Asklemmy

If you watch YouTube from a desktop computer or a browser, you can bookmark this URL here https://www.youtube.com/feed/subscriptions and unsubscribe all people who do clickbait videos

I have watched a lot of YT over the years. Still do, though with certain prophylactics.

I hate clickbait. If I see heavily 'youtubified' thumbnails and titles, it actively pushes me away from the video, regardless of whether there might be a good video behind it.

I use de-arrow on all my devices. It crowd-sources non-clickbait titles and uses stills from the video as thumbnails the way YT used to. It's a massive improvement in the user experience.

Clickbait is the symptom, not the disease. The problem with essentially the whole of the internet is the advertising model. Ads are why clickbait exists. Ads are why data harvesting happens. Ads are why tracking cookies and fingerprinting are everywhere. Ads enable free accounts, which in turn enable bots, anonymous bullying/trolling, etc. Ads are the real point of every major site you use. Google is not a web search company. It is an advertising company. Facebook is not a social media company. It is an advertising company. Take away ads, almost every internet issue goes away, including clickbait.

Do you use youtube mainly?

No

Do you care about clickbait?

No

Did clickbait make you stop seeing some creator?

Yes

Did you use youtube but clickbait (among other things) made you to stop using it’s platform?

No

Do you think clickbait is the major of the YouTube’s problems?

It's a two-way issue. People react to clickbait, creators create clickbait for cash. Chicken or egg: which came first?

Do you see something good in clickbait among the bad things? Like, which ones?

No

Could we see clickbait as a necessary evil?

Yes, in satire maybe

I get why clickbait exists. As long as I know what the video is actually about from the title/thumbnail, I don't mind.

• Do you use youtube mainly? Daily, but secondary to Twitch
• Do you care about clickbait? Nope
• Did clickbait make you stop seeing some creator? Clickbait that are lies damage my opinion of a creator, clickbait that's honest is irrelevant
• Did you use youtube but clickbait (among other things) made you to stop using it's platform? Still use YT
• Do you think clickbait is the major of the YouTube's problems? Nope, discoverability, live streaming, and comments are all bigger imo
• Do you see something good in clickbait among the bad things? Like, which ones? Only negative is when it is intentionally deceptive.
• Could we see clickbait as a necessary evil? It is as necessary as all advertising is, if it's honest, fine, if not, then no.

The connection between attention and economic value has been around for a long time. It didn't come about by YouTube creators. The headlines sells papers. Commercials sells products. Titles sell views.

The problem is that there is no punishment for falsehoods, you can say that you have the first, the biggest, the most, the craziest and it doesn't need to have any bearing on reality. While in other media there are often some safeguards, code of conducts, or whatever. Since most other media has competitors, keeping eachother somewhat honest or straight up have an oversight committe. While platforms like TikTok, YouTube, etc. are exploiting content creators and care only about their short term growth. There will constantly be a stream of new content creators who will have to compete for views on the same platform, with the same algorithms.

Do you use youtube mainly?

I mean, we are talking about the most biggest video sharing platform. So yes, I still use it despite how much I hate YouTube and that's just because the sort of videos I watch is on YouTube and not on places like PeerTube. Personally, I wish more YouTubers, Content Creators (or whatever word as I know people have the pet peeve with the word "Content Creators") would try other alternative video site like PeerTube, even if it as a mirror.

Do you care about clickbait?

This may be controversial but I think especially as YouTube is driven by the algorithm, you had to do bit of clickbait to make your videos pop from the rest. That being said, I don't like it when it is both ragebait and it feels insulting to my intelligences. It is an instant no for me and I block the channel with BlockTube as even pressing "Don't recommend this channel", YouTube still recommends them.

Do you think clickbait is the major of the YouTube's problems?

It's one of the issue but I think Google's trying to make YouTube as advertiser friendly as possible is the biggest issue. A lot of the issue stem from Google doing that and YouTubers are still trying to adapt and walking on eggshells to still create video while getting monetise. It has got so bad, we are censoring "died", "kill themself" to "unaliving" or otherwise, they would get demonetise which from what I heard, their video won't be push out. Those sort of video are talking about some serious subject matters and I know they have good intent but it makes it goofy rather than something serious. I could rant about it but it be off-topic about YouTube clickbait.

But yes, clickbait is the problem and some would make ragebait videos as they know how thin-skinned people are online. I'm thin-skinned as well and I try my very best to avoid them as I know some are just both hateful and low-effort so they are not worth my time.

Do you see something good in clickbait among the bad things? Like, which ones?

My understanding is that clickbait is making some sort of topic or subject matter more clickable. A lot of YouTubers and even journalist online are doing this whether it quote whatever someone said as their headline or whatever. Lot of people associate clickbait as whatever the hell is happening in Mr Beast's Thumbnails.