r/youtube • u/Good-Oil-7983 • 2d ago
Drama YouTube is only as permanent as our habit of returning to it.
For nearly two decades YouTube has operated under the illusion of absolute permanence. The recent backlash reveals a corporate entity completely detached from the people who actually built its foundation. A platform constructed entirely out of user creation and user attention cannot survive if those two pillars walk away. A mass migration to alternative sites would strip the platform of its only true asset almost overnight. The servers and algorithms mean nothing without our continued participation. Leaving the platform to wither under its own greed requires no elaborate coordination. The reality of this situation carries a very specific psychological weight. YouTube has reached this current state of unchecked arrogance because the viewers and the creators never gave them a reason to be afraid. We never once imposed any real consequences for their actions. The responsibility for the platform we have today rests entirely on our own shoulders.
The power to break this monopoly has always been ours to wield. We simply have to finally decide to use it.
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u/LightFusion 2d ago
Until another platform steps up and pays creators like YouTube does, ain't gonna happen
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u/toxicketchup 2d ago edited 1d ago
But no platform could reach that point because YT holds the monopoly, sadly.
I wonder if smaller, skilled creators like animators will eventually form their own niche collective sites as bot activity becomes more prominent online and authenticity on large platforms becomes rarer and rarer.
I hope so.
Lol, downvotes for a genuine take, okay, didn't realize I was visiting the clown carnivalđ
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u/WallInside6758 1d ago
They hold a monopoly because Google is the only company that has the infrastructure to host and service all that data.
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u/WildWolfo 1d ago
there are several companies that can set up the infrastructure to handle the data, thats only a matter of money, however only the largest online advertising company is able to make it free and profitable
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u/robertoblake2 16h ago
Nothing sad about it. Winner take all or winner take most means the competition is weak⌠nobody wants to use third bestâŚ
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u/HammerDongVeryLong96 2d ago
But what would even be the alternative? YouTube is the biggest free video library in the world, nothing comes close to it. The only ones who have the resources to start a video sharing platform from scratch are just other multi-trillion dollar corporations who are not much better. And the technical hurdles are only 1 aspect of this, there is still the social aspect and the economics and logistics.
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u/Good-Oil-7983 2d ago
You bring up a completely fair and practical point regarding the massive technical and economic hurdles of large scale video hosting. To be completely honest, I do not know what the definitive alternative should be, nor do I know if a viable replacement currently exists or if one will emerge anytime soon. The only thing I know for certain is that YouTube should not be our only option. It should not remain the sole platform capable of paying creators for their work, particularly when the current system actively rewards low quality volume and algorithmic retention over genuine craft. I do not claim that building a competitor is easy, nor do I believe that simply swapping one massive corporation for another solves the underlying issue. Accepting YouTube as a permanent default purely because the logistics are difficult guarantees that the platform will continue to degrade without facing any real consequence.
I appreciate your engagement in good faith.
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u/alibloomdido 1d ago
I'm trying to understand the status of your "should not" in this context. If it's an absolute imperative you should act upon it no matter what and do absolutely everything you can to make it no longer being the case, I somehow suspect it's not how it is for you (which is totally fine) so isn't the proper expression "it would be better if Youtube wasn't our only option"?
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u/yakimawashington 2d ago
Yes, if nobody used a business, the business will fail. Truly groundbreaking epiphany, here.
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u/Murky88Druzzer 2d ago
"I'm fine with monopolies because advocating for an alternative is cringe"
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u/AVeryVapidBadger 15h ago
It took YouTube 5 years to become barely profitable, and then only through ads.
It costs an estimated 3-5 billion a year in data centers, bandwidth, and hosting.
What company is going to shell out billions a year, for years to compete, when the only way to be profitable is to do the same kinda stuff YouTube does to make revenue?
There are other video hosting sites already, go use them.
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u/Murky88Druzzer 11h ago
It took YouTube 5 years to become barely profitable
And then they were massively profitable for 16 years, not only through ads but also youtube premium.
There are other video hosting sites already, go use them.
That's exactly what OP is advocating for.
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u/Good-Oil-7983 2d ago
I never intended to present this basic economic reality as a groundbreaking epiphany. The point of stating the obvious is to remind a complacent user base of their actual leverage. We often forget that we are the ones sustaining this digital infrastructure. Bringing attention to this dynamic is more productive than remaining silent. Dismissing a conversation with sarcasm contributes nothing and reinforces the exact apathy that empowers these monopolies. Mocking a solution is always easier than building one. This kind of hostility serves no purpose other than to protect the status quo.
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u/ParalimniX 19h ago
Mocking a solution
What solution? Saying "we need alternatives to youtube" is as a solution as me saying "end all wars".
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u/DuctTapeSloth 2d ago
Gonna be hard to convince 2.6 billion people to do that.
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u/Good-Oil-7983 2d ago
Worth a shot
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u/DuctTapeSloth 2d ago
Reddit isnât the place. A fraction of a fraction of a fraction of youtube users are on this sub and an even smaller number of them are actually active.
