On February 16th 2023, Susan Wojcicki stepped down as CEO of YouTube, and was replaced by Neal Mohan. Many people, myself included, welcomed the change, as we thought this would finally be the end of a constant stream of bad decisions. 

Well... it seems we were wrong.

 YouTube is currently testing a feature that bans users that have adblockers enabled from watching videos. This is most likely to get them to subscribe to YouTube Premium, which removes regular ads. This would be fine enough with most people... if YouTube didn't constantly allow advertisers to run scam ads, malware ads, explicit ads, and other ads involving topic matters that would get a creator blocked for going against their own Community Guidelines... AND constantly pile unskippable ads on top of each other... AND take 45% of the ad revenue that is supposed to be going to the creator... AND not to mention play the ads in inconvenient places during the video!

Well, I say this is the time we put our foot down and put this chain of stupid decisions to an end once and for all! YouTube has been ignoring the views of the community for quite a while (dislike removal, COPPA, UI change, etc) and we, quite clearly, have had enough of it! And, on that last note, don't just take my word for it - here's the reaction from the community:

"I'm just going to stop watching and go do something else." - MaximumMeatPotato, Reddit

"Stop forcing ads down my throat and maybe I'd stop using an Adblock. How is this so hard for sites to understand?" - @ThunderTHR, Twitter

"If they didn't want people to use adblock then they should not have made ads to be insufferable." - Eener1000, YouTube

"I hope youtube understands that I just leave any website that forces me to disable adblock. They are not 'above' that." - Rollout9292, Reddit

"Not addressing their broken copystrike system, not bringing back the dislike button, not fighting the bots or scammers or any of the other actual problems that's plagued this platform for years. Adblockers. That's the only issue within this entire website that they feel the need to address." - Chicken Curry, YouTube

So, in conclusion, I urge you to join me in the fight to stop this decision, and hopefully return YouTube to the great haven of entertainment it once was!

If you'd like to support the cause, here's how you can help:

1. UNSUBSCRIBE from YouTube Premium - as well as YouTube TV if you have it. You should not financially support a company that does not care for its viewers.
2. Sell any stock in Alphabet (NASDAQ: GOOGL) that you may have, for the same reason as the last time.
3. Be as vocal as possible - on YouTube, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook - anywhere you can, get the message out and make your voice heard. (This isn't very efficient, but it's worth a try.)
4. And of course, sign this petition and encourage others to do the same!