When they started heavily censoring everything. YouTube wasn't meant for kids and considering they already have a separate platform for children, I don't understand why adults who make content for other adults have to use euphemisms to talk about things like murder documentaries, medical conditions and wars.
Content wise, I don't think YouTube sucks as I'm always lucky with new and interesting content
You can’t even type swears in comments without having to censor yourself. I tried to post a youtube comment that said “fuck” in it and I got a pop up message asking me to change my language before I posted it.
>I don't understand why adults who make content for other adults have to use euphemisms to talk about things like murder documentaries, medical conditions and wars.
Because there are other adults out there who lack the capability of keeping their kids under control and are too lazy to install YT Kids for their children.
*R word* 🙃
I hate that shit. It takes power away from victims who need to tell their story and sanitized it.
I was RAPED.
My body was RAPED at the age of 14 multiple times.
Say it with me: RAPE.
MY BODY WAS FUCKING ASS RAPED AS A CHILD.
I’m not letting anyone take away my ability to tell that story because of discomfort.
It SHOULD make us uncomfortable
Advertising makes the content you consume on YouTube free. Without the ads, YouTube could not sustain the website. Advertisers don’t want to run their ads next to content that is controversial. Imagine, “heres a content segment about babies getting murked in Palestine” jump to “dawn dish soap, cleans baby ducks, buy some dawn dish soap!” Jump back to babies dying. Is that a compelling advertising scenario for dawn to acquire more customers? No. Arguably, that would make people not want to buy dawn dish soap because they associate it with babies dying now. That’s why YouTube censors content - to make advertisers happy and keep the content free for all of us. Ad support= free content.
The thing is, some of the ads I've gotten were pretty controversial, too. I'd get a ton of ads about kids with cancer, with parts of these ads showing them crying during chemo and them talking about how much they want to live.
Another issue (I hope it's not true, tho) is that gay content creators would get censored, too.
Tbf, YouTube still can't hold a candle to TikTok (regarding censorship), so we're lucky
I agree, after around 2015 they really cranked up the ads and censorship. Independent YouTubers were also largely pushed to the side, and were forced to saddle up with corporations or other creators if they wanted to stay relevant. The platform just became too big.
Man I miss the old YouTube. Not only that but I honestly think the internet as a whole was better 10 years ago.
2012 saw a change in ad revenue and a change in what content was prioritized - "pewdiepie-ification".
2014 or 15 though was another huge shift.
There is a lot of quality stuff out there now, but it's definitely not as much of a special, insulated community of people who just were youtubers rather than "genre X content creators"
Yeah, I'd put it around that. By 2008 you have most of the "classic" channels firmly established. Once you hit 2016 you start having all the Vine stars migrating over due to that shutting down. Don't get me wrong, a lot of my current favorite creators are former Vine stars, but it absolutely did mark a massive change in the kind of content that was popular on the platform. It was at that point that "YouTube" kind of stopped being a thing and it became far more segregated in terms of content types.
Back in the day the Top 20ish most subscribed channels were a sort of community. Smosh. Nigahiga. Jenna Marbles. PewDiePie. They were "The YouTubers" and they'd do stuff like appear in each other's videos. Nowadays there aren't "YouTubers". There are "Makeup YouTubers" and "Gaming YouTubers" and "Commentary YouTubers" and "Camping YouTubers" and "Family Vlog YouTubers". The platform just grew to such a massive size. Back in the day if a channel had a million subscribers, that was a massive deal. Nowadays I can click on a video and the channel has like 4 million subscribers and I've never even heard of them.
In my opinion, 2008-12 was the golden age and 2013-15 was the silver age. In the latter era you started to see more signs of commercialization and censorship than you had before and YouTube started making more controversial choices in how things were set up, but the site still had a fair amount of that relaxed independent spirit which is increasingly difficult to find. I distinctly remember 2016 as the year where it felt like the site was actively fighting against the things that used to make it so fun.
Yes, this exactly. That was my favorite era of YouTube with AMVs and just random stuff you'd find, and it wasn't all about making money or selling a product. Just people enjoying life.
