[batish]

Originally Posted by rajivr1612

Yes, I tried it directly through YouTube.
I have not added my credit card yet, but any guess as to why it doesn't even accept GPay?

Why not add some balance to Play Store? If you already have a subscription going on then wait for a day it'll automatically deduct. If you're taking fresh, then try loading the balance first and then try.

[Samfromindia]

Originally Posted by rajivr1612

Team, I was trying to subscribe to YouTube Premium, but not able to make payment through Play Store.
All payment modes are inactive.
Can someone please help?

Why dont you get the prepaid annual membership, you pay upfront and get 1 months savings.

https://www.youtube.com/premium/annual

[binand]

Originally Posted by binand

Youtube Vanced is no longer being distributed.

Originally Posted by binand

I have kept personal copies of the 4 APK files, so I'm safe for these 2 years while an alternative emerges.

Thought I'll update this thread; I switched to Youtube Revanced for the full-featured Youtube experience, a few months back.

Installing Revanced is a more convoluted process than the original Vanced; primarily because all customisations happen on your device (which works around the Google C&D that took down Vanced).

Official start page: https://github.com/revanced/revanced-manager

Reasonably detailed installation guide: https://www.91mobiles.com/hub/how-to...tube-revanced/

[Thad E Ginathom]

Originally Posted by binand

I switched to Youtube Revanced for the full-featured Youtube experience, a few months back.

Thank you very much for that! I went premium,so I don't know whether I need it or not, but, ads aside, Vanced was a much superior interface to YouTube than Googles's own rubbish app

[Ghost131100]

Originally Posted by rajivr1612

Team, I was trying to subscribe to YouTube Premium, but not able to make payment through Play Store.
All payment modes are inactive.
Can someone please help?

Try logging out, resetting the app data and cache for the play store but a solution to add balance would be to buy a prepaid gift card from Amazon or paytm. That way you can simply redeem it and use the balance for any purchases.

[Doge]

Hi guys, I got a OnePlus Nord CE 3 Lite as a gift that I want to sell, it is a day old but cashify was offering quite low prices for it, what are some other options where I can sell it?

[Ghost131100]

Originally Posted by Doge

Hi guys, I got a OnePlus Nord CE 3 Lite as a gift that I want to sell, it is a day old but cashify was offering quite low prices for it, what are some other options where I can sell it?

If you want to exchange it for something else you can try Amazon or flipkart but for cash there’s your usual suspects of OLX, eBay etc. but the best place would be to ask someone you know if they’re willing to buy it off from you at say 2-3k cheaper than what’s offered for a new one online

[amol4184]

Originally Posted by binand

Thought I'll update this thread; I switched to Youtube Revanced for the full-featured Youtube experience, a few months back.

Installing Revanced is a more convoluted process than the original Vanced; primarily because all customisations happen on your device (which works around the Google C&D that took down Vanced).

Official start page: https://github.com/revanced/revanced-manager

Reasonably detailed installation guide: https://www.91mobiles.com/hub/how-to...tube-revanced/

I use Revanced app, and as you said the install process isn't as straight forward. It does give premium experience except for some edge cases -
1. Android Auto does not recognize it. If you use buttons on steering wheel to skip/move to next song the app starts real YouTube app (and fails because it needs screen open all the time).
2. I use Galaxy Flip 5, when I close the flip, there is a slight pause between the music before it resumes - not a big deal.

But that's not something I am majorly concerned about.

After using it for a few weeks now, I am worried about Google cracking down on the end users themselves. If Google closes my account, 50%, may be more of my digital identity is gone, never to be recovered. I have heard horror stories of account once deleted can never be reinstated. This is my primary fear using Revanced. I used OG Vanced app too for quite some time.

As years pass and I amass stuff on my Google account, losing it is going to be an unimaginable loss. With that in mind, I use another Google account which is not my primary and logged into Revanced using that - but even that is not comforting anymore. Google can find out my political leanings, religion, hobbies etc - how hard it will be for them to associate all my accounts with the one used for such apps.

It is very much possible that Google doesn't care about fraction of users using Revanced and will turn a blind eye but I sometimes wonder if the risk is worth it. Not trying to scare people, its just a thought that has been lingering in my head...what if?

May be there is some other convincing explanation why Google won't do it but I haven't been able to find anything concrete. Please educate me if there is something obvious that I am missing.

----

P.S. Most users might already know this but those using Galaxy Flip devices, you can run full blown YouTube/ YT Music app on the tiny screen on the cover screen. This way you don't have to keep the phone open, which is what I have been doing lately. It works on both Flip 4 and Flip 5 devices.

