159
It'll keep continuing until you get one FPS and no audio without paying for premium.
this post was submitted on 28 Sep 2026
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Enshittification
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What is enshittification?
The phenomenon of online platforms gradually degrading the quality of their services, often by promoting advertisements and sponsored content, in order to increase profits. (Cory Doctorow, 2022, extracted from Wikitionary) source
The lifecycle of Big Internet
We discuss how predatory big tech platforms live and die by luring people in and then decaying for profit.
Embrace, extend and extinguish
We also discuss how naturally open technologies like the Fediverse can be susceptible to corporate takeovers, rugpulls and subsequent enshittification.
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Not that this is a hill I particularly want to die on... But YouTube isn't free. I understand absolutely of course there are operational costs that need to be covered. Even if it is operated by one of the six companies that control the world.
But if I sit through a torrent of ads. That's my payment. Never mind the brokering of all of the personal information it can glean from devices watched on and location etc...
Yes, but I am talking financially, as nothing is truly free as everything costs time. I thought that was pretty self-explanatory.
Them adding more ads is enshittification, not an optional higher bitrate stream. They didnt replace the existing 1080p stream.
You do not need to live this way. I've never seen a YouTube ad.
This doesn't need to be true either. I use FreeTube and never log in
The day Google once and for all successfully stops ad blocking, etc., is the day that I stop watching YouTube videos.