What holds youtube from blocking all videos to addblock users just as other sites do?
It’s a constant game of cat and mouse, an arms race till the end of time. You can’t block videos from ad-block users if you can’t tell which users are using adblock and which are not.
I don’t understand why self hosted videos aren’t more popular
It’s quite complicated technologically, and requires quite a lot of storage space. Viewers only go where the creators go, and the creators have no reason to go to someplace that is more of a pain in the ass to host videos.
https://investors.yum.com/news-events/financial-releases/news-details/2023/Yum-Brands-Reports-Fourth-Quarter-Results-and-Increases-Dividend/default.aspx
They are just greedy. They have the money, but giving the money to the rich is evidently more important.
https://cwa-union.org/stock-buybacks-hurt-workers