Based on recent reports, YouTube is actively restricting access to Premium accounts created through VPNs and cracking down on users accessing Premium content across different regions. According to user discussions, YouTube now detects and blocks VPN connections when attempting to stream Premium content[1][2].
Some key impacts:
- Users report being unable to play YouTube Music through Sonos speakers when using a VPN, with the service becoming accessible only after bypassing VPN connections[1:1]
- Premium subscribers attempting to access content from different regions than their subscription face connection errors and service disruptions
- The restrictions appear to be part of YouTube’s broader strategy to enforce regional content licensing and subscription terms
The crackdown coincides with YouTube’s increased focus on Premium subscriptions, including showing longer unskippable ads to free users in 2025 to drive Premium adoption[3].
You know, I was trying to pay for YouTube Premium. I do think that was fair even though I knew I could use ad blockers for free.
The prices are outrageous where I live so i used a VPN to find a more reasonable price. Every so often, YouTube would cancel my account and I’d do it again.
This happened several times, but I finally realized that YouTube doesn’t want any money for my account! They would rather I pay nothing at all! That’s so generous of them.
So, now I use ad blockers and I get the same service for free.
Also fuck Google.
Firefox + uBlock Origin on desktop.
ReVanced on Android phone/tablet.
SmartTube on Android TV.
Enjoy a good user experience as it should be.
My exact setup.
They’re literally taking money out of their own pockets. Idiots!
This is why you don’t give them money.
Also other reasons.
On what terms? I have my VPN permanently on. That doesn’t mean I’m trying to cheat.
On terms of using a VPN. They don’t need a reason. They can just do it
A year ago I would have been worried about this, but YouTube is so full of AI slop now that I barely watch it.
They are totally doing it to themselves. there is just too much crap there.
ReVanced for the win
More reasons to never subscribe to YouTube.
Lol, it’s like paying to lose your privacy, it’s dumb!
They could have just ignored this
Of course not seeing ads on YouTube doesn’t mean they don’t want to profile you to shore ads somewhere else. Premuim is ad free, not tracker free
Who paid for premium? I can watch ad-free and my screen off on my phone for free
I used this addon and I watch stuff in the phone’s browser
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-GB/firefox/addon/video-background-play-fix/
I used to leave Firefox in the background, then resuming from the Notifications.
this makes it a lot more convenient. thank you
consider fennec on fdroid rather than firefox official
I like it
That’s what I do too 😂
Where our datahoarders at?
Will creatives jump off the sinking ship? Or authorize us to download?
just buy adguard it supports multiple device, and can block twitch ads too.
Even uBOLite do it
Thanks Youtube, once more showing why Peertube is better!
Does anyone actually upload to peertube though? I mean my “recently uploaded” is a few videos from days ago and then from weeks ago
Yeah and majority of them aren’t as popular. Think Fedi.Directory has selection of various PeerTube channels which the popular ones like The Linux Experience, Veronica Explains more used PeerTube as a mirror for people who don’t want to use YouTube and then there’s some FOSS Project (think KDE?) that use it just to show off features related to their project.
Beside Tilvids’ instance, there’s barely much video on PeerTube I feel like I want to actually watch
Checked to confirm, having 22 Peertube instances integrated to Grayjay (platforms aggregator) so not necessarily one communicates with the other, and filtering the contents from the Home tab just by Peertube instances, and indeed most stuff is months old at best.
However, least for tech content creators, it seems to thrive. Also, if lack of contents is a problem but the person sees potential in the technology, I’d invite the given person to also help producing contents for there. Like the saying goes, if you want change, be the change.
And also, the more content a platform has, the more inviting it is to others. Expecting it to be as big as youtube but much quicker and organically is a first step to regret, I think.
I mean, there’s Patreon, but that’s American. It’s in San Francisco in California though, which is at least not Trumpland. But with how things are headed, I’d be cautious.
Liberapay exists, but it uses Paypal, which is even scummier than Visa and Mastercard. Uses Stripe too, which is Irish-American (HQ in both countries).
If there’s a FOSS decentralised* Patreon alternative that would support Wero, cash, and Monero, I could foreseee that having a ton of potential.
* with the HQ of development or whatever being in a country that’s resistant against censorship.
Sure you answered to the right comment? I don’t think the topic of this specific comment thread was payment methods.
I tried once. For some sites I couldn’t even register, at the rest I couldn’t upload anything.
Peertube will take off more when you can make money from it. That’s why people still stuck with YouTube. Money
Well, since Peertube won’t get ads, I don’t see that happening soon. YouTubers will have to get used to asking for donations and setting up donation accounts.
…or another solution is cryptocurrencies but that is not very reliable.
Maybe in the future, until now not a real alternative by content. For users which want to watch music vids of their favorite band or vids from prefered science channels, movies, etc. it’s not an valid alternative, nor for authors which want to monetize their content. Last prefer Bandcamp, Vimeo, Odysee and other.
It won’t become an alternative if we don’t move. I think PeerTube can actually work regarding monetisation - having a decentralised Patreon alternative would help along, for example.
Vimeo is alright, but it’s US-based. I don’t trust far-right censorship to not creep up there.
Odysee is good design-wise, but it’s full of hatred. Also, situated in the US.
Bandcamp, also situated in the US. No thanks.
Yes Odysee is also used by right wings, same as YT or others, In Odysee you find all kind of content and political spectrum. It remain in the same, Bandcamp is for music the best alternative also fair with the creators, it’s a good measure to listen most content for free and a optional paid download of tracks or the whole disk, not given in YT. There you can only legal download an video with an premium account and where the money goes to YT, not to the artist as in Bandcaamp. I only hope that the EU offers more alternatives to YT, but until now there is no other as using the less evil alternative and Bandcamp and Odysee are.
YouTube is trash. I was watching a cooking video, and I swear, after 60 seconds of ads, the YouTuber talked for maybe one whole minute before it went to ads again with a 60 second timer.
For the first time ever today I deliberately watched some shorts. It was so much worse than I expected. Thank TFSM for blocking shorts with ubo.
Wait, are you a pastafarian or a satanist?
I am pretty sure the video uploader controls when ads play. So that seems less of a platform issue and more of a “that specific channel” problem.
Yeah, YouTube will insert ads but never THAT close to the last one unless they play back-to-back.
I’m not sure. There have been times where I thought, this would be the perfect place for an ad break. And lo and behold… ad break. Sometimes they get cut off mid sentence and I think, either it’s automated, or maybe you’re right and they got a say but didn’t specify enough ad breaks so one was inserted semi randomly…
Per their support page, videos over 8 minutes long can have mid roll ads. They can be manual, automatic, or a combination.
If ads were placed that closely together on a video longer than 8 minutes, the creator either did that manually or did not care enough about their audience to check what automatic ads got placed.
Not necessarily: https://x.com/JennyENicholson/status/1933160322048942558
Fuck me if I want to securely access stuff on hotel wifi I guess?
Stop giving youtube money, use ublock and revanced.
Not OP but for me I’m fine giving them some money in exchange for me not having to watch any ads while using their services. Just not the amount they want to charge me in my home country. 5€ a month feels fair, 15 does not.
That’s fair, but my code of ethics prohibits me giving money to a corporation that engages in mass surveillance and actively radicalizes young men and women into the alt-right rabbit hole.
Also fair.
And SmartTube on your Android TV.
