hmm okay I’ve decided that in order to eliminate as many factors as possible on why #YouTube has decided to block me from watching videos “for using an #adblocker”* I’m going to use YouTube with a version of LibreWolf that only has uBlock Origin installed. literally no other plugins whatsoever. also the settings are all default and I haven’t synced anything to this browser

* despite the fact that I can literally turn it off for days at a time and they still won’t unblock me. I can even report an issue (which I’ve done multiple times) and they just ignore me

it seems like they individually block my YouTube sessions. once a session is blocked it will never be unblocked, but if I clear cookies and log in again on Firefox I can get a day or two of YouTube before being re-blocked. so my LibreWolf session isn’t blocked yet, but the real test will be if it’s still not blocked 3 days from now

I’m trying to figure out why I, in particular, get blocked from watching YouTube and others don’t (even though tons of people are using adblockers on YouTube just fine). my theories are:

• it’s because I have some extension or Firefox setting that’s causing a false positive
• it’s because they’re A/B testing an extremely heavy-handed blocking system on me in particular, and not on most users

@fzer0 I’ve actually had this experience in the past too - where they’ll try to pester me or block me for like 1-2 weeks and then give up(?). but this time it’s been going on for over a month so I wonder if they’re doing an A/B test of if they can wear people like me out

it’s good to hear the experiences of someone else who’s dealt with this

@kasdeya I’ve been blocked a few times and never figured out why. I think maybe it’s because I have a static IP + IPv6, so maybe they think I’m a scraper webserver like invidious?

@esheep ohh, interesting. that does seem like something that YouTube would do. I’m actually not sure if my ISP changes my IP over time, but if they do I bet it’s like every 2 months or longer