What a shame. What's the point even? I'm not going subscribe to YouTube premium anyway, and even less install and use the YouTube app. What happens with this move is just that I will just use YouTube less. I believe that's the case for most people who chose to use YouTube in a browser precisely for background playback.

As an example: knowing that I won't be able to keep the sound playing for the 5 minutes in between two buses when I need to walk and pay attention, I'll probably just launch a podcast from the beginning of my hour of transportation so that I'm not interrupted. For these five minutes, they loose me for almost an hour.

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renewiltord 6 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Perhaps that's what they desire. Serving YouTube video has marginal cost and you provide marginal zero value. Losing you as a customer is probably desired.

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p4bl0 6 hours ago | parent [-]

That's a very narrow view. YouTube is the only reason I have a Google account. Because of it I use some of their other products. And because I'm connected to my YouTube/Google account, they can track my behavior across products and across devices. My usage profile has value if only because it can be correlated to others (who don't bock ads), and because I share link to their platform on social media and messaging app. That's still true even if I'm able from time to time to continue listening to a YouTube video while my phone is in my pocket. But I will share less link and leave them a lot less usage data if they push me away from their products.

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aembleton 4 hours ago | parent | next [-]

You'll probably find that most of us don't share links all that much. You're probably an outlier that they're not going to care about. They'll just look at the aggregate of lots of users not generating much revenue, and not encouraging revenue from others.

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renewiltord 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Yeah and people have been trying to pay artists in exposure for eons now. I’m sure the artists are really feeling bad about the decision now.

	▲	p4bl0 4 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Comparing artists and a company like Google is… bold of you. If you're thinking about content creators, you're just wrong. Most of them get almost nothing from YouTube ads, and for those who do, a few of them have no money have multiple revenue sources of which YouTube AdSense is very rarely the main one. Many do in-video product placements, which are not affected by being able to get audio only or having an ad blocker, and many have things like a Patreon, Tipeee, Ulule, of some sort. I pay monthly directly to the creators I watch the most on these platforms and who do not have millions of followers, because that's what they say help them the most. Really, thinking Google worsening our user experience is even remotely something they do in favor of content creators having a hard time at the end of the month is beyond naive.

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nikanj 6 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

The point is that youtube is an ad-funded service, and if you're not watching the ads, Google is losing money on you.

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wazoox 6 hours ago | parent [-]

Bwaaa an evil monopolistic empire won't get our money, that's so sad really. They're racking up tens of billions of money every quarter, we don't. I carefully do my best not to give any money to Microsoft, Google and the likes. They must be dismantled anyway.

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nikanj 5 hours ago | parent [-]

If they are an evil monopolistic empire, why are you upset you can’t use their services? It’s not like watching shorts is a matter of life/death.

	▲	wazoox 3 hours ago \| parent [-]
		They're a monopoly. They force me to use their shitty, ad-laden, privacy-violating services. I'll use all possible circumvention measures possible. Of course I use alternative solutions as much as possible, but it's a monopoly, remember ? Not a public service. Not a sane, competitive market. Dismantle the GAFAM. Death to them. They're evil, imperialistic, freedom-killing machines.