YouTube User Interface/UI is not working properly
For some reason, YouTube is not being very responsive to my account. I've logged in and out of my Gmail account to view YouTube on Firefox and there are several problems that are troubling me.
1. It doesn't recognize me as a logged in user but as a guest. Even when I'm logged in, YouTube still sees me as a guest. For example when I click on the Bell icon on the top right of the site I can't view my notifications at all from those who've I've subscribed.
2. There is no human way to access account settings as a "logged" in user. I tried modifying the settings by clicking on the gear icon on the top right. The options for settings only appear "normal" for a logged user for a split second till it gets overwritten in appearance by a prompt for people who are guests on YouTube.
I still have access to subscriptions only by opening another tab and through that subscription tab I can still view things normally such as my playlists and history for example. But those two major problems persist.
I've logged into YouTube on Brave and no problems I mentioned happened.
All Replies (8)
Hi onyx, is there a difference between being a guest and being anonymous -- i.e., not logged in to any Google account at all?
Since there is an intimate relationship between the YouTube site and Google sites, I wonder whether there is some reason that cross-site access between them might be inhibited or blocked.
Within Firefox itself, I would look at cookie settings, especially "third party" cookie settings, as a potential point of concern. See: Websites say cookies are blocked - Unblock them.
In the realm of add-ons, there are many related to Container tab features that could cut off cross-site communication. Are you aware of running any of those?
I should've rephrased guest as anonymous. And there is a difference, mostly in viewing account settings as that is the focus of my problem. I do have addons that might interfere with Youtube in a way such as AdBlocker Ultimate, DuckDuckGo Privacy Essentials, and a tab addon called Simple Tab Groups. I had these installed around 2 months ago when I began to re use Firefox and there were no issues before but as of about a week ago the problem began to show itself and I've been having trouble ever since.
Hmm, here are my standard suggestions to try when a site stops working normally:
Double-check content blockers: Firefox's Tracking Protection feature, and extensions that counter ads and tracking, may break websites that embed third party content (meaning, from a secondary server).
(A) The shield icon toward the left end of the address bar usually turns a bit purplish when content is blocked. Click the icon to learn more or make an exception. See: Enhanced Tracking Protection in Firefox for desktop.
(B) Extensions such as Adblock Plus, Blur, Disconnect, DuckDuckGo Privacy Essentials, Ghostery, NoScript, Privacy Badger, uBlock Origin or uMatrix usually provide a toolbar button to manage blocked content in a page. There may or may not be a number on the icon indicating the number of blocked items; you sometimes need to click the button to see what's going on and test whether you need to make an exception for this site.
Cache and Cookies: When you have a problem with one particular site, a good "first thing to try" is clearing your Firefox cache and deleting your saved cookies for the site.
(1) Clear Firefox's Cache
See: How to clear the Firefox cache
If you have a large hard drive, this might take a few minutes.
(2) Remove the site's cookies (save any pending work first). While viewing a page on the site, click the lock icon at the left end of the address bar. After a moment, a "Clear Cookies and Site Data" button should appear at the bottom. Go ahead and click that.
In the dialog that opens, you will see one or more matches to the current address so you can remove the site's cookies individually without affecting other sites.
Then try reloading the page. Does that help?
Testing in Firefox's Safe Mode: In its Safe Mode, Firefox temporarily deactivates extensions, hardware acceleration, and some other advanced features to help you assess whether these are causing the problem.
If Firefox is running: You can restart Firefox in Safe Mode using either:
- "3-bar" menu button > "?" Help > Restart with Add-ons Disabled
- (menu bar) Help menu > Restart with Add-ons Disabled
and OK the restart. A small dialog should appear. Click "Start in Safe Mode" (not Refresh).
If Firefox is not running: Hold down the Shift key when starting Firefox. (On Mac, hold down the option/alt key instead of the Shift key.) A small dialog should appear. Click "Start in Safe Mode" (not Refresh).
If Firefox is not running: Hold down the option/alt key when starting Firefox. (On Windows, hold down the Shift key instead of the option/alt key.) A small dialog should appear. Click "Start in Safe Mode" (not Refresh).
Any improvement?
I've cleared my cache and restarted Firefox with addons disabled. Still the same issues occur.
Any difference using a private window instead of a regular window?
No, there are no differences between a private window or regular.
So I believe I found the solution. I have turned off my Anti Virus Software client Kaspersky for a bit, restarted FireFox, and Youtube became normal to use again. I guess I'll have to adjust things to tailor to me.
Hmm, I haven't heard of Kaspersky causing this kind of problem before. It would probably affect a lot of people. Hopefully they will update it soon?