5 ms·

Some of these complaints are because many people don’t realize that their YouTube watch history is separate from your browser history (watch history is stored o

by parsimo2010 7y ago

Some of these complaints are because many people don’t realize that their YouTube watch history is separate from your browser history (watch history is stored on their servers, associated with your Google account). If you want to fully reset your recommendations you need to use Google’s privacy tools to clear your watch history and also unsubscribe to all channels. Google/YouTube could be more clear about this but it’s not a totally broken system. If you realize that you are getting weird recs due to a particular video you watched, you can delete that singular video from your history. I’m not particularly concerned about this aspect of Google/YouTube’s behavior. Finally, if you’re upset about your dad watching conspiracy videos, consider that maybe he’s always been a nut job and you are just now realizing it. People don’t keep watching videos that they don’t like, they started down the rabbit hole by clicking on videos that looked interesting (maybe the rabbit hole got deeper because they feel asleep, but they did start it on their own).

friendlybus 7y ago
People do watch videos they don't like. Most addictions are a whole process where the addictee feels negative the majority of the time and then gets a high that reinforces the cycle. My mum gets paranoid about burglars. If I introduced her to a constant drip feed of robbery videos her fear would escalate disproportionate to her normal life. That's not a revealed character flaw.
rasz 7y ago
You can Not disable recommendation learning algorithm despite whatever Google claims in their documentation. Deleting/disabling watch history does nothing.
- parsimo2010 7y ago
  It most certainly does something. I do it on a regular basis whenever I feel that the recommendations are getting too "fine tuned" and I want to have more broad recommendations. If you are not seeing fully refreshed recommendations it's probably because you are still subscribed to channels or have liked videos or the other pieces of information that goes into recommendations.

friendlybus 7y ago

People do watch videos they don't like. Most addictions are a whole process where the addictee feels negative the majority of the time and then gets a high that reinforces the cycle. My mum gets paranoid about burglars. If I introduced her to a constant drip feed of robbery videos her fear would escalate disproportionate to her normal life. That's not a revealed character flaw.

rasz 7y ago

You can Not disable recommendation learning algorithm despite whatever Google claims in their documentation. Deleting/disabling watch history does nothing.

parsimo2010 7y ago
It most certainly does something. I do it on a regular basis whenever I feel that the recommendations are getting too "fine tuned" and I want to have more broad recommendations. If you are not seeing fully refreshed recommendations it's probably because you are still subscribed to channels or have liked videos or the other pieces of information that goes into recommendations.