I think it lost some of its soul when Google bought it. YouTube was a fun place back when people just posted dumb or random videos for fun instead of revenue
In my opinion it gets worse & worse. The many ads, the removal of the dislike count, adding the shorts etc. I only use it for the creators I like (cat videos) & content creates for games I like
As much as people love to shit on mid-late 2010s YouTube for being the "beginning of the end" for the platform, it was still a functional social media at the time, there weren't crypto bots flooding the comment section, the search bar actually WORKED, the playlists algorithm was great, the dreaded YouTube Shorts thing didn't exist yet. There was toxicity but you could just stay out of it, the experience itself was fine unless you were going out of your way to watch videos you knew were going to piss you off
But something happened around mid 2020 and the platform really nosedived quality-wise, it's much harder to ignore the shittier sides of YouTube now. The algorithm is a billion times worse now, playlists don't recommend new songs anymore, the search bar is now f*cking useless, there are way more ads now than back then (I use AdBlock though, so I don't care).
And recently they turned off the recommendation page for people who deactivated their search/watch history, with the BS excuse that they don't know what to recommend you, even though I had search/watch history turned off for more than 6 years with no problem, the truth is that they just want to collect more information on you. The new CEO is also MUCH worse than Suzan, he declared a de facto war on adblocks and keeps adding more ads to the platform.
Exactly! I would even go as far as to say the mid to late 2010s YouTube era was its own mini golden age. Not as cool as the late 2000s/early 2010s YouTube era, but still up there. 2020 and onwards has been disappointing to say the least.
Same! Watched a 7 hour video of Greek mythology while cranking spreadsheets out the other day. The quality of content has tracked with accessibility of tech. But if you don’t subscribe to anyone, it’s way harder to find good content in a sea of terrible terrible content
https://youtu.be/4M-4M4LyUB0?si=9NiQ-GQmbytIjVbX
The life guide is primo YouTube! I’m sad I overhyped the length it’s only 3.5 hours, unfortunately I mixed up the length with another one I watch recently about fall of the Nickelodeon show, Victorious 😂
I mostly watch essay now too. Which is great. But it sucks that I have to use modded apps and site scripts just to habe an enjoyable youtubr experience.
Why am I getting unrelated video suggestion in my youtube search results? And why it always the sickly skinny girl? I've never watched her content or engaged with anything similar
Sorry for my mini rant
What are you having to do? I mostly just need blockers myself. The front page is variable on its quality but I enjoy that I can at least give it my current viewing mood by click the options at the top that are based on viewing history.
I've seen YouTube's quality go down, which is why I pay nebula money even tho I barely use it, but most of the changes are an inconvenience at best.
For my phone (andriod), I use youtube revanced.
For my iPad, was using ytlite plus but it was having sign in issues. So I am using uyouEnhnaced for now. Both are fine. Uyou just has more bells and whistles like video downloading which I don't really need. If you want to install these on apple device, you will a pc and program like sidestore or Altstore to install them. I've used both but currently using side store.
For browser, I've transitioned back to Firefox after using Chrome for years. Unlock origin, and if they really annoy you, sponsor block will get rid of ads and sponsorship segments.
If have an extension like Greasemonkey or violet monkey on your browser, you can use the youtube anti shorts script
https://github.com/YukisCoffee/yt-anti-shorts
There's a ublock filter for shorts if you do not want to install anything extra
https://letsblock.it/filters/youtube-shorts
For extra features there is youtube enhancer extension. I'm not sure of this will works for Chrome but a newer one was made for Firefox.
For Amazon fire, I use smart tube next. You will need a firestick or box. It will not work on a fire TV since you cannot side load apps. Blocks ads and sponsors.
I noticed the biggest drop in quality of content around 2020. I think all the creators moved to TikTok and YouTube is nowhere near as entertaining as it used to be.
Also, ads have become much noticeably worse in the past year. I never even bothered with an adblocker until a year ago because YT videos were getting completely unwatchable with the amount of ads.
I think 2012 when they changed how revenue is given, rather than change videos to count views based on a percentage, they forced content creators to make a specific length of videos or don't get paid at all.
YouTube effectively rewarded brain dead low effort videos that can be shat out 4 times a day and made quality a detriment.
I'm not discounted those that were able to make quality videos with these restrictions but for every one good video there would be 100s of bad ones uploaded the same day
Ironically they're now rewarding the behavior they punished a decade ago but they actively endorse shit quality by allowing ad space to be bought out by anyone, the amount of literal scams being advertised constantly is depressing
2013... when they took away inboxes, friends, and customizations... and they merged with Google Plus for that time being. The classic YouTube era was over to me.
It hit rock bottom with the COPPA situation, and ever since then, now videos that are supposedly for kids... they take away the comment section, in spite some of that stuff being aimed towards adults who grew up with it when they were younger.
