I noticed my consumption has decased quite a bit. I would visit regularly to watch content from few channels. I would probably still visit every so often to watch the new videos. But the experience has become more deliberate and conscious. I go to YouTube because I want to go and watch something specific. Mindlessly browsing and watching additional content is harder.
This is good progress from Google to get off their platform :)
As someone who routinely watches YT through Invidious and NewPipe, I haven’t changed my habits.
NewPipe user here, and same thing. It’s amazing.
Yeah, I catch myself sometimes to switch to NewPipe. But sometimes the videos just don’t play. And sometimes it works fine
No. Mine decreased when ad frequency increased.
90% of my recommendations are videos I have already watched.
I’ve only been getting that recently.
It’s like I just watched 50 minutes of this hour video, took it out of my Watch Later and enjoyed it enough to actually give it a Like, why the hell would you recommend it to me again.
This is one of my biggest pet peeves about YouTube.
Youtube recommendations used to be an amazing way to find new music. Sometimes you even had a little community of people in the comments going from video to video.
Another casualty of enshittification, I guess.
I have an addon that makes watched videos gray and adds a WATCHED tag to them. Makes it more satisfying to browse, knowing you won’t get tricked into wasting time rewatching something. Now you can waste time watching NEW useless stuff.
I have history turned on and it generally recommends stuff I’m interested in. My only complaint is that it doesn’t update often enough and likes to recommend videos I’ve seen already.
Same, I get the feeling very few people actively interact with the “not interested”/“don’t recommend” stuff, so they end up getting all kinds of weird recommendations. Or they also use Youtube Music. For some reason Youtube seriously struggles to understand that most people don’t consume video the same way they consume music, and conflates the two constantly.
I’m watching less because I’m not getting any new or interesting recommendations. I just keep seeing the same stuff over and over again. I hate algorithms. I hate that something is deciding what I should watch while not showing me 99.999% of the other things on the platform.
Oh, and the ads are absolutely out of control. I have to decide if the content is really worth sitting through all the infuriatingly jarring ad placements. Most times, it’s not.
If you watch on Android get the reVanced app. No ads and skipping features. It’ll skip sponsors, intros, and end credits plus a shit ton more. It’s the stock YouTube UI with really granular control over features
I watch almost exclusively on my AppleTV. I’ve given YT premium a lot of consideration but it’s just a bit too much and I assume the price will continue to increase.
Yes, the ads is a whole another level. Using it without ad-block is not pleasant one bit
Nah recommendations are shit anyway. I just watch my subscriptions
Yes, considerably. Although I still get suggestions through the YouTube app on Apple TV but they are mostly crap anyways.
Also gosh YouTube search is awful.
I haven’t been on YouTube in over a month but it’s because the ads were getting way out of control.
Not sure what your platform of choice is but unlock origin for firefox or youtube revanced for phone are 2 great ways to remove ads.
I use YouTube every day and haven’t see an ad once.
Then you’re definitely using adblocker or Premium. Because YouTube shows ads before (and sometimes after also) almost every video these days.
No, the recommendations became shit ever since I put on ad blocker so I wasn’t really using them. If anything, now with history off I actually pay closer attention to the people I’m subscribed to since there is a subscription tag that I didn’t realize I was ignoring.
oh yeah, much less jumping from video to video nowadays.
YT could have provided recommendations based on categories you picked out, or countries, or just what’s popular today. Instead they decided to throw a hissy fit and show a blank homepage.
I’m taking it as my detox from social media. Facebook many years ago, Twitter last year, Reddit this year, now YT (although to be fair I still use the subscriptions tab, but it’s made me spend less time on YT).
I’ve primarily only watched my subscriptions for a few years now.
I took the steps to pry myself away from google. Turned off all that stuff, nuked my yt channel history, all that. Exporting sub’s into RSS feeds and invidious. Freetube is an awesome desktop app for watching yt. The only thing I miss is interacting in the comment section but also at same time a blessing since I am the kind of person to accidentally write a 5 paragraph essay noons would ever read, no yt comments means less chance if wasting my time.
Also as I got older my taste and willingness to sit in front of YouTube all day has changed When I was a teen I spend hours and hours watching gaming content. As an adult I have better shit to do and would rather actually play games myself. I my sub’s list has whittled down from 200 > 100 > 50 and I only get a few new vids in my feed a day if that.
I just turned on my history, watched the one video I submitted to my own channel, then turned it off again.
That’s apparently enough to bring your dashboard back.
NewPipe/Seal + yt-dlp/Invidious/MPV gang
