Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

YouTube, the jewel of the internet

ft.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 488 posts

Re: YouTube, the jewel of the internet

#51

Post by kmfrk »

xrd wrote: post #27

I'm troubled by YouTube. There is absolutely incredible content there. And there is so much shit in between the good stuff. Does anyone run a frontend that offers control over the shit? I want my kids to have autonomy in viewing interesting things there, but I don't want to YouTube algorithm attacking their developing brains. Maybe a browser plugin?

There's Restricted Mode[1], but it's extremely aggressive to the point of hiding too much.

I personally use the drop-down feature to tell YouTube I'm not interested in a particular recommended channel or video, as well as maintain a manually updated BlockTube list for channels and keywords.

I've also heard that clearing stuff like your watch history is a good way to flush weird recommendations. Generally, disabling all targeted stuff goes a long way to ward off the craziest stuff. On top of disabling the main trending page so it goes directly to your subscriptions.

[1]: https://www.howtogeek.com/770192/how-to-turn-off-restricted-...

Re: YouTube, the jewel of the internet

#52

Post by menzoic »

rcarr wrote: post #9

I agree with the author. I just cancelled Spotify and got YouTube Premium and it was an absolutely brilliant decision. Pretty soon I’m going to cancel Netflix and Prime too and just take out the odd month subscription to a streaming service if there’s something I really want to watch. I’m probably better off watching some informative documentary on YT than I am watching Netflix anyway and if I want entertainment, the…

> No other generation in history has had such an opportunity.

I'm a milllenial that learned how to code at 14 using the internet. To be fair to your point about "free" I did use pirated software and a few pirated video courses

Re: YouTube, the jewel of the internet

#53

Post by sp332 »

xrd wrote: post #27

I'm troubled by YouTube. There is absolutely incredible content there. And there is so much shit in between the good stuff. Does anyone run a frontend that offers control over the shit? I want my kids to have autonomy in viewing interesting things there, but I don't want to YouTube algorithm attacking their developing brains. Maybe a browser plugin?

Well, YouTube Kids?

Re: YouTube, the jewel of the internet

#55

Post by sgu999 »

xrd wrote: post #27

I'm troubled by YouTube. There is absolutely incredible content there. And there is so much shit in between the good stuff. Does anyone run a frontend that offers control over the shit? I want my kids to have autonomy in viewing interesting things there, but I don't want to YouTube algorithm attacking their developing brains. Maybe a browser plugin?

That's my problem with it as well... I keep on clicking "I'm not interested" for all kind of clickbait brainless content, but they keep on coming back.

Re: YouTube, the jewel of the internet

#56

Post by verall »

kubectl_h wrote: post #44

Over the christmas holiday I was surprised you couldn't purchase youtube premium as a gift card for someone else. Seems like this would be a non-trivial source of revenue for YT.

You can pay for YT premium from Google play dollars which have gift cards. It's a little bit annoying to set up though.

Re: YouTube, the jewel of the internet

#57

Post by zokier »

andrewstuart wrote: post #16

YouTube is amazing but a couple of disappointments: 1: YouTube financially rewards 12 minute videos. I feel like this has resulted in a collapse in creativity as now most videos are 12 minutes. You get what you pay for. 2: being a walled garden, YouTube is devoid of technical innovation. This really hasn’t evolved far beyond broadcast TV and that’s because YouTube owns all the content and developers can’t innovate th…

> 1: YouTube financially rewards 12 minute videos. I feel like this has resulted in a collapse in creativity as now most videos are 12 minutes. You get what you pay for.

I checked my subscriptions page and of the latest 18 videos, here are the lengths stats

* 1× * 3× 4-6min

* 1× 10-12min

* 6× 13-20min

* 7× 20-40min

Re: YouTube, the jewel of the internet

#58

Post by loloquwowndueo »

YouTube will pull you towards controversial clickbaity crappy content since that’s what generated clicks. These days I just surgically search for what I need, watch that, then get out, ignoring all recommends because invariably they are crap.

And YouTube is poison for young children who don’t know better than to follow what the algorithm tells you. You like super Mario? Here, 500 ways to die in Mario. And next - what would happen if all Mario characters killed each other bloodily? And it starts getting worse.

We banned YouTube for our kid and couldn’t be happier - the damage that thing was doing to his mind was noticeable and no amount of guidance or curation was able to keep him away from the cesspool.

Re: YouTube, the jewel of the internet

#59

Post by bmitc »

rcarr wrote: post #9

I agree with the author. I just cancelled Spotify and got YouTube Premium and it was an absolutely brilliant decision. Pretty soon I’m going to cancel Netflix and Prime too and just take out the odd month subscription to a streaming service if there’s something I really want to watch. I’m probably better off watching some informative documentary on YT than I am watching Netflix anyway and if I want entertainment, the…

> It’s an awesome resource and I think Gen Z are at a massive advantage because of it. They can literally leave school and already be professionally competent. I think we’ll see them leapfrogging millennials on the career ladder because they had a youth where they could spend their entire time learning literally everything there is to know about their passion for free.

I'm not convinced for YouTube. For the most part, I just see Gen Zers teaching other Gen Zers. It is very rare to find someone older on YouTube with actual, professional, real-world experience, and if you do, the channel is not popular and is thus buried in search results.

Re: YouTube, the jewel of the internet

#60

Post by schrectacular »

liendolucas wrote: post #41
rcarr wrote: post #9

I agree with the author. I just cancelled Spotify and got YouTube Premium and it was an absolutely brilliant decision. Pretty soon I’m going to cancel Netflix and Prime too and just take out the odd month subscription to a streaming service if there’s something I really want to watch. I’m probably better off watching some informative documentary on YT than I am watching Netflix anyway and if I want entertainment, the…

I can't understand people paying for streaming services like Netflix & competition, where all their catalogs are region-locked and every single one of them producing mostly crappy shows/movies (at least that's the Netflix I experienced last time I was able to use someone else's account on someone else's computer many years ago, so I must assume as everything else, things get worse, not better). What would I pay for?…

You might like the Criterion Collection streaming service. Not a customer but love their movie collection.
Post reply on HN