SponsorBlock – Skip over sponsorship segments on YouTube

Stops intrusive ads that literally take up 30% of your screen and move the website around making it difficult to read an article. But sponsored segments built into the video itself? It has none of these issues.

any ad disrupts the viewing experience and makes a video difficult/annoying to view.

a̶l̶s̶o̶,̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶i̶m̶p̶a̶c̶t̶ ̶o̶f̶ ̶s̶p̶o̶n̶s̶o̶r̶ ̶s̶e̶c̶t̶i̶o̶n̶s̶ ̶c̶a̶n̶ ̶o̶n̶l̶y̶ ̶b̶e̶ ̶m̶e̶a̶s̶u̶r̶e̶d̶ ̶b̶a̶s̶e̶d̶ ̶o̶n̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶t̶o̶t̶a̶l̶ ̶v̶i̶e̶w̶s̶ ̶o̶f̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶v̶i̶d̶e̶o̶,̶ ̶r̶e̶g̶a̶r̶d̶l̶e̶s̶s̶ ̶o̶f̶ ̶w̶h̶e̶t̶h̶e̶r̶ ̶p̶e̶o̶p̶l̶e̶ ̶a̶c̶t̶u̶a̶l̶l̶y̶ ̶s̶e̶e̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶a̶d̶ ̶o̶r̶ ̶n̶o̶t̶.̶ ̶i̶f̶ ̶i̶ ̶a̶m̶ ̶n̶o̶t̶ ̶i̶n̶t̶e̶r̶e̶s̶t̶e̶d̶ ̶i̶n̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶a̶d̶,̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶n̶ ̶b̶l̶o̶c̶k̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶i̶t̶ ̶f̶r̶o̶m̶ ̶v̶i̶e̶w̶ ̶m̶a̶k̶e̶s̶ ̶a̶b̶s̶o̶l̶u̶t̶e̶l̶y̶ ̶n̶o̶ ̶d̶i̶f̶f̶e̶r̶e̶n̶c̶e̶ (whereas adblock not loading an ad may reduce the exposure count) (correction: apparently youtube does show engagement over time, so it may be possible to figure out how many people skip ads)

I don't think that's true at all.

1. There are video analytics to measure what parts of the video were watched.

2. Even if you generally dislike ads, there is a chance that you will see an ad you are interested in that you will check out, which will contribute to the ad's effectiveness, and can be measured. If you automatically block ads, the effectiveness becomes 0 in all cases.