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YouTube Considering an Ad-Free, Subscription-Based Version

Posted by samzenpus on from the premium-pay dept.

Walking The Walk writes YouTube is looking at creating a paid-subscription model that would allow users to skip the ads on their videos. (A more condensed summary from CBC.) No firm date has been announced, and it sounds like tentative steps right now, but YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki did mention that ad-enabled music videos would still be offered.

7 of 225 comments (clear)

  1. Ads always load fine by Russ1642 · · Score: 4, Funny

    Ads, even full top quality HD, load up just fine. Then when your video is actually supposed to play you just get that stupid waiting symbol. Then the video starts to play and just as it's getting to a good part it pauses while it loads again then rapidly skips the part you actually wanted to see. Maybe, just maybe, YouTube could make their site not suck before asking people to pay for it.

    1. Re:Ads always load fine by sound+vision · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I've been very disappointed in how the YouTube video player has been getting worse on a technical level. In fact, it's been many years since it was in a state that I'd consider "good". Between videos failing halfway through, or just failing to load period, requiring a refresh... not to mention the extreme bandwidth waste while seeking. It used to be, once a video had loaded, you could seek to any point in that video and it would simply start playing the loaded video from that point. Now, it begins re-downloading the entire video, beginning at your seek point.

  2. Ad free...until they reach critical mass by xxxJonBoyxxx · · Score: 5, Interesting

    >> I'd happily pay a higher monthly fee not to have the ads

    You must be new to the planet. Remember when the promise of cable TV was "you pay for it, so it's ad-free!" Once YouTube has a critical population writing monthly checks for content, they'll surely add the ads back in.

  3. Re:Ad-enabled music videos? by ganjadude · · Score: 4, Informative

    ads??? i havent seen ads on youtube in forever. granted i know what adblockplus is

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  4. Re:Ad-enabled music videos? by sound+vision · · Score: 4, Insightful

    If Google will now be directly earning money from people subscribing to ad-free service, the AdBlock situation could change quickly. Frankly, I'm surprised Google hasn't already made the ads inseparable from the content - it's not hard. I suppose there hasn't been enough incentive for them to do that. If they bring out subscriptions, maybe they will have the incentive.

  5. Price needs to be realistic (low) by timmyf2371 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    For this to work and reach a mass market, the price needs to be (i) realistic and (ii) generate an impulse purchase.

    There are too many subscription services out there; everyone wants their £5 per month or £7.99 per month or £9.99 per month, and it all adds up. I think an ad-free YouTube at £1.99 per month would entice a lot of people. Any more would probably not be worth it.

    BTW, Adblock is great and I love it. But it doesn't stop the adverts which sometimes play before a video when I'm using the YouTube app on my iPhone.

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  6. Re:pay money for youtube? by ninjacheeseburger · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Youtube has come a long way recently in terms of production value some channels host shows that even surpass TV shows in terms of quality such as VGHS https://www.youtube.com/show/v... or even full length movies such as Ashens and the Quest for the game child https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

    Users like TotalBiscuit regularly provide high quality coverage of video games, so depending on your interests, there are defiantly videos worth paying to watch, obviously depending on prices. It would have to be pretty low to be justifiable though, a TV licence in the UK is just over £12 a month which funds multiple add free channels with for the most part high quality content.