I have a feeling, despite Google's communications, this is all an attempt to thwart the numerous ad-free YouTube apps.
Another reason it should have been broken apart years ago. It's laughable that the biggest ad company in the world owns the largest video site in the world, largest browser in the world, largest search engine in the world, and largest mobile OS in the world.
NewPipe (FOSS available on F-Droid) is nice alternative to ads-infested YouTube. I disabled YouTube and YouTube Music apps on my mobile, and I use NewPipe instead. You can even download YT videos or audio from YT videos using it.
Pipepipe stopped downloading audio or video when I was using it a couple of years back.
I switched over to NewPipe as it was better maintained and worked well.
Since past few months, NewPipe is not automatically showing latest YT videos, but it opens the video if I type in the video's source url. Downloads are working fine though, which is what I mainly use it for.
Will try Pipepipe again next weekend if it fares better.
Google is trying to suppress all these FOSS alternatives to its ads-overloaded apps.
What's going on with NewPipe? Their F-droid repository is down. Their domain is down. Their github repository is up, but it links to their domain, which isn't. Are they dying?
Google pays content creators so little they have all started including ads in their videos. Si technically as long as you are counted they get paid. Meanwhile, Google is more and more aggressive with their own ads interrupting videos and pushing you to subscribe to their expensive offer.
Some people, like me, have just stopped watching YouTube. Other are turning to blocking ads.
It's the usual tug of war between revenues and UX but I don't think consumers have to feel bad about not playing by Google's rules.
I will be downvoted, but I'm not fooling myself. I don't care. As long as uBlock and yt-dlp still work, I'll use them. If Google breaks them, I'll resort to some automated screengrabbing + maybe some AI automation to click "skip" in a virtual machine or something.
People will use all sorts of excuses, like the ads are about gambling, or contain viruses, or are detrimental to mental health, or whatever. No, don't use these excuses. You just don't want ads, and it is still possible to not see them. That's respectable.
I'm not sure how those are "excuses". They are reasons to not want ads. Ads are fundamentally malicious, so you should remove them from your life. I don't view attempting to "influence" me as a valid way to make a living, and am unconcerned with those who want to do it in the same way that I'm unconcerned about what would happen if someone tried to scam people with early wins in a shell game, but people just took the early win and walked instead of placing a big bet. That's just comeuppance.
That website will have an IP address and a registered owner. Taking down piracy websites is routine for governments, server providers, and domain registrars now, and they don't care whether the site is actually illegal. You can only get away with this long-term if the site is hosted in Russia, but Russia is sanctioned so how will you pay them?
Eh, somehow The Pirate Bay, Fitgirl Repacks, Anna's Archive, Sci-Hub etc seem to manage it.
The real challenge is delivering good enough performance that your site is better than waiting through 30 seconds of ads; and making it worth your time to run the site: there's hassle, legal risk, and it's not like you can run ads to make some cash.
Another reason it should have been broken apart years ago. It's laughable that the biggest ad company in the world owns the largest video site in the world, largest browser in the world, largest search engine in the world, and largest mobile OS in the world.