This week YouTube hosted Brandcast 2025 in which it revealed how marketers could make better use of the platform to connect with customers.
A few new so-called innovations were announced at the event but one has caught the attention of the internet – Peak Points. This new product makes use of Gemini to detect “the most meaningful, or ‘peak’, moments within YouTube’s popular content to place your brand where audiences are the most engaged”.
Essentially, YouTube will use Gemini and probably the heatmap generated on YouTube videos by people skipping to popular points, to determine where to place advertising. Anybody who has grown up watching terrestrial television where adverts arrive as a way to build suspense will understand how annoying Peak Points could become.
I think it’s funny that Google thinks putting an ad in when someone is most engaged with a video will be an effective advertising technique. So someone’s going to be absorbed in the video, be presented with an ad while engaging with it and be happy that they were interrupted to be served an ad? Sounds like a great formula for pissing off your users.
For YouTube, viewers aren’t the users, advertisers are.
It’s the same idiotic MBA reasoning that keeps bringing the popup back in some new form every few years. No, it wasn’t the technical implementation of the delivery mechanism we were upset about, you absolute fucking morons.
It’s always jarring loading a news site without ad blocking. The whole thing just seems cancerous, and that’s before you can even start reading the story.
I recently switched phones and forgot I didn’t have an adblocker installed yet. Clicked on an article and holy shit the modern mobile web is a toxic hellscape without it…
Pretty wild seeing an ad for UL out in the wild in these comments, you an electrician?
I got my MTR in UL 508A a couple years ago
Architect, so in the neighborhood… I mostly interact with UL in the context of fire-rated assemblies, though.
Ahh my context is all related to industrial electrical systems. It gets really fun when UL and NFPA 79 start to conflict with each other.
Firefox X UBlock Origin X Sponsorblock X Bring Back Youtube Dislike. Thank fuck for those Devs.
The removal of YouTube dislike is still fucking infuriating to me. I get it: now I have to watch the video to find out if it’s a piece of shit, and that’s exactly what they want, but holy fuck what a shitty decision designed to waste my time and maximize their chances to flash an ad in my face.
Wow big congratulations to the corporate ghoul who thought this up. Thanks for making our world a shittier place.
firefox and uBlock Origin. I don’t see ads. Fuck Google and their AI.
How to ensure huge swathes of the population will never ever buy your product out of sheer spite
On youtube, you’re not the customer. You’re the product being sold
Not going to help when you have a monopoly over the user-generated content field like YT and by extension Google basically does.
That number is still SIGNIFICANTLY less than those who won’t do anything. Us using ad blockers doesn’t even account for a percentage of what they rake in from those without them.
Just imagine coming up with shit like this being the only job you can find and not jumping off a building instead.
You should pay off you don’t like the ads.
YT + Music is a fantastic value.
Queue a line of people screaming it’s trash while not being able to get over their addiction of the service.
I will pay only when Google ensure that my data will not be used for any type of advertising or AI training (this obviously includes selling to third parties). Months ago I read around, I don’t know if it’s true, that even those with a premium account will see ads. If that proves true, it means I will never make the subscription. It’s pretty simple.
Then deal with the ads 🤷♂️
Nah, don’t pay Google with money or data. They already have enough.
Nah, I don’t like ads. Too much work to play cat and mouse over ad blockers.
I have installed uBlockOrigin once and have literally not done any configuring since then. Not a really good cat it seems.
Google seems bound and determined to destroy itself trying to escalate it’s profits from “staggering” to “colossal.” The search is so bad AI is actually better, and that’s saying something. And now they want to enshittify YouTube? Okay. I’m sure it won’t die right away, but this will be one of the thousands cuts.
laughs in uBlock Origin
Laughs in FreeTube.
… Revanced
I just pay for premium. Worth every penny with the amount of YouTube we watch.
minor krill issue
Thank you for giving Google money.
With your endearing support, Google is paying less attention to us so we can continue getting the same content for free.
No problem, I like supporting all the neat content creators I follow while others are happy to rip them off because they feel entitled to free content.
And don’t give me the “support them on patreon” line because a) I already do and b) ain’t no way the majority of you who pirate YouTube are donating money to everyone you follow.
You’re right, of course, however as consumers we’re put into the position of having to support an absolutely atrocious corporate surveillance company AND creators, or neither. Creators are entangling themselves that way. Given the option, I will choose the latter every time. When creators want to make their content available on other platforms, I do support them there.
“pirate YouTube” lmfao
bet you’re one of those people that pirate oxygen
I’m with you, paying is better than supporting the Ad business.
I just wish YouTube did not treat paying customers like criminals with the app based restrictions.
Why pay when there’s a free option?
The free option is not sustainable and does not reward the correct customer/business relationship.
Willing to bet uBlock Origin will make it so I never see a single one of these ads.
Firefox forever.
And Revanced for android is just 😘🤌 chef’s kiss.
Revanced.
It won’t bother me at all.
Or just stop being dependent on Google and use PeerTube and Odysee.
It’s your choice.
Use Freetube or Invidious, problem solved.
Only Freetube is being actively attacked by Google and Invidious is basically dead.
Use NewPipe or its forks
For future readers: Freetube currently works. Using it right now. Invidious works too, granted some instance do not. One needs to look for ones that are currently active.
A guy I know started selling AI push notifications.
Your app signs up for his service, and he uses what’s essentially ChatGPT to find the best time slot to send you custom push notifications. That’s just his third party service working with limited data and system access.
Just imagine when Google and Apple start selling that as a service integrated to the OS.
Firefox + uBlock origin
