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Ad-free alternatives to YouTube

Admiral Beez

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I am tired of trying to watch videos on youtube only to have to sit through some 15 sec. ad beforehand, and then trying to find the hidden "x" to kill the embedded ads and links within the video. Of course now that Google owns YouTube you can expect this, but there has to be an alternative video sharing site that does not place ads at the beginning of vids or embed ads and links within the vid.

What about http://www.dailymotion.com?
 
Nothing is going to have the penetration YouTube has. Vimeo is a good place to upload your own videos, but it won't get you any walk by traffic to the video, nor are you likely to easily discover other videos there.
 
Unfortunately, advertising is the only way to make free video sharing economically viable. My point is that the videos are free, and sitting through a 15 second ad is better than pulling out a credit card any day. Adblock is an option, and so are the few ad-free video services - but once any ad-free service reaches a critical mass in volume, they need the added revenue of ads to keep up on server costs.
 
There are a few greasemonkey scripts that make youtube a much more pleasurable experience. Unfortunately they get outdated quick as Google is intent on updating Youtube with useless garbage frequently, but it is still a good alternative.

I miss the old Youtube, it was so much easier to navigate around and no, I don't want to use my real name. :mad: I heard that Dailymotion is currently run by the same guys that made the original Youtube, and I must say I've had a better experience using Dailymotion over Youtube over the past year or so. It still doesn't compete with Youtube's reach and widespread use however.
 
AFAIK, all that does is block ads on the page, but does nothing to eliminate ads embedded in the video itself.

I'm not sure how (or if) you're using Adblock, but I've been running it for years and have never seen a Youtube ad either on the page or in the video.
(Apologies to UT as I've never seen any of your ads either!)

That said, I agree with WislaHD in that Youtube has definitely been getting worse and worse over time for any number of other reasons. That seems to be the credo of the internet - develop something great that everyone likes, then keep pointlessly fucking with it until you drive all your users away...
 
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Youtube gives us access to millions of videos that load fast, and we pay nothing. And people are complaining because they sometimes have to wait 15 seconds?
 
middeljohn:

Personally I am a little bit suspicious of Google's supposed largesse - they are collecting behaviourial information every time you click and use their services afterall, and it is an exceedingly powerful database when combined across all the users temporally.

AoD
 
Dailymotion, Vimeo, LiveLeak, Break and Metacafe are some that come to mind.

EDIT: I just realized that Break and Metacafe has ads too.
 
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Youtube gives us access to millions of videos that load fast, and we pay nothing. And people are complaining because they sometimes have to wait 15 seconds?
No, it's not the waiting that bugs me. It's the trying to find the little "x" to remove the tiled boxes embedded within videos so I can watch the video without all the clutter.
 
I recently discovered Youtube Center add-on for Firefox, Chrome and Opera, based on the original greasemonkey script.

I highly recommend! Improved my Youtube experience 10-fold.
 

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