[Thad E Ginathom]

Originally Posted by amol4184

It is very much possible that Google doesn't care about fraction of users using Revanced ...

They cared enough about Vanced to shut it down. But they didn't go for end users.

The thought crossed my mind "How would they know anyway?" The self answer was swift: stupid question!

[binand]

Originally Posted by amol4184

1. Android Auto does not recognize it.

Android Auto out of the box only recognises apps that were pre-loaded or installed from the Play Store. To make it recognise sideloaded apps, you need to:

1. Activate its developer settings (procedure here: https://9to5google.com/2023/01/25/ho...-might-want-to)
2. Ask it to acknowledge sideloaded apps (activate the checkbox against Developer Settings > Unknown Sources)

Originally Posted by amol4184

After using it for a few weeks now, I am worried about Google cracking down on the end users themselves[...] As years pass and I amass stuff on my Google account, losing it is going to be an unimaginable loss. With that in mind, I use another Google account which is not my primary and logged into Revanced using that - but even that is not comforting anymore. Google can find out my political leanings, religion, hobbies etc - how hard it will be for them to associate all my accounts with the one used for such apps.

This is a whole separate topic in itself; not one that is limited to this particular use-case (perhaps worthy of its own thread). I have written my thoughts around this topic in bits and pieces in a number of threads here. Briefly, all your concerns are valid; and the only things that might stop Google from doing so are (a) the backlash from user community, (b) the legal scrutiny that is almost certain to follow, and (c) the negative PR/loss of brand image. Theoretically they might not even try to aggregate data the way you envisage in your last line.

But the bigger question here is - why do we have to give Google such access over our digital identity? Is it good for our well being that a multinational behemoth exercises nearly boundless control over our digital life? I had come to the conclusion (my triggerpoint was losing access to a secondary Gmail account I maintained) that it isn't, and started taking steps to get out of this vice-like grip. I have a personal domain which is what I use for emails these days (ironically, it was hosted at Google Apps but a year or so back I shifted to Office365). I don't upload photos to Google any longer. If they take my Gmail account down what I'll lose are my Android developer account, all the apps/content I have purchased on Play Store, Google Location History, several documents on Google Docs and maybe a few things here and there. Nothing life-threatening, I hope. I will miss my firstname@gmail.com email address though.

Originally Posted by Thad E Ginathom

The thought crossed my mind "How would they know anyway?" The self answer was swift: stupid question!

Oh this is easy. WhatsApp famously does this routinely. For "enterprises" there are a number of service providers who offer this feature (detection of app tampering) as a service.

[amol4184]

Originally Posted by binand

Android Auto out of the box only recognises apps that were pre-loaded or installed from the Play Store.

But the bigger question here is - why do we have to give Google such access over our digital identity? Is it good for our well being that a multinational behemoth exercises nearly boundless control over our digital life? I had come to the conclusion (my triggerpoint was losing access to a secondary Gmail account I maintained) that it isn't, and started taking steps to get out of this vice-like grip. I have a personal domain which is what I use for emails these days (ironically, it was hosted at Google Apps but a year or so back I shifted to Office365). I don't upload photos to Google any longer. If they take my Gmail account down what I'll lose are my Android developer account, all the apps/content I have purchased on Play Store, Google Location History, several documents on Google Docs and maybe a few things here and there. Nothing life-threatening, I hope. I will miss my firstname@gmail.com email address though.

Thanks for the tip on AA!

Re: giving access to Google. At this point I am actually not worried about photos or documents that I have stored on their storage. Most of those docs and almost 100% of the photos (the ones that matter anyway) are somewhere else too. My bigger concern is all the numerous (read countless) websites where I have signed up using one of three Google accounts. I either have used my email and created a password OR of late I have just used direct Google sign on. If my Google account is gone, the login to those websites is going to be a pain. The one where I created a password will still be okay until I lose the password or for any reason need to re-verify my identity.

Since last few years I am using LastPass in conjunction with Google/Chrome/Samsung Pass and pretty much all the passwords stored in Chrome are also there in LastPass or Samsung Pass. But LastPass is a massive hit or miss app at least on Android.
Anyway, topic for another day may be and possibly not suited for this thread as you said!

I do thank you for the insight on why Google won't go to lengths of banning end user accounts. I also take comfort in the fact that I am a paying customer of Google (2tb/month for Drive) so may be they will spare me?

