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Quality content takes time to create; many of the past changes in YouTube algorithms explicitly pushed for churning out low-quality content frequently and rewar

by bitL 8y ago

Quality content takes time to create; many of the past changes in YouTube algorithms explicitly pushed for churning out low-quality content frequently and rewarded it, while seriously disadvantaging irregular quality content (that moved elsewhere in the meantime). You get what you reward.

degenerate 8y ago
This can be seen easily if you go to Youtube and search "fortnite", with every single top video being just over 6 minutes long, full of vapid nothingness related to the title, and perhaps 20-30 seconds of content related to the title it originally baited you into watching. The majority of what can be found through searching/filtering on YouTube is also hot steamy garbage, or large corporate channels. The recommendation engine sometimes throws in some gems, but rarely. The only video length filters are "short <4mins" and "long >20mins". Why on earth? It's like they randomly tried those values in 2008 and never looked at it again.
- rchaud 8y ago
  Kids watch that stuff and don't yet know how to sift through the trash to get to the good videos. They're like us in 2007 when we'd all get Rick Roll'd by blindly clicking on YT links placed on forums. By setting their KPIs arund "view time", YT created a product which caters almost exclusively to kids and conspiracy nuts, aka the only 2 demographics that have seemingly unlimited time to watch cartoons or people talking into a camera.
CM30 8y ago
Not just YouTube algorithms either. Almost all social media site algorithms and search engine ones (like say, Google's) seem to put a heavy emphasis on regular content rather than quality content. And it's the main cause behind both journalism going through a massive decline in quality and so much low effort content showing up everywhere online.
tmm84 8y ago
I noticed this a long time ago. Content creators were being rewarded for "daily" videos. So many of the channels I loved had videos where they came out and said "I'm going daily and, yes, the videos are going to suck until I daily upload good stuff." A few channels I watched just disappeared because of the daily upload reward/promote requirement. Algos don't work with creative works and human tastes.

by bitL 8y ago

degenerate 8y ago

This can be seen easily if you go to Youtube and search "fortnite", with every single top video being just over 6 minutes long, full of vapid nothingness related to the title, and perhaps 20-30 seconds of content related to the title it originally baited you into watching. The majority of what can be found through searching/filtering on YouTube is also hot steamy garbage, or large corporate channels. The recommendation engine sometimes throws in some gems, but rarely. The only video length filters are "short <4mins" and "long >20mins". Why on earth? It's like they randomly tried those values in 2008 and never looked at it again.

rchaud 8y ago
Kids watch that stuff and don't yet know how to sift through the trash to get to the good videos. They're like us in 2007 when we'd all get Rick Roll'd by blindly clicking on YT links placed on forums. By setting their KPIs arund "view time", YT created a product which caters almost exclusively to kids and conspiracy nuts, aka the only 2 demographics that have seemingly unlimited time to watch cartoons or people talking into a camera.

CM30 8y ago

Not just YouTube algorithms either. Almost all social media site algorithms and search engine ones (like say, Google's) seem to put a heavy emphasis on regular content rather than quality content. And it's the main cause behind both journalism going through a massive decline in quality and so much low effort content showing up everywhere online.

tmm84 8y ago

I noticed this a long time ago. Content creators were being rewarded for "daily" videos. So many of the channels I loved had videos where they came out and said "I'm going daily and, yes, the videos are going to suck until I daily upload good stuff." A few channels I watched just disappeared because of the daily upload reward/promote requirement. Algos don't work with creative works and human tastes.