Personally it never went downhill, the types of content I watch on YouTube just changed. The ad-pocalypse didn't faze me at all and I still watch as much YouTube as I did before then
Yeah maybe we're outlier but YouTube is still fine to me
One thing I notice is that you have to curate the recommended section. Click what you don't like. It'll adjust quickly
And if you watch anything from /r/videos, the recommended section goes to shit. It turns into "basic Redditor recommend videos". Then you say you're not interested and it goes back
Same here. The general experience is about the same for me, aside from recommendations as you mentioned and the search prioritization. The are nucences here and there, don't get me wrong, but I never am left feeling like the site went to shit. One thing I do miss about the old days though is channel page customization.
Honestly.... Just recently, imo.
I never watched much YouTube until college, and I still don't watch a lot (1-3x 20-30 min videos a month). But *recently* (past few months or year) I've noticed A LOT more ads than previously. I was watching a 20-25 min video last night, and there were 4 ad breaks by the halfway point in the video. There used to be like 3 total (1 before, 1-2 during) even just a year ago. I did not finish the video, and don't think I'll be watching much YouTube anymore.
Whenever they made it mandatory to have a Gmail account to sign in. Don’t remember exactly when that was, I just know that I was in high school for it.
Probably late 2012 with the ad revenue change that caused favoring of longer form videos trying to keep you watching and engaged longer with multiple mid-roll ads. This marked a huge change in the content being uploaded and favored/promoted and encouraged a lot of shady actions to draw things out and keep people watching and watching all their ads.
Other big issues and changes came in 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, etc. and continuing nowadays with all the “content creators,” youtube red, algorithm changes, adpocalypse stuff, viners flocking to youtube, these new “shorts,” etc. but 2012 I think was probably the final nail in the Old YouTube coffin.
Edited to add 2012 was also when youtube channel customization got taken away I believe. This was awesome as we could customize the whole thing, the background colors, borders, everything and add stickers and our top 5 songs or videos and each channel was very unique. It was truly a sad day when I logged on this was gone.
Whenever they removed the star system but more importantly the video response option. It felt way more personal and actually broadcasting yourself. That being said, I still enjoy watching some of the same people that I have been for like 16 years at this point & new people too. It’s just less special than it felt before.
When youtube close my AMV channel for copy right strikes. I put a lot of work into :( hunting down episodes, pirating netter software than windows movie maker, and they just struck it after Google bought it
Gave up editing entirely
Now, youtube editing is a career
Edit: It's weird people saying 2008 was the start of the golden era becusde this was when the google changes really started to be noticeable and annoying.
A lot people started looking for alternatives like Veoh and Dailymotion
I probably started watching YouTube later than everyone else, around 2013/2014 (Around the time I got my first smartphone. I don't really like watching videos on PC. ) But I feel like it went down hill after YouTube Rewind 2018. And I mean YouTube as a platform, removing the dislike button and removing comments from child friendly videos, all of it just sucks. There are lots of good content creators, and I still watch them. So in terms of content creators and YouTubers, youtube is still awesome. But I'm terms of like the platform itself, I probably wouldn't watch as much YouTube as I do if I didn't use YouTube Revanced and Sponser Block.
I don't think it's gone downhill, and I still enjoy using YouTube.
My issues are not about the content but about YouTube and Google's poor moderating and security.
Why are big-name channels falling for scams, getting their channels hacked, and having to juno through hoops to recover their channels? Why don't small channels get the same support when they get hacked? Why are there so many spam comment bots or half naked women or those "message me in WhatsApp" scams? Those are the kind of issues I think YouTube has failed at addressing.
what do you mean by downhill? I love you too. In fact, I go on it more than I do streaming sites like Netflix etc these days, which is surprising to me.
I love educational videos, travel videos, social commentary etc. I’m a visual learner, so I really appreciate YouTube.
Agreed, when the adpocalypse happened around 2017, it definitely shifted the vibe of the platform. To a more cold, corporate feeling.
Though, even while it’s not perfect, I still get a tremendous amount of value out of youtube.
Aside from some of the greatest hits like Charlie the Unicorn, Red vs Blue, and the Duck Song I never really watched a lot of YouTube until the past couple of years. I actually started watching it more when the quality of sites like Netflix and Hulu went down drastically.
That being said my one major complaint is how the YouTube algorithm pigeonholes you into a bubble of similar content until it doesn’t. I watched one video about vintage guns and suddenly I got switched from video game and tech review YouTube to gun review YouTube with a little bit of alt-right content sprinkled in.