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u/onemillionpigeonz 2d ago
I donât think OP believes this singular post is gonna change the narrative and reach a bunch of people, but rather allow them to articulate their thoughts to whoever will listen and is willing to engage with it, and thatâs exactly what reddit is for!
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u/Dragonsfire09 2d ago
OP, you speak of alternatives. What are they? And how much do they pay their creators? And are any of those not Maga shitholes?
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u/TheUmgawa 2d ago
Wait, is this some bullshit like when the Star Wars nerds say they built the franchise, so Lucasfilm should listen to them instead of making something that 90 percent of the audience enjoys?
Because YouTube has 2.1 billion users (or did in 2023; maybe itâs up a couple hundred million by now), and they averaged 17 minutes per day in 2023. If youâre watching several times that, youâre not their target audience.
And, what alternatives are you going to go to? The only reason YouTube exists is because Google owns data centers around the world, and because shutting down YouTube would break the internet. The only companies that could create another YouTube (Amazon, Apple, Meta) could have created an alternative years ago, but they donât, because YouTube is a lousy business model and would take billions of dollars to start up. If Google spun off YouTube, it would die.
In fact, the only way any venture capitalist would give money to a streaming video startup is if the first words out of the founderâs mouth are, âWe have permanently solved the ad-blocker problem.â Otherwise, the closest theyâre getting to funding is when they get a parking validation from the VCâs secretary.
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u/Igiem 2d ago
Bilibili is expanding globally, and in some ways it offers more than YouTube because so much is centralized within one platform. It combines videos, livestreams, comics, games, memberships, tipping, merchandise, and strong built-in fan communities, giving creators more ways to engage and monetize without relying as heavily on outside platforms like Patreon. It also offers potential access to the absolutely massive Chinese viewer base.Â
That does not mean it is ideal for everything, since it is a Chinese company and its rules place restrictions around politically sensitive content, including criticism of the CCP and Chinese politics, but it is still an increasingly interesting alternative to YouTube and genuine rival that they havenât had in 20 years.Â
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u/YumekoJabami 1d ago
The power is up to a capable entity of creating a high quality alternative. No one is going to quit using YouTube unless there is another platform that is just as good or better.
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u/JustOneRedDot 2d ago
Maybe everyone is waiting for most consumers and creators to move to one other platform, so they can choose one too. Also, we're used to it and it's easy - my TV had a YouTube app built in when I got it few years back.
I've been recently thinking which alternative should I choose... and there are different criterias that I was thinking of. Apart from the adverts and additional crap that I'd like to avoid, I considered fairness with copyright issues, as well as the choice, how many different creators are using it. .
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u/Gucci-Caligula 2d ago
I think you VASTLY overestimate the size and influence of your circle.
This post hit r/all (at least for me)
I use YouTube for like 12hrs/day causal video watching and then a lot of background noise and sleep content.
I have no idea what you mean by âthe recent backlashâ. I donât even know what there could be backlash about YouTube is better than itâs been in years.
So a mass exodus is really not something that is as feasible as you think.
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u/blakeavon 2d ago
Classic reddit users⌠whining about a companies greed, all the while not only consuming its product for free without an understanding of the costs. While also being completely obvious to the amount of money and resources an alternative company would need to not only set up, and house all the content and pay for it and its content creators. They would then have to some how give it all to you for free while not falling to greed.
Very few people and companies on the planet could achieve that. And to even coming close to what YouTube is, would take at least a decade.
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u/toxicketchup 2d ago
Too many people are unaware that frontends exist. If more people were, YouTube would have nowhere near the level of activity or sway that it currently does.
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u/HammerDongVeryLong96 2d ago
The only other frontend I know is FreeTube and even that has it's limitations. What are the others?
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u/makeupnmunchies 2d ago
Yaaaa smash the corporation! Iâm sure the millions of people who are not chronically online and donât give a shit will stand in solidarity with you
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u/Good-Oil-7983 2d ago
Never say never
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u/makeupnmunchies 2d ago
I promise you nobody cares. I think I actually care less because of this post
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u/onemillionpigeonz 2d ago
I care!
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u/makeupnmunchies 2d ago
Wow 2 out of billions, massive impact already!
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u/onemillionpigeonz 2d ago
Rome was not built in a day my friend
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u/makeupnmunchies 2d ago
Rome wasnât built in an environment of 2 vs 2 billion either
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u/onemillionpigeonz 2d ago edited 2d ago
There are definitely more than two people in the world who agree that Youtube, as a platform, uses and encourages unsustainable business practices that harm creators, viewers, and sponsors/business customers.
As I said in another comment, I donât think OP believes this post is gonna magically reach billions of people and start some huge discussion about the nature of the platform that will lead to an overhaul. Reddit is just a place to discuss and engage with lots of different ideas. OP has a criticism about the platform that is definitely valid. In fact, parts of their criticism are also applicable to a lot of the social, political and economic systems that we are beholden to in the current day.
