this post was submitted on 06 Aug 2023
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I imagine if it doesn't make sense to you already, I won't be able to help you understand, but here goes anyway.
A company pays a lot of money to have a service developed and hosted, then offers a paid teir, and an ad supported teir. If you neither pay, nor watch ads, yet still use the service, then the company is incurring fees due to your usage while receiving no revenue for providing the service.
Like, YouTube videos are great. Practically a utility at this point. However YouTube, the platform, is a company not a charity; if you cost them money, while providing $0 revenue, you're stealing their money.
Personally I don't think theft is justified outside extreme desparation (stealing food, basically), and given that YouTube gives you an option that does not require giving them money I find it hard to justify stealing bandwidth.
If YouTube started banning Adblockers they'd end up with really bad PR and an arms race, neither of which would sound terribly appealing (although I predict this is a policy change in the works already).
The problem with account bans is that, unlike steam accounts, YouTube accounts have no value associated with them. You ban one and another one pops up.
If I went to the drive through, and they handed me a coffee and said "that'll be $3. Would you like to pay with cash? or points?" And I just drove off, they wouldn't chase me over it, but it is absolutely still theft.
Listen, if you want to pirate content, go ahead, I can't stop you, and it's not like I haven't done it myself, but don't lie to yourself.