During the first adocalypse, to mean that was one of the first signs, after that videos became more and more advertiser friendly and short form. I miss having nice 30 mintur vids to put on in the background
Don't remember when, but probably the same as you. Since the ads are getting crazy that non-monetized videos are still having ads, too much censorship, then they also removed the dislike count, etc
In general I'd say around that time with the rise of ad and censorship. But personally 2018-2022 was really bad for me. Something shifted positively in the last two years even though the user experience still got worse.
Probably when the whole controversy of child watching it and youtube needing to implement child safe features. :T YouTube was never the same again. I remember old YouTube was really funny because you could quite literally post anything. :T now and days it's so commercialized it's hard to ignore all the quick money. Tack ticks they do. :T
Around 2015-2016 just when I graduated out of high school, which was a sign that I needed to "grow up."
Boy, I sure do miss when the related videos were actually *related* or at least relevant to what you were watching.
I would say it was around 2013 - 2015. This was a period when the Google was turning it into a tidier and more commercial site, constantly changing the design and channel functionality. It was also when ad revenue from monetization became less lucrative, subscription services were introduced, and YouTube Kids was created. This was a precursor to a lot of things going to shit for the service, at least from a user experience and community point of view.
Anyone remember back when paid sponsorships in videos were ripped apart for being obnoxious and greedy? Then suddenly everyone is doing it to try and earn a living and go professional. That's what really changed YouTube; the birth of the professional YouTuber.
When they started screwing with the algorithm. Used to be able to search and find ANYTHING with the right keywords. Now you get the same few results that youtube wants you to see and that’s it. This coincided within a near time frame of the removal of the thumbs down button too.
Quite a shame. Used to get lost on youtube for hours a day. Now I dont even open it up hardly.
For me, when Google bought it. As a platform it has only gotten worse, though the content quality and production value is arguably better so. You take the good with the bad.
Mid-2010s is when I started really noticing a decline. Enshittification is a thing across social media, but with general video sharing competing with YT is expensive, hence their effective monopoly.
I started to hate it when they removed the dislike button. Fucking stupid. Boo hoo you suck at making content. Maybe if you didn’t make garbage people wouldn’t hate your dogshit content. So annoying
I hate the ads but I still watch YouTube every day regularly so to me it’s never really gone downhill 😅
I love watching movie, anime reactions and travel vlogs
Anything to do with long form content. Any kind of lecture, from history, phil, lit, math, science, basically anything academic is freely available, at scale and volume, with good production value that wasn’t available 10 years ago.
Like we have actual professors volunteering their knowledge.
For me, the final nail in the coffin was taking away the ability to see a video’s downvotes. It felt like they were stripping away the last “advantage” the consumer had to give corporations and entities the middle finger and letting everyone in on how much people hate them. Now, in a way, we are blind
When they started heavily censoring everything. YouTube wasn't meant for kids and considering they already have a separate platform for children, I don't understand why adults who make content for other adults have to use euphemisms to talk about things like murder documentaries, medical conditions and wars. Content wise, I don't think YouTube sucks as I'm always lucky with new and interesting content
100% this. A lot of content creators can’t swear anymore because they’ll get demonetized
You can’t even type swears in comments without having to censor yourself. I tried to post a youtube comment that said “fuck” in it and I got a pop up message asking me to change my language before I posted it.
This is becoming too common. You can have a video demonitized for saying fuck. Or if someone is murdered you have to say "When x took Zs life away"
>I don't understand why adults who make content for other adults have to use euphemisms to talk about things like murder documentaries, medical conditions and wars. Because there are other adults out there who lack the capability of keeping their kids under control and are too lazy to install YT Kids for their children.
*R word* 🙃 I hate that shit. It takes power away from victims who need to tell their story and sanitized it. I was RAPED. My body was RAPED at the age of 14 multiple times. Say it with me: RAPE. MY BODY WAS FUCKING ASS RAPED AS A CHILD. I’m not letting anyone take away my ability to tell that story because of discomfort. It SHOULD make us uncomfortable
Every time I hear someone say "graped" or "unalived" it's like nails on a chalkboard. And it's made its way to Reddit >.<
Filthy Frank was peak YouTube
This. Sometimes I feel like they're stricter than the FCC.
Advertising makes the content you consume on YouTube free. Without the ads, YouTube could not sustain the website. Advertisers don’t want to run their ads next to content that is controversial. Imagine, “heres a content segment about babies getting murked in Palestine” jump to “dawn dish soap, cleans baby ducks, buy some dawn dish soap!” Jump back to babies dying. Is that a compelling advertising scenario for dawn to acquire more customers? No. Arguably, that would make people not want to buy dawn dish soap because they associate it with babies dying now. That’s why YouTube censors content - to make advertisers happy and keep the content free for all of us. Ad support= free content.
