These companies can approach whoever they want whenever they want

 

You're just going on arguing about some random shit I never even brought up.

 

1 hour ago, jagdtigger said:

Not really, its the other way around, adblocking is the result of too many and/or irritating ads....

Its a vicious cycle as someone said. Some people block ads, more ads show up, more people block ads, even more ads show up .......

[mr moose]

I actually really hope the whole internet advertising thing dies horribly.  At least in terms of large advertising agencies.  Direct sponsorship I can live with, an ad placed directly to a website with a direct sponsorship deal is fine. The content creator, the community who uses that websites and the advertiser have much better control over the whole process,  it can't be blocked, it can be monitored for dodgy scripts and most importantly, it will stop advertising money going almost solely into the hands of large companies and keeps it in the country of origin. 

[joaopt]

The "we need more ads because you don't see ads" reminds me the "we need to sell you overpriced cd's because you download too many pirate mp3's from napster". Anyone knows how this ended?

[Elijah Kamski]

12 hours ago, RedRound2 said:

The number of ads directly sort of dictates the cost of service. You are just using a very premium service. That's the only conclusion here.

 

Its been said many times here and from Linus as well, by you not watching the ads (by blocking it) you have just reduced the chance to zero for YouTube as well as Linus to get any revenue from you. And all they sort of are asking is you to just get exposed to the ad (clicking it is another story)

 

I understand your frustration that the ads are annoying. It is. Hence why I have YT premium. Nothing in life is free. Ad blocking, is sort of equivalent to pirating it.

 

If all audience never had adblocking in the first place, maybe we wouldn't have this many ads and youtube creators would've made much more money without sponsorships and external support (just food for thought)

 

Disclaimer: I used adblock. But I have whitelisted all my regular sites. For youtube I have Youtube premium. While I adblock most of the rest of the web, I do admit, that there may be potentially lost revenue (however small it may be). But if you are a legit website that serves good content, I will do my part and turn off adblocking. YouTube is an amazing platform and honestly my premium membership is a bargain compared to Netflix, or prime or whatever streaming platforms that I usually find way too expensive for in terms of money spent and unproductive time we spend on it.

 

And my justification for *pirating (or privateering ) rest of the web is that provider probably dont care about the 0.0001 USD he/she may could have potentially earned from me, if I hadn't used adblock. But as I said before, if its a website I regularly use (ie visit hundreds of times in a year), then that value becomes significant, and I have to do my part to support them

 

But seriously you all filthy adblock pirates, just admit to yourself on what you're doing is pirating and get over it. Make up for it when you start earning reasonably enough and maybe get yourself YT Premium (or if you only watch LMG, get some merch from LTTstore.com)

Imagine paying for something that is free.

 

Just have videos behind a paywall like what Patreon does.

[leadeater]

10 hours ago, RedRound2 said:

Consuming content for free that you are supposed to either pay in as cash or your time. Its as simple as that.

I'm not supposed to pay anything for, YouTube is a Free Access platform with cost recovery through methods they want to employ. There is no agreement between me and the creator to pay or do anything and my view without a YouTube Ad still generates them revenue.

 

It's not "as simple as that", never was and never will be.

 

I'm not the one that made the claim or statement that by blocking YouTube ads the chances of getting any revenue from me is zero which you should know is not true. YouTube Ad revenue yes, revenue no.

 

Vessel Subscriber: Check (while existed)

Floatplane Subscriber: Check

Merch Buyer: Check

Used sponsor code when buying: Check

Amazon Referral Code User: Check

Merch Buyer: Check

Video referrals to people: Check

YouTube Ad Watcher: Uncheck

 

Yea so much for zero revenue from me because I block YouTube ads.

 

10 hours ago, RedRound2 said:

Now the broader issue of advertisement ethics and how much control they have on what kind of content is not on topic

Yes it is because that's a major reason why I block them, so if you to discuss with me why I blocked them then that is absolutely on topic.

 

You asked me why I said or thought the advertisers were predatory and abusive not the other way round, if you don't want to know then don't ask. Don't go throwing out of context claims when you instigated the question and don't like the answer. Learn to deal with it.

 

You have serious problems with opinions you don't agree with, hence you always default to out of context claims.

 

10 hours ago, RedRound2 said:

Unless you have proof I have no reason to doubt Youtube does it any other way. And other than view and CTA, what else do advertisers want?

YouTube removed the ability for non MCN partnered channels to have geo-restriction capabilities under negotiation from Advertising agencies and large corporations. Why do you think there is only one way to pay Google for advertising?

 

10 hours ago, RedRound2 said:

What are you even trying to say here? Youtube is a middleman here. Why and even how would a small youtuber want to have direct access to sponsorships? These companies can approach whoever they want whenever they want

 

You're just going on arguing about some random shit I never even brought up.

YouTube is not the middleman for sponsorship deals at all, creators get next to no control over what YouTube Ads are played on their channel and YouTube can and has forced them on without permission from the creator/channel owner, even ones not eligible to get payouts at all.

 

But you know what integrated ads are correct? How about YouTube works with the industry and creators to supply a selection of well produced segments that can be included in videos or inserted at upload that the creator can choose from so they can have actually relevant advertisements they wouldn't otherwise get and be privy to a better deal than pennies for views (if you don't click Skip Ad that YouTube allows).

 

I would far rather watch a MagellanTV advertisement segment, provided by/through YouTube, on any channel like or similar to 'Today I Found Out' than some irrelevant product not even available in my country. Explain to me the use for an Ad for a product or service I cannot use? This of course doesn't always happen because YouTube tires to prevent that but it does.

 

You seem to know extremely little to nothing about this situation other than your own opinion that Adblock = bad because someone said something I liked and agreed with.