I have UBlock installed on Firefox and what is pictured here is what has been happening for every video that I’m clicking on. Panning doesn’t make the video play either. I tried that. It’s not my internet connection since the videos and ads that you can’t even skip and pause when you tab out play just fine on Chrome. In the days before this happened I got several popups from YouTube saying that adblockers aren’t allowed after months of browsing YouTube ad-free without issue
They periodically update the back-end code to try new things, and they A-B test, so that some users get an update and others don’t. Then they monitor their logs, and maybe even social media, to try to determine who’s seeing what and when, and if anyone’s having trouble.
They may even generate a pop-up asking you if you’re having trouble, and especially to tell you that you have to watch ads.
Anything that works in their favour will be rolled out to everyone. And then the good people (person?) at UBlock Origin (which is the one you should use if you’re going to use UBlock) work their butts off to find a way around it, in a never-ending arms race.
Anecdotally, I recently noticed that one of my accounts/profiles that has UBo wasn’t able to load more than 2 seconds of 360p video. I thought that was it for my viewing. Was getting a “null” tooltip on the settings cog and everything. Then I force-reloaded the tab and everything was alright again. They’d clearly changed something on the back-end for me and I was using an outdated interface (a day old! the humanity!) that couldn’t handle it any more.
But back to the topic of ads: One day they might find a way to completely lock out ad-blockers. That is the day you learn to use the stats for nerds right-click menu on an ad video. From there you can learn the video ID of the ad and visit it directly. That way you can find the advertiser’s account if not also the comment section, where you can leave a comment telling them exactly what you thought of their ad. Maybe also give it a thumbs down.
Eventually the cowards will turn off their comment sections, or else YouTube will prevent people from finding specific ad video IDs, but that’s what other social media is for.
Got a turboencabulator ad in the middle of your Elsa vs Spiderman binge? Let Encabulator Inc. feel your wrath.
Be sure to include something like "as a result of seeing this ad when I didn’t want to, I will not be buying or recommending your products for the period of " and then do your best to follow through on that.
They can make us watch the ads on their platform, but they can’t make us like it.