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Culture War Roundup for the week of July 22, 2024

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I'm not sure there really is a viable alternative currently. Youtube marketshare as a "Media Players And Streaming Platforms category" is at 97.67%. If you look at streaming or short form videos there are competitors, but for long form videos there still isn't any real competition. YouTube rolled out a horrendous UI update but rather than quitting I just found some solutions online via some uBlock filters and Tampermonkey scripts to mostly revert it back to an older UI. I don't know where else I would view videos!

Personally, I would never live without AdBlock, but most people actually don't even bother.

According to one source, 32.8% of people globally use some kind of AdBlock.

Some more stats for US users:

  • "While up to 41% of American internet users report using ad blockers... Ad blocking is detected in 18% of web sessions on computers among American users."
  • 37% of respondents blocked ads while using a desktop computer.
  • 15% of respondents said that they used blockers on mobile devices.
  • 10% of internet users in the US say that they block ads while browsing on a tablet.

One could consider how much time people that use AdBlock spend online relative to those that don't, but I've met plenty of people that spend hours on their phone, and they don't use any form of AdBlock.

Granted he's not quite there yet, but I think this is an overarching goal for Elon with Twitter -- which does seem achievable if YT becomes sufficiently unfriendly. (although it remains to be seen how he would monetize it without resorting to ads himself -- or further strongarming on paid subscriptions I guess)