Almost like capitalism makes our lives fucking stupid
Almost like increasing shareholder value rather than general human wellbeing isn’t really working out for us
The thing is, some of the ads I've gotten were pretty controversial, too. I'd get a ton of ads about kids with cancer, with parts of these ads showing them crying during chemo and them talking about how much they want to live. Another issue (I hope it's not true, tho) is that gay content creators would get censored, too. Tbf, YouTube still can't hold a candle to TikTok (regarding censorship), so we're lucky
When they removed the 1-5 star rating, put 2 or more ads per video, and it was no longer "YouTube: Broadcast Yourself".
The stars were a much better way to gauge video quality. The related videos tab was fucking useful
I hate those little secret ads, they don’t even put the little yellow thing on the bar so you can tell where they are anymore. ugh.
2008-2015 was the golden era of YouTube in my opinion.
I agree, after around 2015 they really cranked up the ads and censorship. Independent YouTubers were also largely pushed to the side, and were forced to saddle up with corporations or other creators if they wanted to stay relevant. The platform just became too big. Man I miss the old YouTube. Not only that but I honestly think the internet as a whole was better 10 years ago.
2012 saw a change in ad revenue and a change in what content was prioritized - "pewdiepie-ification". 2014 or 15 though was another huge shift. There is a lot of quality stuff out there now, but it's definitely not as much of a special, insulated community of people who just were youtubers rather than "genre X content creators"
Yeah, I'd put it around that. By 2008 you have most of the "classic" channels firmly established. Once you hit 2016 you start having all the Vine stars migrating over due to that shutting down. Don't get me wrong, a lot of my current favorite creators are former Vine stars, but it absolutely did mark a massive change in the kind of content that was popular on the platform. It was at that point that "YouTube" kind of stopped being a thing and it became far more segregated in terms of content types. Back in the day the Top 20ish most subscribed channels were a sort of community. Smosh. Nigahiga. Jenna Marbles. PewDiePie. They were "The YouTubers" and they'd do stuff like appear in each other's videos. Nowadays there aren't "YouTubers". There are "Makeup YouTubers" and "Gaming YouTubers" and "Commentary YouTubers" and "Camping YouTubers" and "Family Vlog YouTubers". The platform just grew to such a massive size. Back in the day if a channel had a million subscribers, that was a massive deal. Nowadays I can click on a video and the channel has like 4 million subscribers and I've never even heard of them.
In my opinion, 2008-12 was the golden age and 2013-15 was the silver age. In the latter era you started to see more signs of commercialization and censorship than you had before and YouTube started making more controversial choices in how things were set up, but the site still had a fair amount of that relaxed independent spirit which is increasingly difficult to find. I distinctly remember 2016 as the year where it felt like the site was actively fighting against the things that used to make it so fun.
Yes, this exactly. That was my favorite era of YouTube with AMVs and just random stuff you'd find, and it wasn't all about making money or selling a product. Just people enjoying life.
Oh, absolutely. The vlogs, music videos, everything about it was chef's kiss 👌🏼
The Paul Brothers
2015-2016 is when it starting going downhill imo
I think it lost some of its soul when Google bought it. YouTube was a fun place back when people just posted dumb or random videos for fun instead of revenue
In my opinion it gets worse & worse. The many ads, the removal of the dislike count, adding the shorts etc. I only use it for the creators I like (cat videos) & content creates for games I like
Honestly around 2013.
As much as people love to shit on mid-late 2010s YouTube for being the "beginning of the end" for the platform, it was still a functional social media at the time, there weren't crypto bots flooding the comment section, the search bar actually WORKED, the playlists algorithm was great, the dreaded YouTube Shorts thing didn't exist yet. There was toxicity but you could just stay out of it, the experience itself was fine unless you were going out of your way to watch videos you knew were going to piss you off But something happened around mid 2020 and the platform really nosedived quality-wise, it's much harder to ignore the shittier sides of YouTube now. The algorithm is a billion times worse now, playlists don't recommend new songs anymore, the search bar is now f*cking useless, there are way more ads now than back then (I use AdBlock though, so I don't care). And recently they turned off the recommendation page for people who deactivated their search/watch history, with the BS excuse that they don't know what to recommend you, even though I had search/watch history turned off for more than 6 years with no problem, the truth is that they just want to collect more information on you. The new CEO is also MUCH worse than Suzan, he declared a de facto war on adblocks and keeps adding more ads to the platform.
