YouTube Reverses Picture-in-Picture Block on iOS 14

A cool new feature that came to the latest version of Apple’s smartphone operating system iOS had to do with picture in picture mode, allowing you to use two different apps at the same time. This is a feature that came to Android a while ago so this was one of the rare instances where Apple was the one playing catch up, but at the end of the day the feature did end up coming through but with all of that having been said and out of the way it is important to note that YouTube seemed to have a real problem with it.

The video streaming app has been adamant about not allowing audio to be played once the app is closed, and a big part of the reason why that is the case has to do with the fact that many people listen to music on the platform and when they do so they are often taking advantage of music that has been illegally uploaded in some way, shape or form or at the very least consuming some kind of content that YouTube might not be able to monetize if they are passively consuming it rather than being focused and clicking on ads and the like. Only premium members of YouTube could use this feature, but it turns out that the video streaming app has, for some reason, reversed this decision, as reported by Macrumors.

Now regular users will also be able to use the feature, and this might be because of the fact that YouTube knew that preventing the use of this feature might just do a lot more harm than good because of the fact that restricting the things that users can do usually makes them take alternatives to the platform they are currently using a lot more seriously.

14.0.1 pic.twitter.com/qUaxnT6UdF

— MacRumors.com (@MacRumors) October 2, 2020

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