Typically I spend a small portion of my day going through my feed on YouTube and watching what YouTube has deemed worthy for me to watch. It's not the best as oftentimes I do watch a video that is far left field from what I usually watch and then my feed is filled with related content around what I just watched. It takes a lot of content watching from things I usually watch for that infection to go away. I know I could simply right-click and tell YouTube I'm not interested but, I don't in so that I can be shown something that might be of interest down the road.

For today I saw that there was a video from the channel MXRplays with a title that piqued my interest as YouTube has consistently piled on them for strikes and takedowns. True in that some of the videos and the thumbnails might walk towards the line that YouTube deems unacceptable but, many other channels go past the line with seemingly no troubles. Watching the video I could sympathize with them in how YouTube's system of keeping the platform "clean" is extremely unbalanced. YouTube has a tough spot in keeping an eye on its platform of millions of video submissions per day. The thing is that when the content of similar channels is not being put through the grinder as the much smaller channels are, is disingenuous.

We've seen countless times of people trying desperately to get marks removed or even their channels reinstated through Twitter, pleading to YouTube only for them to be silent. Only when these massive channels pick up on the news and push the issue through their feeds does YouTube do something? The small creators have no support whatsoever from YouTube and in my opinion, are being actively bullied off the platform by the platform itself.

It gives me pause when I post something to the platform knowing that I too may lose my channel for something so benign that a YouTube bot would misunderstand a phrase or context within a video. To know that I have so little control over the future of YouTube that a mere slight puff of air, for example, could spell immediate doom. This is what I mean when I say to find alternative platforms or to take more control over your content. You are simply there to make YouTube money. There is no other way to look at it in that manner. I understand that YouTube is essentially the driving force of online video consumption but, you do have a choice in how your content can be seen. True in that your potential reach is severely hampered if you do decide to drop YouTube and it's something I constantly have on my mind at all times. It will make your job harder but, in my mind, the results could be better when striking out away from the mainstream.

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Oy, I feel this. I gave up YouTube and deleted all my vids. The good thing was that as a smaller creator, I actually got more followers by shifting everything to a PeerTube instance than I had accumulated over 8 years at YouTube. None of my vids have nearly the same numbers of views, but in comparison to the big picture they weren’t being seen at all.  

For me specifically, reducing the size of the pond actually helped.

But art is different than the kind of work you’re doing. As much as we both need reach, we make different stuff so we appeal to different kinds of people. I have to wonder if that didn’t play a factor in my transition—I think I finally found a bunch of my people…

For general usage, I turned off my watch history and I only visit my Subscriptions page when I go there.  I don’t see their “recommendations”, so I don’t deal with that… It has been very healthy for me, personally.

Very true in how one’s own experience is going to be different than another person’s experience with the platform. 

I would love to fully divest myself from YouTube but, my work would have to live there in order to expose more people to the platforms and services I explore. What I’ve been doing lately is to have my Peertube function as the main video hub and, share out from it to YouTube. 

On 5/25/2024 at 8:14 PM, Coreyartus said:

Oy, I feel this. I gave up YouTube and deleted all my vids. The good thing was that as a smaller creator, I actually got more followers by shifting everything to a PeerTube instance than I had accumulated over 8 years at YouTube. None of my vids have nearly the same numbers of views, but in comparison to the big picture they weren’t being seen at all.  

For me specifically, reducing the size of the pond actually helped.

But art is different than the kind of work you’re doing. As much as we both need reach, we make different stuff so we appeal to different kinds of people. I have to wonder if that didn’t play a factor in my transition—I think I finally found a bunch of my people…

For general usage, I turned off my watch history and I only visit my Subscriptions page when I go there.  I don’t see their “recommendations”, so I don’t deal with that… It has been very healthy for me, personally.

The major problem I have with using YouTube as a content consumer is how they bombard me with ads. It's too much that it makes me paranoid now whenever I'm on YouTube. It's making me seriously considering leaving the app permanently. 

Ads are an unfortunate process for providing content free of charge. Now, if done correctly and for the benefit of the viewer's time, ads could be profitable. That isn't the case as greed and the ever-increasing cost demand that YouTube insert more and more ads into the content. You might have heard the term "enshitification"? This is what we're seeing with YouTube and many other platforms.