I am Passionately connecting dots and thinking about things here. this is a Big Theory.
Points:
reddit post, tech news sites, age of account vs number of posts, first post, looks totally deleted, only about this subject, youtube response that it's an "experiment," tech blogs seem to be misinterpreting the reddit post consistently, seems to be... I HAVE POINTS TO MAKE AND SCREENSHOTS TO GRAB.
Enough wiggle room that there's room to back out if the public outrage was hot enough would lose them enough money but if people just accepted the mainstream fear and were disgruntled but accepting it then they could actually roll it out. Because i stress- the reddit user DID NOT have to turn off adblock. Nothing would have happened. All the tech websites have - I need to get sources but I saw them say "well!!!! Looks like you have to turn off adblock and use youtube premium!!!!!" And google is rich rich rich. And there's a new youtube CEO.
I mean LOOK man. Account created in 2015. 23483 post karma. 1800 karma from ONE post in /r/youtube and then after that one post with a couple upvotes in /r/chrome. This account has been fucking BLEACHED dude!!!!! /u/Sazk100 is the center of this story, they're the one who got this new adblock-detecting thing first.
Actually what I smell is a plant. This all looks constructed for a plan, to pass superficial scrutiny, but it's all intentional.
YouTube reached out DIRECTLY to the subreddit in which this initial discovery was posted in order to confirm it was real and call it an experiment.
I need to stress prior knowledge that this is a common pattern on Reddit. Companies will buy older Reddit accounts with higher post and comment karma, delete all the posts and comments, and use the more reputable accounts to advocate for their brands. Astroturfing, basically. YouTube being in charge of THIS part of the "experiment" would mean that you would be looking at an account exactly like this one, taken out of whatever accounts they've stored up in the astroturf vault. Every good PR firm has them.
The juxtaposition of being worried enough about
having their account terminated to make the reddit post, yet knowing AND ASSERTING that the terms of service definitely don't include that.
The measured, clear delivery of the call to action.
And this remark about the flame of the class war is a little
on the nose.
Also consider repetition of the minute detail of the ad detection happening only while browsing the news
portion of YouTube. When planning a big lie, one may turn many wheels at once. Have you ever fucking heard of YouTube's News tab? Has anyone ever fucking used youtube's news tab
unironically? Assuming corporate motive is a step beyond my current thesis delivery but think about it. When you plan a big lie, all the details are ironed out beautifully clean
and you know them by heart. Seemingly extraneous details are easy to weave in because they look pretty, or serve some ulterior motive as well.
I could see the reliance on the point about the news page being the area where uBlock is detected as a potential swivel to brand this in the media as similar to the New York Times asking you to turn off your adblocker. Or, well, blocking you from reading an article, completely paywalling and denying you access, unless you disable your adblocker.
With regard to the first comment linked, the type of person who sees this popup multiple times and is worried enough about losing their account is not simultaneously:
a)the type of person who posts about it on reddit and
b) the type
of person who knows for certain that YouTube hasn't stipulated account termination as a potential consequence in the terms and conditions.
The call to action is so blatant, detailed, and dry. On its own line in the center of the comment they say "I also haven’t seen any news orgs, tweets or posts regarding this pop-up." The goal revealed here in the PR campaign is to drum up discussion about this event, first by flagging journalists that this is a fresh story, then by continuing with a more general call to action. Simple, direct.
The class war comment is so on the nose that it seems like an inside joke between marketing MBA's in a thinktank conference room.
I say this is bad journalism because it is inaccurate. It is not reporting the facts OF THE REDDIT POST IT CITES!, this makes it bad journalism. Articles I've found so far and my notes: (Add stars for Sus Points [semi arbitrary but we'll try it out])
I would try to recreate it (remember according to the reddit you need to go to the news video section, and use ublock) but I use FireFox and I spent so long scrubbing Chrome off my laptop with steel wool that I refuse to redownload it. I mean fuck I might just to like test this point. They say they're running it globally, and I know A/B testing is a thing, but I have a feeling if I go download chrome and try to recreate this I won't get it. The news article at tomsguide said they were unable to recreate it. Did they use the News function with uBlock on Google Chrome? ... I will try to recreate it.
The reddit post was staged, the news posts are replicating misinformation with bad source reading comprehension, YouTube PR is attempting to manipulate the public around the AdBlock issue, and there will always, always be a way to block ads on YouTube.