this post was submitted on 13 Jun 2023
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Technology

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[–] chaorace@lemmy.sdf.org 22 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (19 children)

I'll say something unexpected: I pay for YouTube. With money! Why?

  • I use it every day and I'm a human who likes boosting the things that I enjoy
  • I think YouTube's content recommendations are a genuine value-add and not easily replaced
  • A cut of my subscription fee goes directly back to the video creators that I watch
  • The "premium" encoding levels are actually a substantial improvement to video bitrates
    • Important: the premium bitrate is higher than anything previously offered and probably would not have been otherwise practical to serve for free

So yeah. I personally like YouTube enough to pay for it and I have the financial means to do so. Am I a clown for expressing personal appreciation towards a faceless megacorp? Yes. Yes I am. Constantly trying to win at every transaction in life is a drag though, so I think I'll continue to enjoy getting swindled.

[–] jadenity@beehaw.org 4 points 1 year ago

I subscribed to a paid version of YouTube Music many years ago, and at some point, due to some changes by YouTube, this automatically converted into a Premium YouTube membership, and I've been somehow locked in at $9.99/mo since then. Thankfully, my wife doesn't care about watching ads, so we don't need the family plan. That being said, even if I had to pay full price, and even if my other family members wanted Premium, I'd still pay for it. It's 100% worth it from my perspective, for all of the reasons you mentioned.

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