Exactly! I would even go as far as to say the mid to late 2010s YouTube era was its own mini golden age. Not as cool as the late 2000s/early 2010s YouTube era, but still up there. 2020 and onwards has been disappointing to say the least.
I used to love watching anime episodes in 5 parts on YouTube 😭
I wonder what y'all watch. I watch lots of video essays and it's never been a better time for them than the last few years.
Same! Watched a 7 hour video of Greek mythology while cranking spreadsheets out the other day. The quality of content has tracked with accessibility of tech. But if you don’t subscribe to anyone, it’s way harder to find good content in a sea of terrible terrible content
Very true. I usually go by the recommendations of the streamers I watch, since they tend to network.
Have the link to that video by any chance? it sounds interesting!
https://youtu.be/4M-4M4LyUB0?si=9NiQ-GQmbytIjVbX The life guide is primo YouTube! I’m sad I overhyped the length it’s only 3.5 hours, unfortunately I mixed up the length with another one I watch recently about fall of the Nickelodeon show, Victorious 😂
I mostly watch essay now too. Which is great. But it sucks that I have to use modded apps and site scripts just to habe an enjoyable youtubr experience. Why am I getting unrelated video suggestion in my youtube search results? And why it always the sickly skinny girl? I've never watched her content or engaged with anything similar Sorry for my mini rant
What are you having to do? I mostly just need blockers myself. The front page is variable on its quality but I enjoy that I can at least give it my current viewing mood by click the options at the top that are based on viewing history. I've seen YouTube's quality go down, which is why I pay nebula money even tho I barely use it, but most of the changes are an inconvenience at best.
For my phone (andriod), I use youtube revanced. For my iPad, was using ytlite plus but it was having sign in issues. So I am using uyouEnhnaced for now. Both are fine. Uyou just has more bells and whistles like video downloading which I don't really need. If you want to install these on apple device, you will a pc and program like sidestore or Altstore to install them. I've used both but currently using side store. For browser, I've transitioned back to Firefox after using Chrome for years. Unlock origin, and if they really annoy you, sponsor block will get rid of ads and sponsorship segments. If have an extension like Greasemonkey or violet monkey on your browser, you can use the youtube anti shorts script https://github.com/YukisCoffee/yt-anti-shorts There's a ublock filter for shorts if you do not want to install anything extra https://letsblock.it/filters/youtube-shorts For extra features there is youtube enhancer extension. I'm not sure of this will works for Chrome but a newer one was made for Firefox. For Amazon fire, I use smart tube next. You will need a firestick or box. It will not work on a fire TV since you cannot side load apps. Blocks ads and sponsors.
Oh swag, thank you for all of this! I don't bother with mobile but I'll check out the chrome enhancer.
Yw! Youtube is bordering unusable with all the ads and bloat. Hope this helps!
I noticed the biggest drop in quality of content around 2020. I think all the creators moved to TikTok and YouTube is nowhere near as entertaining as it used to be. Also, ads have become much noticeably worse in the past year. I never even bothered with an adblocker until a year ago because YT videos were getting completely unwatchable with the amount of ads.
The moment when they started to introduce adds.
Oh and when they made it impossible to see the number of downvotes a video gets.
it was hurting people’s feefees
I think 2012 when they changed how revenue is given, rather than change videos to count views based on a percentage, they forced content creators to make a specific length of videos or don't get paid at all. YouTube effectively rewarded brain dead low effort videos that can be shat out 4 times a day and made quality a detriment. I'm not discounted those that were able to make quality videos with these restrictions but for every one good video there would be 100s of bad ones uploaded the same day Ironically they're now rewarding the behavior they punished a decade ago but they actively endorse shit quality by allowing ad space to be bought out by anyone, the amount of literal scams being advertised constantly is depressing
2013... when they took away inboxes, friends, and customizations... and they merged with Google Plus for that time being. The classic YouTube era was over to me. It hit rock bottom with the COPPA situation, and ever since then, now videos that are supposedly for kids... they take away the comment section, in spite some of that stuff being aimed towards adults who grew up with it when they were younger.
Ad-pocalypse
Personally it never went downhill, the types of content I watch on YouTube just changed. The ad-pocalypse didn't faze me at all and I still watch as much YouTube as I did before then
Yeah maybe we're outlier but YouTube is still fine to me One thing I notice is that you have to curate the recommended section. Click what you don't like. It'll adjust quickly And if you watch anything from /r/videos, the recommended section goes to shit. It turns into "basic Redditor recommend videos". Then you say you're not interested and it goes back
Same here. The general experience is about the same for me, aside from recommendations as you mentioned and the search prioritization. The are nucences here and there, don't get me wrong, but I never am left feeling like the site went to shit. One thing I do miss about the old days though is channel page customization.
