And now for something completely different

Let's lighten the tone a bit, shall we? How about I stop talking about the evils of Facebook to discuss the stupidity of Google, who have just given YouTube users yet another reason to ad-block. Yes, really.

From Gizmodo:

YouTube, the world largest video streaming platform, wants you to start paying money to watch Kendrick Lamar’s latest music video—and to force the issue, you’ll start seeing a lot more advertisements between specifically music videos.

Bloomberg reported that Lyor Cohen, YouTube’s global head of music, said during a SXSW interview that music video watchers will see advertisement increases the company hopes will annoying the shit out of viewers enough to buy into their new rumored streaming service, Remix.

Specifically, Cohen said:

There’s a lot more people in our funnel that we can frustrate and seduce to become subscribers. Once we do that, trust me, all that noise will be gone, and articles people write about that noise will be gone.

You—yes, you, the YouTube consumer, will be lovingly frustrated by a poor advertising experience, then be seduced into a monthly payment to avoid those unwelcoming ads. Sounds like a great plan: annoy your loyal user base until they pay money to not hate your product.

Was it just this morning that I was praising Google for being far more consumer-focused and consumer-friendly than Facebook? I think it was. And yes, I do feel just a little bit foolish for doing so. Only a little bit, mind you... in the grand scheme of things, this latest bad idea really is just hurting themselves, and not affecting me at all. Still, though, what are they thinking?

Well, apparently they're thinking that they can just target the YouTube version of "whales."

A YouTube spokesperson told Gizmodo in an email that not all users will see more ads, but a “specific subset of users” might.

“Our top priority at YouTube is to deliver a great user experience and that includes ensuring users do not encounter excessive ad loads,” the spokesperson said. “We do not seek to specifically increase ad loads across YouTube. For a specific subset of users who use YouTube like a paid music service today—and would benefit most from additional features—we may show more ads or promotional prompts to upsell to our paid service.”

Yeah... good luck with that, Google.


BTW, apropos of nothing... links!

• uBlock Origin for Chrome and Firefox.
• AdBlocker Ultimate for Chrome and Firefox.

You're welcome.