We have all been there. It starts with one juicy thumbnail. 3 hours later you’re cursing yourself for going down a rabbit hole of some irrelevant topic that has no real value to you, either now or later.
I will admit it. I love YouTube.
Spurred on by increasing connectivity speeds and a world that is increasingly digital with every passing year, it is a medium of communication that is filling in the vacuum left by a traditional media format that is rapidly losing its appeal. It gives every person with a Google account an opportunity to unleash the creator in them, and build a community that as an activity is both intellectually satisfying and financially profitable. It is a great platform to learn almost anything under the sun. You can find your niche community of creators and viewers for even the most obscure topics.
However, as many of us might already be intuitively familiar, it can also have its downsides.
The problems
Aside from being pushed into a specific ideological bubble (social and political, for example), viewers run the risk of gaining binge watching viewing habits that are detrimental to their overall mental well being. To me, YouTube and lawnmowers are similar tools. They can both be entertaining to watch and also increase the productivity of those who use them, provided they use it the right way. We don’t let a lawnmower go unmanned and run amok on our grassy lawns, and yet we seem to give recommendation algorithms a free reign on our minds. It is as though every junk video we watch seemingly trims one more braincell of ours.
Over the last 5 years, my use of YouTube had skyrocketed. I don’t watch Netflix and have never felt an Amazon Prime subscription worth the cost. YouTube was free (or so I thought), had wide ranging content and felt more personal. I could choose to watch videos on topics that I was interested in (again, a fallacy), and not something that a studio executive thought I might like. And COVID lockdowns created the optimal conditions for this behavior to stick around. It seemed like I could connect with the whole world using my YouTube home page. When YouTube started blocking users with AdBlockers, I bought a Premium subscription to keep my service on and those pesky ads away. How could I not? The allure was too much to resist.
I am not a psychologist by training or even remotely qualified to judge mental well being. But in my personal experience, the more time I spent time on YouTube, the further I felt disconnected from everyday events and a certain loss of control. Certain weeknights turned into late night binge watching sessions that could have been better spent resting for the next busy workday. Weekends seemed to evaporate into thin air and aside from dry eyes and the occasional raging headache, there was not much else to show for it.
The TV used to be called the idiot box, because people believed it was numbing the viewers’s intellect. What should we call this then?
The biggest downside
Along with the talked about bad viewing habits, I had developed one more regrettable past time: reading YouTube comments. This was, by far, the most damaging habit. Watching a click bait video on some latest internet outrage might have set the stage, but reading the digital garbage being flung at each other by viewers in the comments section solidified the addiction.
Internet anonymity seems to bring out the worst in all of us. We seem to be comfortable saying things that we would potentially never say to someone in person. While chat rooms, forums, Reddit and other platforms have existed since early Internet days and also suffer from this problem, I think the fact that YouTube’s algorithm is tuned to make things go viral exacerbates it further.
For instance, it is highly unlikely that I will login to Reddit and navigate to a subreddit that is anti-something. I might occasionally come across one mentioned in a news article or stumble upon it by chance while browsing Reddit for some other purpose. With YouTube, any topic that is trending or deemed near suited based on my previous watch history lands on my Home page. With the algorithm prioritizing sensationalist content that the primal part of my brain is most likely to choose, there is always a chance of being exposed to low quality content that is nothing more than a cash grab.
The curse of engagement
Creators have an incentive to make videos on controversial topics that they know will get a lot of eyeballs and conversations going. Engagement is all that counts, and regardless of whether it is factual or how it actually affects the public discourse. And for the weak-willed like me, the eye often gradually wanders to the comments section to know what others think.
To be fair, there are definitely restrained comments on most videos, but in my personal experience, the ratio seems to tilt if the topic is more controversial. It is like watching a car crash safety test. There are parts flying in all directions and it seems unreasonable to destroy a shiny nice looking vehicle, but you cannot stop watching.
Personally, I believe reading incendiary comments consistently affects our understanding of the world around us. Especially if the verbal tirade is directed towards communities or groups that we represent. It is bad enough that the presenter in the video painted an entire group with a very broad stroke, you now have to read how others concur and validate that opinion.
Over the last year, I have had to remind myself many times over that a YouTube comment section is not reflective of what the broader society actually thinks about an issue. Sure, they might be the opinions of a percentage of people but even those might not necessarily be tightly held beliefs. Internet anonymity gives users a consequence free place to rant and we are all making full use of it.
So, what can we do?
Ironically, I watched a video on YouTube by the channel Technology Connections that highlighted the perils of being passive enforcers of algorithmic recommendations, day in and day out. The thumbnail said it best, “Feed your mind, mind your feed”. I decided to take action and run an experiment.
I turned on Restricted Mode to block comments from showing up on videos. It felt liberating at first, but the curiosity to know what others thought was still very hard to resist, especially on videos that could be considered trending.
After a couple of weeks, I decided to take this further and turned off my Watch History and Search History. All of my recommendations on the home page vanished and there was just a simple blank page. No prompting, no unconscious clicking.
It was extremely weird at first. When I logged onto YouTube after a tiring work day, I certainly did not want to make one more decision on what to watch. YouTube had been my escape from decision making where I could just accept the suggested videos and zone out to take my mind of the other daily stressors.
But this is where my existing Subscriptions helped. Over the years, I had subscribed to channels that I found were interesting, entertaining and informative. If I wanted to watch something, I could very well head to my Subscriptions tab and pick one from there. To clarify, I still had recommendations on a video page within the side panel, but it was a controlled set of sources that was limited and not seemingly infinite. And if I did not like the kind of videos a creator was pushing recently, I could simply unsubscribe.
Will this actually work?
All three of my actions: turning on Restricted Mode, turning off Watch History and Search History are not fool proof. They are only additional barriers between me and digital junk. There is still a risk of engaging in a binge watching session or coming across an incendiary thumbnail but there is at least some control that I can now exert over what I consume. I love Pizza but cannot consume it everyday without destroying my body. The same applies for digital content and the mind.
If you have read this far, you might have two questions: does this mean I will not get any interesting recommendations anymore? And what if all of someone’s current subscriptions are controversial junk channels, will that not make the ideological bubble problem worse?
The answer to the first question is no. You will still continue to receive recommendations on the side panel or below (if on a mobile interface) but it will be limited and probably related to what you just watched.
The answer to the second question is, its complicated. We all hold beliefs that sometimes become central to our identity. And freedom of speech and expression are very crucial in a world where misinformation and manipulation runs rampant. Every voice matters, but as digital consumers we cannot let algorithmic brainwashing dull our ability to reason and critically evaluate the world around us.
I recognize it is hard to peek over our ideological spectrum and absorb viewpoints that not only contradict ours but do not appear to be grounded in our understanding of reality. The issue, however, is that the world simply what it is, and not what we think it is. We are the main protagonist in our respective stories we tell ourselves everyday and a selfless understanding of the world is quite difficult. In an age where power browsing and click and run mechanisms are the norm, context is often misunderstood or lost.
But we have no choice. To co-exist in a complex world and thrive, we must try to give other viewpoints at least the benefit of doubt and then evaluate it with as little bias. To that end, I would recommend that we intentionally seek out multiple sources and validate any information obtained from one of our subscribed creators (particularly if it is a trending topic).
Parting thoughts
I have stuck with this experiment for a few months now and have seen some improvements along the way. I have started to read a bit more, engage in more conversations with actual people around me and more consequentially in this case, was able to write this blog post. I intend to continue this journey but now feel comfortable in advocating that others also try it out for themselves.
The digital world can sometimes make it look like the worst of times, but conscious choice and control can provide some much needed relief and perspective.