Alert! YouTube launches global crackdown against ad blockers

Eremite Games’ Against the Storm, a roguelite city-builder, is exiting Steam Early Access on December 8th. It’s also launching day one on PC Game Pass. Check out the announcement trailer, which also explains how the game works.

Last week, we reported on rumors that The Last Of Us 2 Remastered was in the works for PlayStation 5. Hours after that report, Sony made the official announcement , and the reaction to it has certainly been something.

Today, November 18, marked a day of shocking developments in the artificial intelligence space. In the first incident, the cofounder of OpenAI, Sam Altman, was sacked from the position of CEO of OpenAI by the company's board of directors. In the fallout of the decision, company president Greg Brockman also resigned from his position. In other news, Amazon announced it is trimming jobs at its Alexa voice assistant unit, citing shifting business priorities and a greater focus on generative artificial intelligence. This and more in today's AI roundup. Let us take a closer look.

In a significant update, YouTube has officially introduced its latest Premium features, with a focus on enhancing the viewing experience for users. The much-anticipated "enhanced bitrate" 1080p resolution option, is now available on Android and TVs. The company made the announcement on Wednesday, highlighting that the improved video quality had initially debuted on iOS earlier this year before extending to the web in August. According to YouTube, the enhanced resolution is "enabled automatically based on your connection and viewing settings," or users can access it conveniently at the top of the quality menu.

YouTube, the video platform owned by Alphabet Inc.'s Google, will soon require video makers to disclose when they've uploaded manipulated or synthetic content that looks realistic — including video that has been created using artificial intelligence tools.

Yesterday, Nvidia unveiled the H200 chip for artificial intelligence models, which will now be the company's most advanced semiconductor. Now today, November 14, things in the AI space has become even more exciting. In the first incident, YouTube announced that it would begin a crackdown on AI-generated deepfakes, especially those that mimic the platform's music industry partners. In other news, a new Oxford study has revealed that AI can help predict the risk of a heart attack as much as 10 years ahead of time. This and more in today's AI round-up. Let us take a closer look.

In June, YouTube started experimenting with a way to counter ad blockers. This experiment was turned into a global crackdown recently which involved blocking those who use ad-blockers on the video streaming service. Consequently, those who used adblockers faced a ‘It looks like you may be using an ad blocker' message. While this was aimed at stopping the use of adblockers while encouraging users to adopt YouTube Premium, the platform could face repercussions as a complaint has been filed against it for alleged unlawful surveillance.

The Black Clover gacha entry, Black Clover M: Rise of the Wizard King has finally had its release date announcement! Launching globally on November 30th, Black Clover fanatics and those simply hungry for gachas can now pre-register for the title. Fans of the franchise are especially excited about the full English Dub that has been announced for the on-launch treat.

Users of both Microsoft Edge and Google Chrome are in for a treat as a new feature is set to roll out, allowing them to capture frames from YouTube videos seamlessly. This innovative capability enables users to take screenshots in PNG format at the original resolution, thanks to the recent addition of the "copy video frame" option on YouTube. Google has taken it a step further by introducing the "save frame" feature, ensuring that users can preserve individual frames from YouTube films without compromising the original quality. The Microsoft Edge Canary build has also incorporated these functionalities.

November 7 has been an intriguing day for the artificial intelligence space. Building on yesterday's OpenAI developer conference, new initiatives were unveiled today. In the first development, an AI called Autopilot, belonging to the British AI firm Luminance, negotiated a contract from the start to the end with another AI, without any involvement from humans. In other news, YouTube has finally begun testing its new AI chatbot that will appear under select videos. This and more in today's AI roundup. Let us take a closer look.

YouTube has received an artificial intelligence (AI) boost recently, with several notable features coming to the video streaming platform. In September, the platform announced AI-powered tools for anyone to become a creator on its platform. It introduced its own range of AI tools such as Dream Screen, a new app called YouTube Create, and other AI features to help edit videos easily. Now, YouTube is getting ready for another big AI push as Google has recently started testing new generative AI features that promise to enhance the viewing experience. Know all about it.

In the world of the Internet, advertisements are the bread and butter for almost all the websites that we visit on a daily basis. Even something as massive as YouTube relies on ads, and since earlier this year, the company has been working on getting rid of ad blockers. It's finally time that the policy has gone global.