[NCC1701DEngage]

>YouTube also has volumes of content, most of which barely gets seen, while they have a massive user base that is regularly unsatisfied with recommendations they get...

>YouTube is still useful if you know how to dig deep and find content...

I'm working on alternative YouTube recommendations to solve these exact issues. Search a channel you watch to get a list of other channels making similar and related content:

https://channelgalaxy.com/

The lists are inter-linked so you can click the icons and "surf" from channel to channel to discover more creators. The algorithm prioritizes smaller channels to help users explore deeper into subject areas.

We've also mapped YouTube by plotting a few thousand YouTube channels in a 2-d mapping with a drag and zoom Google Maps-type interface, placing similar channels closer together. You can get a sense of the entirety of YouTube and how broad subject-areas are inter-related.

https://channelgalaxy.com/blog/article0/

(We're getting weird "Please try again in 30 seconds" errors from Google App Engine, but an immediate reload will usually work. Any advice on this would be appreciated.)

[winternett]

Just an opinion, but I think YouTube doesn't leverage their CDN for content that gets low views, and they also move that content to less responsive (less expensive) storage space... It makes accessing content with low views buffer a lot more than popular content, and increases the effect of lower viewership. If you look regularly at videos under 100 views, it becomes really apparent. This is why they also only feature low videos manually, and in small batches so they can move them to "higher priority" hosting. That may well explain your issues... I am not exactly sure where the high value host threshold for views is likely set though.

They are really not concerned with discovery of new (non sponsored) creators and talent on the platform, some of the best content I've found is really underviewed. I post my rare finds too - http://www.ruffandtuffrecordings.com/SELECTIONS

It hinders others when they embed YT video links into their own apps as well by making them slow to load. That way there's also little motivation for viewers to want to watch YT anywhere else but on the main platform.