YouTube sued in major lawsuit over 'no interruptions' ad-free Premium subscription
For many, YouTube Premium is a godsend. Alongside background and offline play, we get to skip those dreaded ads, meaning you can get back to your MrBeast video without being bombarded by adverts for new flavors of Pringles or the paradox of trying to get you to jab GLP-1s.
Still, YouTube's offering has come under fire over the years, with constant complaints that it's not worth the $15.99 a month. At a time when we're trying to tighten our belts and trim the fat when it comes to juggling various subscription services, the likes of YouTube Premium are potentially on the chopping block.
YouTube Premium Lite has been introduced to offer a pared-down version of the full-fat package, while various tests have tried making certain features free, locking others behind a paywall, and have led to claims that 90-second unskippable ads have been slipped in under our noses.
What is the YouTube Premium lawsuit?
A major lawsuit now threatens to hit YouTube hard in the pocket, with MediaDailyNews reporting how two plaintiffs are suing Google amid complaints that the tech giant has violated consumer protection laws by interrupting streaming with ads.
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This comes even though YouTube Premium is pitched as ad-free. Filed in the US District Court for the Northern District of California on July 14, California residents William Flemming and Devin Rose seek to represent a nationwide class of YouTube Premium customers by claiming that sponsored segments interrupt their supposedly ad-free viewing experience.
These interruptions are said to come in the form of creators adding paid sponsorships to their videos.
The lawsuit cites a Theo Von podcast that inserts a Pepsi promotion into the middle of a Kevin James interview, a Kallmekris true crime video being sidetracked by a Surfshark VPN sponsorship, and a gameplay video from Markiplier that switches to NordVPN promo.
The latter is reprimanded as being particularly egregious because it happens just seconds after the video starts.
Another puts Steven Bartlett's "The Diary of a CEO" podcast in its crosshairs, with whole sections of his videos specifically branded 'ads' by the Dragon's Den judge.
The class-action suit states: "YouTube Premium does not offer an 'ad-free' and 'uninterrupted' experience. To the contrary, advertisements and interruptions frequently appear during streamed content, interrupting videos with commercials for everything from popular automobiles to marketing for local attorneys or dietary supplements."
Is YouTube Premium really an ad-free experience?
Fleming claims he watches around six hours of YouTube a day after signing up to Premium in 2019, but complains he's "subjected to advertising constantly" as the filing adds: "Just in the last week alone, videos he has viewed have been interrupted by ads from the dollarwise app, various gaming apps, and a service called Incogni."
Rose has been a YouTube Premium subscriber since 2018, saying he's "commonly subjected to advertisements both before and during the videos that he streams while watching and/or listening to YouTube."
Presented as evidence is a sign-up page that compares YouTube Premium to YouTube Premium Lite, with the former being described as ad-free for all videos and Lite as ad-free for most videos.
The complaint concludes: "A reasonable consumer would understand YouTube’s representations to mean that in exchange for monthly subscription payments, YouTube Premium will contain no ads and no interruptions.
"In comparison, a reasonable consumer would understand that in exchange for a lesser monthly subscription payment, YouTube Premium Lite would display limited ads in some streaming content."
The pair acknowledge that YouTube's Help center states some Premium videos have "branding or promotions" that can be embedded by creators alongside "promotional links, shelves and features in and around content that are added or enabled by the creator."
Still, they argue the YouTube Help page shouldn't be considered part of YouTube Premium's terms that are accepted when subscribing.
As the plaintiffs maintain it's "simply word games and double talk," Google is yet to respond to MediaDailyNews' request for comment.