[Thad E Ginathom]

Originally Posted by binand

Oh this is easy. WhatsApp famously does this routinely. For "enterprises" there are a number of service providers who offer this feature (detection of app tampering) as a service.

Indeed. Google knows all. And the biggest reason? We gave them permission to be ever-present in our lives.

Wife: "How long did you have to wait at the doctor's?"
Me: "I don't know. But hang on, Google will."

Sold my soul for some trivially useful functionality.

[binand]

Originally Posted by amol4184

My bigger concern is all the numerous (read countless) websites where I have signed up using one of three Google accounts. I either have used my email and created a password OR of late I have just used direct Google sign on. If my Google account is gone, the login to those websites is going to be a pain. The one where I created a password will still be okay until I lose the password or for any reason need to re-verify my identity.

While that process is quick and painless, it has some unmitigated dangers as you have discovered. This might help:

1. Do you need to create an account on this site? On most websites, you can get away with "no".
2. If yes, are you fine with losing your account because the provider chose to not service you?
3. If no, check if the site/app allows multiple OAuth2 providers and link all of them. (Hardly anyone does this; I have a feeling there are protocol-level limitations to do this.)
4. If no, then create the account with a userid/password.

You can go to myaccount.google.com and see all the sites/apps you have linkages under the Security > Third-party Apps/Services.

Originally Posted by amol4184

Since last few years I am using LastPass in conjunction with Google/Chrome/Samsung Pass and pretty much all the passwords stored in Chrome are also there in LastPass or Samsung Pass. But LastPass is a massive hit or miss app at least on Android.

Remember that Google Chrome and the Cloud Password Manager are both Google products; if you lose your Google Account then the chance of losing access to your passwords stored in Chrome is non-zero. :-)

I switched to Firefox and its integrated password manager for exactly this reason.

Originally Posted by amol4184

I am a paying customer of Google (2tb/month for Drive) so may be they will spare me?

Doesn't matter an iota. Based on some interaction I have had with the folks who make the decision to suspend accounts, they are not hindered by topline or any other constraints. In fact even the Indian technique of approaching via a contact in the company doesn't really work - that team apparently works as a complete black box.

[mayukh42]

Originally Posted by amol4184

Google cracking down on the end users themselves. If Google closes my account, 50%, may be more of my digital identity is gone, never to be recovered

They are not likely to shoot themselves in the foot by do so, because the consumer is the product at Google. They will lose much more than the youtube subcription revenue if they start doing it for all.

Even Microsoft with all its wisdom has never cracked down on many Windows users who violate their EULA by buying organization cd keys for cheap online then use them for personal. And Windows is still a retail product; customer so far has not been the product (though current versions do not intend to go that route). The bottom-line is user data is much more valuable than the license/ subscription fee. And with AI bling, data is still the king for sometime.

Having said that, it is always better to use alternate accounts for "experiments", and use the personal account as a model internet citizen . Not sure about now, but even in 2022 we could create a new Google account without phone number on a new Android device at least. Considering that we buy a new phone or tab every 4-5 years, we can have a few accounts not linked to our phone, i.e. identity. If we remember to strictly not use these accounts on the devices we use our primary account, Google can never link them to same person (subnet is not enough since they could just be flatmates).

One of my experiments have been to use Android TV on Raspberry Pi; the chromium OS forks for that are not official, so I have always used these alternate accounts.

Coming to ad-free Youtube, one option (for android TV) is through Kodi plugin, which uses one's own account's Youtube API Key to access content. For personal use, it works fine, and would not exceed rate limits beyond which Google charges it. Most alternate options requiring to use one's own API key is same as this.

Alternate option is to have PiHole or equivalent, for all devices in the house, but that would need another computer running 24x7. I have not tried that myself yet since I have so far been able to get by without.

[amol4184]

Originally Posted by mayukh42

Alternate option is to have PiHole or equivalent, for all devices in the house, but that would need another computer running 24x7. I have not tried that myself yet since I have so far been able to get by without.

I run network wide ad blocker on Raspberry pi running 24/7 (PiHole). It can't block YouTube/YT music ads. Every now and then people come up with new ideas to stop yt ads but none work. It kills many other ads quite effectively but not video ads on streaming services like YT, including Hulu, FreeVee etc.
Another unforeseen disadvantage is it straight away blocks affiliate/incentivized links from one website to another and also kills product links on search results page. You have to manually "stop" the service if you are shopping for something or it gets annoying. May be not a biggie but it is a hassle nevertheless.