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Comment by bentt

3 days ago

I really don't understand why there are not sites that curate Youtube videos? Like, present basically the same recommendation UI, but just hand pick cool videos around different topics? Hell, it could even be like Reddit with voting... but the algorithmic recommendation engine that Youtube uses is NOT aligned with my interests. It's aligned ONLY with my behavior. I want to learn! I want to explore! I do NOT want to get corralled into the same videos as everyone else just because they are engaging.

I'll give you an example. I'm super into game development. I also love the NBA. NBA videos are posted nearly every day and I click on them. Gamedev videos, not so often. So what do I get? Tons of NBA content because that's what I click on in my recommended. What I want, though, is for the recommendations to think about what I would _like_ to watch and not just what I _do_ watch. I think a curation site would help alleviate this problem, especially if I could steer it more than Youtube's.

You could just... make a subreddit for it, right? Youtube videos still have URLs that can be linked to from anywhere.

On your personalized level: Don't let the algorithm work against you; instead, help it work for you. If you're being inundated with NBA videos and want fewer of them, then pick one or more of them and declare that you're "Not interested." This slows the flood of any over-abundant topic.

  • Thanks yeah thats a fair point. I just get a sense that incentives are misaligned. I pay $30/mo for family premium primarily to keep my kids away from ads, but Youtube still finds more ways to squeeze us by steering us around for retention instead of to what we actually want.

Maybe it's not financially viable? Or the admins don't want to depend on a third-party like that? Dunno.

URLIST was really great for this sort of things but they never made enough money.