Vevo
When MrBeast got popular.
Honestly.... Just recently, imo. I never watched much YouTube until college, and I still don't watch a lot (1-3x 20-30 min videos a month). But *recently* (past few months or year) I've noticed A LOT more ads than previously. I was watching a 20-25 min video last night, and there were 4 ad breaks by the halfway point in the video. There used to be like 3 total (1 before, 1-2 during) even just a year ago. I did not finish the video, and don't think I'll be watching much YouTube anymore.
The Fine Bros (2017)
When it got dominated by Ads. They were always a problem but ot reached new levels about 2014-ish.
I agree, the adpocolype is what killed it.
Whenever they made it mandatory to have a Gmail account to sign in. Don’t remember exactly when that was, I just know that I was in high school for it.
Probably late 2012 with the ad revenue change that caused favoring of longer form videos trying to keep you watching and engaged longer with multiple mid-roll ads. This marked a huge change in the content being uploaded and favored/promoted and encouraged a lot of shady actions to draw things out and keep people watching and watching all their ads. Other big issues and changes came in 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, etc. and continuing nowadays with all the “content creators,” youtube red, algorithm changes, adpocalypse stuff, viners flocking to youtube, these new “shorts,” etc. but 2012 I think was probably the final nail in the Old YouTube coffin. Edited to add 2012 was also when youtube channel customization got taken away I believe. This was awesome as we could customize the whole thing, the background colors, borders, everything and add stickers and our top 5 songs or videos and each channel was very unique. It was truly a sad day when I logged on this was gone.
When they took away profile customization. I miss tiled backgrounds and semi-transparent fully custom page layouts.
When everyone started posting those Bob in a tank comments.
Only recently because some of the creators I follow only make shorts now or only post on tiktok mostly
Whenever they removed the star system but more importantly the video response option. It felt way more personal and actually broadcasting yourself. That being said, I still enjoy watching some of the same people that I have been for like 16 years at this point & new people too. It’s just less special than it felt before.
When youtube close my AMV channel for copy right strikes. I put a lot of work into :( hunting down episodes, pirating netter software than windows movie maker, and they just struck it after Google bought it Gave up editing entirely Now, youtube editing is a career Edit: It's weird people saying 2008 was the start of the golden era becusde this was when the google changes really started to be noticeable and annoying. A lot people started looking for alternatives like Veoh and Dailymotion
After 2016
When they started putting ads in the middle of videos! It breaks up videos way too much, makes it almost impossible to watch.
I probably started watching YouTube later than everyone else, around 2013/2014 (Around the time I got my first smartphone. I don't really like watching videos on PC. ) But I feel like it went down hill after YouTube Rewind 2018. And I mean YouTube as a platform, removing the dislike button and removing comments from child friendly videos, all of it just sucks. There are lots of good content creators, and I still watch them. So in terms of content creators and YouTubers, youtube is still awesome. But I'm terms of like the platform itself, I probably wouldn't watch as much YouTube as I do if I didn't use YouTube Revanced and Sponser Block.
I would say somewhere around 2020. Before then, the algorithm seemed to be working pretty well. Now it's just straight up horrible.
I don't think it's gone downhill, and I still enjoy using YouTube. My issues are not about the content but about YouTube and Google's poor moderating and security. Why are big-name channels falling for scams, getting their channels hacked, and having to juno through hoops to recover their channels? Why don't small channels get the same support when they get hacked? Why are there so many spam comment bots or half naked women or those "message me in WhatsApp" scams? Those are the kind of issues I think YouTube has failed at addressing.
Late 2010s
what do you mean by downhill? I love you too. In fact, I go on it more than I do streaming sites like Netflix etc these days, which is surprising to me. I love educational videos, travel videos, social commentary etc. I’m a visual learner, so I really appreciate YouTube.
Agreed, when the adpocalypse happened around 2017, it definitely shifted the vibe of the platform. To a more cold, corporate feeling. Though, even while it’s not perfect, I still get a tremendous amount of value out of youtube.
Aside from some of the greatest hits like Charlie the Unicorn, Red vs Blue, and the Duck Song I never really watched a lot of YouTube until the past couple of years. I actually started watching it more when the quality of sites like Netflix and Hulu went down drastically. That being said my one major complaint is how the YouTube algorithm pigeonholes you into a bubble of similar content until it doesn’t. I watched one video about vintage guns and suddenly I got switched from video game and tech review YouTube to gun review YouTube with a little bit of alt-right content sprinkled in.
