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‘YouTube recommendations are toxic,’ says dev who worked on the algorithm (2019)

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Re: ‘YouTube recommendations are toxic,’ says dev who worked on the algorithm (2019)

#121

Post by wolco2 »

scrollaway wrote: post #114
_0ffh wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't use the "watch later" feature anymore. It's always a bit irritating when you want to catch up on the list only to find that a video has been removed in the mean time. So I switched to archiving using youtube-dl. Also nice to have a few backup videos in case of an internet outage.

I rarely have that problem with watch later, but it does happen. When I want to ensure a video is available down the line, i send the url to the web archive; they have a special archiver for youtube videos.

What's the link?

Re: ‘YouTube recommendations are toxic,’ says dev who worked on the algorithm (2019)

#122

Post by tpxl »

stuaxo wrote: post #70
gfxgirl wrote: post #44

I know I'm old but dang for some reason I really dislike recommendations from almost any company. For media I grew up in the 70s and had the TV Guide. I'd look through to see what I wanted to watch, circle some things and then watch. No spying what-so-ever. So, I like for example HN where AFAIK I'm not tracked so much and I choose what I want from the top of the list. Conversely I mostly hate Amazon, Netflix, Amazon…

"Engagement" is toxic full stop.

> "The road is most utilized when all traffic comes to a full stop"

-One of my managers

This is what I hear every time someone optimizes engagement.

Re: ‘YouTube recommendations are toxic,’ says dev who worked on the algorithm (2019)

#123

Post by andrewzah »

qwerty456127 wrote: post #60

For me YouTube recommendations are not toxic, they are so amazing I some times wonder how comes the world around is not heaven when everybody has free access to this. That's because I always watch high-quality educational content and some beautiful comforting and inspiring music. So for me YouTube is a fountain of knowledge, visual and musical aesthetics etc. Every day I get inspiration, healthy kind of fun and learn…

> Better watch anonymously so you can always clean the cookies and get out of the pit.

Eh, you can always remove a video from your history. I just don't watch certain things, or watch them in a throwaway firefox container. Being able to maintain playlists and subscriptions is worthwhile.

Like you I get amazing music recommendations and educational content. It took concerted effort but my recommendations spot on for the most part.

Re: ‘YouTube recommendations are toxic,’ says dev who worked on the algorithm (2019)

#124

Post by swiley »

qwerty456127 wrote: post #60

For me YouTube recommendations are not toxic, they are so amazing I some times wonder how comes the world around is not heaven when everybody has free access to this. That's because I always watch high-quality educational content and some beautiful comforting and inspiring music. So for me YouTube is a fountain of knowledge, visual and musical aesthetics etc. Every day I get inspiration, healthy kind of fun and learn…

Try opening youtube in private mode. You get a ton of garbage that it expects you to watch.

I binged Nilered once and felt pretty terrible, I can't imagine how I would feel after a day of "peppa pig plays minecraft."

Re: ‘YouTube recommendations are toxic,’ says dev who worked on the algorithm (2019)

#125

Post by acdha »

qwerty456127 wrote: post #61
hackeraccount wrote: post #11

I find youtube recommendations crap because if I watch something on one subject it seems to assume the subject is now the love of my life and proceeds to offer a zillion on just that subject. regarding what the article is talking about ... eh, it seems like they're saying it works fine but sometimes puts up videos whose politics they don't like. Short of going in and removing the stuff you don't like so that other pe…

What happens if you start actively pressing to dislike on every video you didn't want to get recommended to you?

It’ll eventually get a little better but it takes a LOT of repetition. For example, after the gamer tantrum a few years ago anything remotely related (e.g. some designer’s talk - dry, non-provocative) would queue a bunch of anti-feminist “reaction” rants and it took many dozens of dislikes before that would stop after watching one video in the area. Science topics were similar - the angry reactionary side of the new atheism movement presumably has equal engagement numbers so the algorithm really wants you to settle in for some ad views.

Re: ‘YouTube recommendations are toxic,’ says dev who worked on the algorithm (2019)

#126

Post by Shivetya »

The only toxic with youtube is in settings where you cannot block the incessant ads. Twelve dollars is just ridiculous to watch ad free user created content. worse the ad play is wholly random feeling where you can end up with multiple ads even in a short video only you have none in the next.

the recommendations for me have been fine if not repetitive, just because I watched one video on a subject doesn't mean I want all the rest

Re: ‘YouTube recommendations are toxic,’ says dev who worked on the algorithm (2019)

#127

Post by ManlyBread »

I gave up on the recommendations completely. It has been nothing but videos I've already watched (about 90% of what I saw came from my playlists and subscriptions) and videos that have nothing to do with what I'm watching right now.

So I did the following:

- installed a plugin that redirects me from Home to Subscribtins page, effectively disabling the Home page completely

- deleted all history from YouTube

- disabled all possible tracking and data collection

The recommened videos on the left of the video player are a lot better as a result. It sucks that these mostly focus on the author of the video but scrolling down usually reveals new content. It's not as good as what it used to be in the late 2000s but it's far better than the default settings.

Re: ‘YouTube recommendations are toxic,’ says dev who worked on the algorithm (2019)

#128

Post by saturdaysaint »

hackeraccount wrote: post #11

I find youtube recommendations crap because if I watch something on one subject it seems to assume the subject is now the love of my life and proceeds to offer a zillion on just that subject. regarding what the article is talking about ... eh, it seems like they're saying it works fine but sometimes puts up videos whose politics they don't like. Short of going in and removing the stuff you don't like so that other pe…

Exactly. I've been on Tik Tok for a few months and I feel like I've seen a hundred times as many interesting and relevant videos that have actually improved my life and inspired purchases as I've ever seen on YouTube, mostly just on my For You Page (aka its recommendation algorithm). As a user, it doesn't feel like magical AI, it just feels like Tik Tok quickly grokked my most basic demographic information and frequently tries feeding me things that anyone would guess might be relevant to a 40 year old American dad who likes videogames (aka stuff Google knows). It's perplexing that Google, masters of A/B testing, can't figure out that parenting advice or retrogaming content might be relevant to me.

Granted the interaction model is very different, and who knows if I'd ever commit to watching even a 5 minute YouTube video on something I'm not primed to watch, but after Tik Tok, Youtube feels like a stale product of yesteryear.

Re: ‘YouTube recommendations are toxic,’ says dev who worked on the algorithm (2019)

#129

Post by wildpeaks »

qwerty456127 wrote: post #60

For me YouTube recommendations are not toxic, they are so amazing I some times wonder how comes the world around is not heaven when everybody has free access to this. That's because I always watch high-quality educational content and some beautiful comforting and inspiring music. So for me YouTube is a fountain of knowledge, visual and musical aesthetics etc. Every day I get inspiration, healthy kind of fun and learn…

It's a mixed bag: I usually only watch very niche low views tech things, so it's easy to see which recommendations are truly based on what I watch and which ones are based on what Youtube wants me to watch (because it has millions of views and from unrelated topics).

The ones based on my views are pretty good recommendations, the other type is usually extremist ragebait.

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