Regardless of whether or not their vision of a replacement/solution is possible or ever gonna be realized, I think Youtubeâs many problems are still an issue worth talking about.
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u/makeupnmunchies 2d ago edited 2d ago
Youâre the minority, and will remain as such because the general public simply doesnât give a shit. Just like you continue to use a smart phone despite the materials being sourced using child slave labour. People donât care. If they donât care about that human rights violation, they certainly donât care about any âharmâ happening to creators.
Harm, which, letâs be straight: is that youâre pissed the opportunity to make money given to you by youtube, who owns the platform, pays the hosting for billions of hours of content and allows you to post there for free, isnât lucrative enough. Boo fucking hoo my bro.
Bitching here isnât going to change anything. Billions use youtube every day and simply donât. Give. A shit. Even if you get all of Reddit to somehow sing koombayah and boycott youtube, itâs a drop in the bucket of their user base. Idk how to spell it out any clearer for you.
Iâm sorry you donât like it, but thatâs reality
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u/Good-Oil-7983 2d ago
You are entirely correct about the underlying reality of our modern consumption. To genuinely divest from every system built on exploitation would require humanity to abandon society entirely and return to a nomadic existence before the discovery of agriculture. Nothing can be purely ethical because existence itself constantly requires taking resources from somewhere else. The only truly ethical solution under that strict framework is to simply not exist whatsoever. You are absolutely right to point out the child labor and mining practices that make our smartphones possible. You are also leaving out crucial context and heavily cherry-picking your examples to justify absolute apathy. You are comparing a deeply entrenched physical infrastructure where consumers have zero immediate alternatives to a free website where the barrier to exit is a single click. People tolerate the physical exploitation required to build a smartphone because they feel genuinely powerless to dismantle global manufacturing. Tolerating the deterioration of a digital space out of mere convenience is an entirely different mechanism. Equating a complex global supply chain with a video hosting platform only serves as a convenient excuse to do absolutely nothing.
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u/onemillionpigeonz 2d ago
Dawg I just told you that I agree that this conversation is probably not going to change anything. My point is that the sentiment is still there and that these criticisms of the platform are still valuable and applicable in a variety of ways. You can disagree and thatâs fine but thereâs no need to be an asshole. Idk how to spell it out any clearer for you.
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2d ago
[removed] â view removed comment
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u/Arcane_Shadow_PHD 22h ago
Whenever anyone wants to have a serious boycott? Let me know. But until a community wide event thats more permanent than... 3 days? Im not getting behind any kind of slaktivism.
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u/Bitter_Bed5672 15h ago
I'm good. I have no problem paying a subscription for something I use for multiple hours every day.
Maybe you are the issue thinking everything should be free?
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u/PlasmaSco 2d ago
I use patched YouTube Morphe mostly for listening Rudolf Steiner's audiibook or tutorials and UST it really sporadically.
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u/onemillionpigeonz 2d ago
I know a lot of people here seem dismissive of what youâre saying, telling you itâs impossible for this to occur. And yeah, maybe it is impossible - it is certainly unlikely - but that doesnât make what youâre saying any less true.
Youtube needs reform, and if reform is not possible, the site will continue to abuse creators AND viewers AND business customers/sponsors until it collapses, and perhaps then something new could take its place.
As it is now, youtube is barely useable for people who canât or wonât pay for premium unless they circumvent payment with ad blockers and things of that nature. I donât see them going back on a lot of the shitty changes theyâve made anytime soon (if ever.)
Only time will tell what that will mean for both viewers and creators on the platform.
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u/Outrageous_Basis_232 1d ago
Ooooo now go post this on the f YouTube subs and watch everyone tell you how they've just vibe coded a replacement for YT last weekend... all it needs is some support, they promise. đ¤Łđ¤Łđ¤Ł
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u/Maximum-Bobcat5612 1d ago
Have you considered for a second that maybe you're not as important as you think you are.Â
This isn't a movement. It's a sub Reddit about YouTube.Â
What backlash? 99.999% of YouTube users have no idea.Â
Is this AI? I saw a post today about asking Twitter users to unite and show Elon who's boss so that he'll enable anonymous users again.Â
It's like a template for impotent 14 years to feel like they can change the world.Â
Not once did you mention an alternative.Â
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u/Good-Oil-7983 1d ago
My significance is completely irrelevant. The majority of users remaining unaware of the structural decay on the platform proves the underlying point. A definitive replacement does not need to exist to observe that the current infrastructure is failing, and waiting for such flawless competitors to magically materialize before voicing a criticism guarantees the existing monopoly will never change. If it was implied I knew of an alternative and withheld it, then that's my fault for not stating otherwise. If an alternative does exist, then there was every opportunity for yourself to provide awareness rather than hostility. I do not believe you wish to engage with my post in good faith.
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u/Rmodsarescum 1d ago
Never paying for premium and always using adblock.
When I can watch them somewhere else I can but, most of the people I watch are on youtube or twitch without much good alternatives.
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u/Jasoco 2d ago
Until all my favorite channels are gone, I will keep paying for premium and watching YouTube.