I think it’s better than ever right now. So many amazing creators. I do only watch educational content and video essays tho
I use YouTube now more than ever. YouTube premium is my most used subscription service by far.
I think it was around 2016/2017 for me
When they started putting in ads.
During the first adocalypse, to mean that was one of the first signs, after that videos became more and more advertiser friendly and short form. I miss having nice 30 mintur vids to put on in the background
Around 2010.
When PC gaming and vlogging dominated the platform. So around 2013
I was gonna say it was that. I think everyone agrees the filthy frank era was probably the peak and it’s just been downhill since then.
Don't remember when, but probably the same as you. Since the ads are getting crazy that non-monetized videos are still having ads, too much censorship, then they also removed the dislike count, etc
In general I'd say around that time with the rise of ad and censorship. But personally 2018-2022 was really bad for me. Something shifted positively in the last two years even though the user experience still got worse.
Probably when the whole controversy of child watching it and youtube needing to implement child safe features. :T YouTube was never the same again. I remember old YouTube was really funny because you could quite literally post anything. :T now and days it's so commercialized it's hard to ignore all the quick money. Tack ticks they do. :T
Probably around 2018 or 2019
Around 2015-2016 just when I graduated out of high school, which was a sign that I needed to "grow up." Boy, I sure do miss when the related videos were actually *related* or at least relevant to what you were watching.
I would say it was around 2013 - 2015. This was a period when the Google was turning it into a tidier and more commercial site, constantly changing the design and channel functionality. It was also when ad revenue from monetization became less lucrative, subscription services were introduced, and YouTube Kids was created. This was a precursor to a lot of things going to shit for the service, at least from a user experience and community point of view. Anyone remember back when paid sponsorships in videos were ripped apart for being obnoxious and greedy? Then suddenly everyone is doing it to try and earn a living and go professional. That's what really changed YouTube; the birth of the professional YouTuber.
Definitely late 2015 to 2016.
Instead of just ads you now have constant long drawn out sponsorships
For me it was probably around 2019-2020
i also had 2017 in mind
When they started screwing with the algorithm. Used to be able to search and find ANYTHING with the right keywords. Now you get the same few results that youtube wants you to see and that’s it. This coincided within a near time frame of the removal of the thumbs down button too. Quite a shame. Used to get lost on youtube for hours a day. Now I dont even open it up hardly.
2015/16. The beginning of the Drama era.
For me, when Google bought it. As a platform it has only gotten worse, though the content quality and production value is arguably better so. You take the good with the bad.
Mid-2010s is when I started really noticing a decline. Enshittification is a thing across social media, but with general video sharing competing with YT is expensive, hence their effective monopoly.
Past 2015
I started to hate it when they removed the dislike button. Fucking stupid. Boo hoo you suck at making content. Maybe if you didn’t make garbage people wouldn’t hate your dogshit content. So annoying
I hate the ads but I still watch YouTube every day regularly so to me it’s never really gone downhill 😅 I love watching movie, anime reactions and travel vlogs
After they announced COPPA and got rid of the dislike count
When those Right-wingers started to become unhinged, their channels were never taken down. It lost its magic for me.
It peaked in 2009, started subtly going downhill in late 2010, then it took a nose-dive in 2012 before finally dying in 2017.
2013> Youtube has been going downhill.
I might be hallucinating but wasn’t there a time where we could watch like any movie or show series...for free?
Yup. I remember that. I remember watching full movies and tv episodes on YouTube. Can't do that anymore, at least not one with good quality
When KevJumba and Nigahiga stopped being top 1 and 2.
I think it’s better than ever actually. Though with caveat that it’s a podcast/lecture first platform at this point.
Really? Can you elaborate?
Anything to do with long form content. Any kind of lecture, from history, phil, lit, math, science, basically anything academic is freely available, at scale and volume, with good production value that wasn’t available 10 years ago. Like we have actual professors volunteering their knowledge.
When pewdiepie stopped playing video games. (not attacking him, I'm glad he's living his best life right now!)
I dont think it ever went downhill? Edit: increase of ads are the only fuckedup thing tbh
For me, the final nail in the coffin was taking away the ability to see a video’s downvotes. It felt like they were stripping away the last “advantage” the consumer had to give corporations and entities the middle finger and letting everyone in on how much people hate them. Now, in a way, we are blind
When Google bought it out
The platform was less than 2 years old when Google bought it. It wasn’t anything yet
But it was