this post was submitted on 02 Dec 2023
786 points (97.9% liked)
Technology
59436 readers
3535 users here now
This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
Our Rules
- Follow the lemmy.world rules.
- Only tech related content.
- Be excellent to each another!
- Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
- Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
- Politics threads may be removed.
- No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
- Only approved bots from the list below, to ask if your bot can be added please contact us.
- Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed
Approved Bots
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
You look from a position of a tech-savvy user.
You know how Firefox is built different from Chrome. You know what Manifest V3 is. You know how Ublock Origin is different from other adblockers, etc.
The fact is, we are the minority. Most people would just keep using Chrome or Chromium-based browsers and won't know any better. They'll end up (and already end up) in a trap that's super easy to escape, they just don't plan to/don't know how.
And for us Firefox geniuses they prepare quite a few surprises, like the recently found artificial delay of 5s when your user agent reports you use Firefox on some experimental users. This will drag on, and while we absolutely know what to do to fuck them up, normal users, who are the majority, don't.
You give me too much credit, I mostly learn things by hanging around here lol. It's not difficult to follow some instructions for a few simple things.
This is kind of my point, actually. Why go so far for a minority? As you say, most people won't even try it because it's too big a hassle, or so they think. Those who will, however, actively engage with their systems to maximize positive user experience. As such, to simply move the goal a few more clicks away won't make give up, but instead fuel more of their aggression. This is why this whole story began in the first place. That's why it's a hilariously bad plan that I can't help but question. AdBlockers are now better than before thanks to this whole mess, so watching YouTube get beaten at their own game so effortlessly makes me suspicious.
Or maybe the CEO is stupid lol, that's also a possibility.
That already qualifies you as tech-savvy, lol. Going so deep as to know what Lemmy is is quite an accomplishment in itself. You don't have to be an IT specialist, you should just know the most general details on what computer is and how it works instead of "magic box that runs YouTube" with latter being synonymous to "video".
I reckon when Chrome fully switches to Manifest V3, most users won't bother looking for alternatives - for them it'll just be the end of an adblocking era. Then maaaaybe some of them will learn to switch. But very far from everyone.
Frankly, with the prevalence of adblocks everywhere, even on your grandma's computer, this way YouTube can actually significantly increase the ad revenue.