[qwerty1234599]

If you want a glimpse of the average person's youtube experience, open the site in incognito and go to the "trending" tab.

It's a completely different site depending on what you initially search for when you start using it.

The problem is, 80% of youtube userbase never really typed a search query for anything in the first place, and as a result the stuff they get recommended and watch is pure shit.

[crispyambulance]

We don't actually know what the "ingredients" are for recommendations.

I don't think it's possible to draw conclusions from one's own experience with youtube recommendations and extrapolate it to others or to any sort of judgement about the quality of the algorithms. We are simply not privy to what, exactly, youtube is doing.

I think it's wise to heed Guillaume Chaslot's warnings. In the same way that youtube exploited (inadvertently or not) glitches in the brains of preschoolers (remember "Spiderman and Heidi" videos? if not, don't look it up). There's reason to believe these things can fly under our radar and influence adults in ways that are not perceptible and not something we would approve of in advance.

[vizzier]

The stuff is what the stuff is brother. [1]

[1] https://youtu.be/ajGX7odA87k?t=945

[cratermoon]

That's an amazing talk and I thank you for bringing it to my attention. Congratulations, you beat YouTube's recommendations for me.

BTW I was already aware of all the questionable things AI is used for, but Mickens' analysis is beautiful.

[fao_]

Holy shit, this talk is amazing. Thank you!!

[bfieidhbrjr]

Wow I just did this. It's like turning on cable TV at a motel. (I don't watch TV at home).

[laurent92]

Are you telling me the first recommendation engine of the world with a billion-dollars AI and 2 billion users optimizing for addiction returns the same results as cable channels whose offices look like a « Dunder Mufflin » environment, with only yearly feedback on whether customers trended upwards or downwards? Good job on the cable guys.

[dspillett]

> the average person

An average person, not the average person. They'll at very least target the content by country, and if you have a fixed or rarely varying IP address (which I do at home, and may public wireless APs do in my experience) they can be more fine-grained than that and give recommendations based on what people in your more local area have searched for recently.

I had an Italian friend staying in my spare room for about half a year some time ago (hassles with previous landlord, took her and her fellow a while to save to the point where they could afford a place together). For many months afterwards I would get Italian language recommendations and adverts from youtube and others, even in incognito on a fresh device.

[troebr]

It wasn't that bad. Some influencer videos, music, prank videos, sports, a couple niche youtubers, some video games. I saw a couple educational videos in there too.

Sure the influencer stuff is pretty stupid, but whatever, it's not harmful.

[jw1224]

Influencers are very often harmful.

1. Their aspirational lifestyles perpetuate feelings of inadequacy amongst their viewers, especially when their target market is often predominantly young people. Their audiences grow up with self doubt and anxiety by comparing their lives to that of the influencers they follow.

2. They are in the pockets of their advertisers and sponsors. Any recommendations they make are inherently disingenuous.

3. They’re often just really terrible people. Being the kind of attention-seeker who is able to command a large online following often seems to correlate with being a jerk. Just look at Jake and Logan Paul — two of the biggest stars of today, and both mired in controversy and bad choices.

[wpietri]

I'm a fan of Reddit's AmITheAsshole and I'm always stunned by the stories of teens whose life plan is to become an influencer. As a sociological phenomenon, it's fascinating: celebrity distilled down to an implausibly pure form, like Paris Hilton rendered into uncut white powder. But as somebody who feels responsibility to the kids in my extended family, it's a worry. I'm not even sure how to explain to them that it might not be the best way to spend 40 or 50 years.

[lopmotr]

You know what's worse than aspirations to become a celebrity? No aspirations at all. I know people like that. They just seem to see the future as a regular life with nothing particularly to do in it except exist and perform normal regular practical activities to sustain it. I can't imagine how dull it must be, but they seem to cope, and get all their excitement from immediate events. I hope you can be happy that your relatives at least have ambition, even if it's not quite accurately targeted yet. Not everyone is that fortunate.

