YOUTUBE STRIKES BACK: MUTING VIDEOS IN THE BATTLE AGAINST AD BLOCKERS

YouTube, the video streaming giant, has waged war on ad blockers, and its most recent effort in that push is a serious escalation. To identify ad blocker users and protect its advertising dollars – the platform’s lifeblood – YouTube is muting videos and skipping to their end for those viewers who use ad blockers. The war between content platforms and ad blocking technologies is heating up, and the tactics YouTube is deploying on the front line make for an instructive and tortured chapter in the broader war over user experience and revenues, and how far platforms will go to protect those revenues.

THE CATALYST BEHIND YOUTUBE'S LATEST STRATEGY

AdBlockers have become a nagging pain for YouTube, since they threaten the very base of its business model: ads. When they are turned on, viewers see way fewer ads, which puts a dent in its finances. The attempts of YouTube to mute videos for users who use ad blockers is a way of saying: ‘We’ll do anything to stop you from killing our income.’

A CONTROVERSIAL YET BOLD MOVE

With this choice of course, YouTube has put itself in some rough surf. Not so long ago, the typical tactic was to issue a warning or to simply block access to content for ad block users. Muting videos or bypassing the content altogether is a dramatic escalation – arguably a punitive one that directly targets the viewing experience in an attempt to force the user to view the ads or pay for the ad-free version.

YOUTUBE VS. AD BLOCKERS: A WINDOW INTO A LARGER BATTLE

This development is part of a larger skirmish about digital ad revenue. Ad-blockers threaten not only YouTube, but all web sites based on ad revenue. And since YouTube, with its billion-plus users, is the undisputed king of all video streaming sites, its strategies and their successes or failures carry outsized importance. This is one of the most important fronts in the battle over content platforms and ad-blockers.

NAVIGATING USER REACTION

YouTube’s tactic against ad blockers now comes down to how viewers respond: will they reluctantly turn off their blockers or simply shift to, say, YouTube Premium — or head to another platform or perhaps, more powerful, ad-blockers? Balancing the need to protect their revenue stream with user satisfaction is always a tricky proposition; YouTube’s latest gambit is a bit of a gamble in that regard.

THE FUTURE OF ONLINE CONTENT CONSUMPTION

The YouTube-adblockers war provides a peek into larger trends about how online content could be consumed in the future. As platforms try more aggressive methods to protect their revenues, the balance between free content, user experience and advertising will change. This is a case study in the fine line between keeping the platform healthy and providing an experience that does not make the user run away.

EXPLORING THE MOVE FURTHER

Moves like YouTube’s represent a turning point for digital content and advertising. They also illustrate the ongoing struggle between fuelling revenue and creating friction-free user experience that comes from huge efforts to block ad-blocking. The mute-or-skip approach to ad block users, in the context of YouTube’s stance on protecting ad revenue, is quite combative, but challenging as it is, the reality is that ad-supported platforms in the age of the ad-blocker are dealing with issues of content that users don’t want and ads that they hate.

As we try to make sense of YouTube’s decision, we should also think about where such moves might take us in the wider world of digital content – and whether policymakers and those who run sites have a way of balancing ad revenue versus user satisfaction that can keep sites both profitable and usable.