this post was submitted on 20 Apr 2024

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Privacy

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Youtube is now unusable without a frontend (lemmy.world)

submitted 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

169 comments fedilink hide all child comments

I have an extension that can individually disable all the most useless/addicting components of the Youtube site, such as shorts and whatnot. On the search page, I have turned on:

hide Shorts

hide For You

hide Trending

hide 'People Also Searched For'

hide Search Categories

hide Promoted Videos

hide Promoted Websites

hide Suggested Products

Do you know what Youtube has started doing? They are now inserting engagement slop DIRECTLY into the search results, as seen in the image above. It's literally a short, yet it's inserted like a video so you're forced to see it. The only possible way to remove it is by using a privacy frontend, as even on incognito mode, Youtube will look at the three videos you've watched and start inserting shit based off that.

Louis Rossman is right, they all have rapist mentalities... "just let me stick it in"

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[–] [email protected] 7 points 7 months ago

Piped. Trust me.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 7 months ago (2 children)

I disabled History and only see my channel subscriptions. None of the options above appear in my Youtube feed.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 7 months ago (4 children)

Yeah i did this until they make the entire homepage blank if you keep history off. Very annoying.

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[–] [email protected] 7 points 7 months ago

Upvoted for BoC

[–] [email protected] 7 points 7 months ago

as a boards lover myself, i just have to comment on this, for one, impeccable taste in music.

anyway, i tested this myself, seems fine. Have you tried disabling the watch history bullshit? It even lists a sidebar full of album related shit.

So uh, go off queen ig.

[–] notthoughtsjustcrabrave 6 points 7 months ago (2 children)

On a similar note, does anybody know of a frontend or add on for Instagram? I do not want the suggested content and reels they shove down everyone's throats because it is very easy to waste hours and get distracted easily with it. Also no ads would be nice. I have to use Instagram to keep in touch with certain people who I have no alternative means of keeping in touch with.

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[–] [email protected] 5 points 7 months ago (6 children)

I’m really surprised at how bad of an experience people are having! I have a bunch of channels I follow and people I interact with. Some big channels but most small. I love channels with only a few hundred to a few thousand viewers. The creators post their videos and then I talk to them through the comments. We have some really interesting conversations.

Lots of other channels I follow I don’t interact with but still really enjoy. A lot of hobby channels are amazing! I generally avoid the news and politics stuff, though I still occasionally watch Ukraine videos or Trump trial stuff. I get sick of those after one video though!

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[–] [email protected] 5 points 7 months ago (4 children)

Works for me

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[–] [email protected] 5 points 7 months ago

The damn site tries to crash my browser before showing me what I want

[–] [email protected] 5 points 7 months ago (5 children)

In fairness, I have no idea what I would want from that search query.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 7 months ago

Boards of Canada is a very popular IDM artist, and they're the third result down from the top.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 7 months ago

It looks like it's a band name, as the third result is from a channel with that exact name. Idk what the first search result is, but that second one seems vaguely related probably because the guy mentioned it in his silly short

[–] [email protected] 5 points 7 months ago

It's indeed the name of a band

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[–] [email protected] 5 points 7 months ago (5 children)

My method for android & desktop. I never sign in to YouTube & never use the app. Using Joplin synced through Nextcloud (any syncable note taking app would do the trick) I keep a list of channels ("subscriptions") & interesting looking videos ("watch later") which I group by length. Obviously, this way the links can be via Piped, YouTube whatever.

I only ever interract through browser which is never signed in. Kiwi browser on Android, Firefox or Brave on desktop. All of them run uBlock + SponsorBlock + DeArrow.

DeArrow is by the same dev/s as SponsorBlock & gives anti clickbait crowd sourced titles & thumbs. Its become an invaluable tool so I'm glad to have paid to offer some support.