[wpietri]

Just to be clear, I know of no relatives who want to be influencers. It's only a hypothetical problem for me.

I also have never met people with "no aspirations at all" and am not sure they exist. Although you seem concerned about diminishing people's ambitions, you also seem to denigrate people who want to have "a regular life", as if there's something wrong with people who want to settle down and raise kids and live a good life. That's never been my path, but I respect it a lot.

[laurent92]

I don’t know, I have quite a lot of respect for the fathers around me. I’d rank climbing Mount Lenin, being a CEO or hitchiking from Paris to Sydney an order of magnitude easier than being a father ;)

[jarjoura]

Influencers are just people that have a sizable fan base, that they earned fair and square. Now, what they choose to do with that fan base, is another story. Just like a startup can lose its soul when bringing in VC money, an influencer can lose their soul when they try to scale their brand with marketing deals.

Mark Rober is a good example of an influencer who has stayed true to his core values while scaling his brand. He’s the Gen-Z version of Mythbusters.

Potato Jet is the opposite, his brand has become overrun with every cinematography company using him to peddle their wares. It’s hard to take anything he says as an honest review of the product.

[vorpalhex]

If someone else having a nice life makes you feel your life is bad, your life may actually be bad. If you spend your days working and feeling unfulfilled and wish you could be the person restoring a ghost town or exploring the arctic... that's a signal.

Humans aren't farm animals meant to be kept nicely penned up.

[thelastwave]

> open the site in incognito and go to the "trending" tab.

I just tried that and all of the top trending videos were something called "My Best Friends" followed by a long scroll of NBA videos.

[rsync]

Yes - I had the exact same experience - lots of "best friends" content and then NBA video.

I watched one of the NBA videos so, touché, youtube.

[JJMcJ]

Watch two or three e.g. flying saucer videos, then it's saucers recommended for the next three months.

[szatkus]

I have quite similar results in incognito and normal mode. Are you that the trending tab is profiled?

[sam0x17]

Or they typed one thing 5 years ago and now YT thinks that's what you're all about

[galuggus]

I believe trending is hand curated by youtube

[thelastwave]

I really hope they are not hand picking only My Best Friend and NBA videos.

[CodeGlitch]

I looked at trending once. Never again.

There is great content on YouTube, but what I consider great is completely different from the next person, which is why trending makes no sense...

[lopmotr]

I expect it's like how stamp collecting used to be the world's most popular hobby. It might not have been anybody's favorite activity, but it was commonly accessible to everyone. They call these things "lowest common denominator". If you have to pick something for everybody, that's probably a better choice than any niche group's favorite thing.

[edm0nd]

The Trending videos always disappoint me. It seems like it's always some fame chasing YouTubers/people who dont deserve being on the Trending list instead of actual cool videos and content. People are gaming the algo hardcore to make tens of millions for themselves. The James Charles & Charli D'amelio entire crew of like 10 people who are always in the trending list, Soundcloud rappers, etc. Then, on the flipside, you have the YouTube algo punishing content creators and shadowbanning their videos of content YouTube doesn't like, great example of this is any of the popular firearms channels. You'll never see any of those in the Trending list despite them having millions of views.

Are you a LGBTQ makeup artist rapper who gives money away and plays Minecraft? Straight to #1 Trending video for you. Dont forget the clickbait title and misleading thumbnail image.

Are you producing original and awesome content? No one will ever find your video.

[oarabbus_]

>It seems like it's always some fame chasing YouTubers/people who dont deserve being on the Trending list instead of actual cool videos and content.

What else should they be showing? How does the algorithm determine what are "cool videos and content" to someone who hasn't entered searches? It makes the most sense to put the top Youtube channels/stars on the front page, after all they are the most viewed.

>Are you producing original and awesome content? No one will ever find your video.

This is why TikTok has blown up; an absolute nobody can get a million views on their video overnight.

[pavel_lishin]

> Charli D'amelio

I have no idea who this is, but can confirm that they take up something like 50% of the screen real estate. The other half is a BBQ channel.