Based on recent reports, YouTube is actively restricting access to Premium accounts created through VPNs and cracking down on users accessing Premium content across different regions. According to user discussions, YouTube now detects and blocks VPN connections when attempting to stream Premium content[1][2].
Some key impacts:
- Users report being unable to play YouTube Music through Sonos speakers when using a VPN, with the service becoming accessible only after bypassing VPN connections[1:1]
- Premium subscribers attempting to access content from different regions than their subscription face connection errors and service disruptions
- The restrictions appear to be part of YouTube’s broader strategy to enforce regional content licensing and subscription terms
The crackdown coincides with YouTube’s increased focus on Premium subscriptions, including showing longer unskippable ads to free users in 2025 to drive Premium adoption[3].
For me, it’s that the Apple UI is so unintuitive. I thought Spotify was fine before I uninstalled it. Going back and forth between playlists and songs or other playlists is a lot harder in Apple Music. My Apple Watch had a more seamless control of Spotify as well which is super odd to me. I had Spotify premium before ditching it for Apple Music so I found the UI pretty straightforward. It operated as I expected a music interface to operate. None of this is worth going back to Spotify but I do find it weird that apple is harder to navigate since they had such a head start in developing music players. Following and getting new music updates from artists was super easy on Spotify, following label and distributors along with their playlists was easy. Maybe Spotify has changed over the past 4-5 years I’m not sure as I haven’t used it since the whole Joe Rogan thing.