I would not say that if youtube straight up asked for payment for their product and there were no ads.

Instead, Youtube is pestering you with ads and asking for payment to stop doing so.

A big difference I see is how much money does Google make me "watching"/skipping ads in a month? I find it hard to believe it's around $10/month. What are rates now a days?

Paying for something not to happen is different than paying for something in return. Obviously.

Ah no you pay the content creators by watching the ads with your time or the subscription.

> Restaurants extort me to pay for food if I want to eat there.

> Paying for something not to happen is different than paying for something in return.

The rough metaphor about restaurants, is not an equivalent situation.

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> you pay the content creators by watching the ads with your time or the subscription

To clarify, you believe that there is an ephemeral currency of attention.

Your attention (which was to be directed at the content creator) can be redirected forcefully, unless you pay in money. I'd be remiss to call it outright extortion, but the parallel is there.

Let them eat ads.