Gross. Same logic as removing dislikes and Netflix changing their rating. They want their plethora of content to be viewed as equal. Good stuff, diamonds in the rough, pure garbage, just consume it all in one autoplay recommended playlist.
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YouTube tests removing view counts and upload dates from videos
- Thread starter Wrexis
- Start date
I think overall removing view counts would probably be a positive for everybody. Yes you make decisions about what to click on partially using view count as a guide, but those decisions aren't necessarily good ones. I think it would lead to a better landscape if people weren't making decisions based on how big a number is. You can still promote videos that people respond well to without advertising the viewcount right underneath.
Getting rid of dates - no. I need to know when a video was uploaded to know if the information is remotely current.
Getting rid of dates - no. I need to know when a video was uploaded to know if the information is remotely current.
I'm sure what they ultimately want their site to be is like TikTok where users just stay there constantly just mindlessly scrolling from one video to the next. You don't need dates and view counts for that.
But seriously, removing dates is an absolute disaster. E.g. I often watch some clips from MSNBC channel and they don't usually have dates anywhere in the video itself or the description. This would make it an absolute nightmare to search for them as you wouldn't be able to know if it's a recent video or something from years ago. Especially with what seems to be a recent tendency of Youtube to suddenly start recommending vides from 15+ years ago. Also stuff like vides with technical tutorials (coding etc.) make no sense to watch if it's something like 5 years old because it will be completely out of date. But what if you don't know before watching the video?
I guess they're doing it because when you don't know it's an old video or one with a low count, you're more likely to "engage" with it. That's probably as far as their thinking goes and they certainly won't care about what their users want, because, well, where are you going to go if you don't like Youtube?
But seriously, removing dates is an absolute disaster. E.g. I often watch some clips from MSNBC channel and they don't usually have dates anywhere in the video itself or the description. This would make it an absolute nightmare to search for them as you wouldn't be able to know if it's a recent video or something from years ago. Especially with what seems to be a recent tendency of Youtube to suddenly start recommending vides from 15+ years ago. Also stuff like vides with technical tutorials (coding etc.) make no sense to watch if it's something like 5 years old because it will be completely out of date. But what if you don't know before watching the video?
I guess they're doing it because when you don't know it's an old video or one with a low count, you're more likely to "engage" with it. That's probably as far as their thinking goes and they certainly won't care about what their users want, because, well, where are you going to go if you don't like Youtube?
The date is vital information in so many situations. Is this video's technical advice out of date? Which one of these trailers is the new one? What day did this news break? At this point, decades of videos have already been made under the assumption that they didn't need to include dates inside the video because we can see them already. We need to know this.
Removing dates is a horrible precedent in so many online storefronts and news pages lately.. and if it comes to youtube it's a disaster there too. News stores are bad enough, no context on when something was published or written is a nightmare and straight up misinformation. I've noticed that Amazon has removed the "Date first available" from many item listings lately, preventing you from making a decision on what products are newer or older. Benefiting the seller over the buyer.
Stop this shit.
Stop this shit.
Imagine you're looking for a character build video for some online game you're playing and it turns out to be a build from like three years ago and is completely irrelevant in the current meta.
Creators will have to put the date in every video title just to counter it.
Creators will have to put the date in every video title just to counter it.
Oh man, I thought they were just going to remove the view count from being seen on the main page(which is bad enough as it is).
But the dates? Oh hell no! Dates are viable to know when they were uploaded exactly so without that it'll make it much harder to tell.
Like why would Youtube do any of this?
How can I tell if a video has hundreds, thousands or millions of views(at first glance)? How would I know which date the video was uploaded on?
Man if Youtube goes through with this then...
But the dates? Oh hell no! Dates are viable to know when they were uploaded exactly so without that it'll make it much harder to tell.
Like why would Youtube do any of this?
How can I tell if a video has hundreds, thousands or millions of views(at first glance)? How would I know which date the video was uploaded on?
Man if Youtube goes through with this then...
????
Why remove the dates? It's actually useful to see when a video released, especially when looking for product reviews and such.
Google doesn't want to make their services useable anymore.
Why remove the dates? It's actually useful to see when a video released, especially when looking for product reviews and such.
Google doesn't want to make their services useable anymore.
Upload dates provide a ton of information. Why the fuck is youtube so shit lately. God I miss the older youtube.
The upload date is actually useful so hopefully they don't change that permanently. Don't care about view count stuff outside of nice to see people you enjoy do well. Though I guess it could have a bit of a knock on effect where it's harder for the plebs to see what topics are trending and being able to adjust accordingly to appease the almighty Algorithm 🙌 so still a net negative change overall.
Yeah there can be a case for removing view counts from the main page and such for smaller creators mainly.
Possibly. If it's like dislikes it may not show in the video itself and only the uploader can see it in Youtube Studio.
Yes, this is one of the main reasons for that.
Honestly I don't hate the idea.
Dates uploaded to me is uninteresting. Viewer count is something I think they could keep.
Honestly tho, both are unnecessary.
Dates uploaded to me is uninteresting. Viewer count is something I think they could keep.
Honestly tho, both are unnecessary.
Yeah I don't see anything suggesting they are removing the info entirely. Just not having it front facing when trying to get people to click. I think that kinda makes sense in terms of helping less viewed and older videos.
What I was thinking as well. Sometimes the dates don't matter and sometimes they really do matter. I don't want to watch a video on outdated builds or tutorials on how to do something in a piece of software from a decade ago when updates have move locations and stuff. Such a stupid idea.
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It would honestly be so harmful to remove the upload date. At least keep year or month/year.
IDC about view counts.
IDC about view counts.
So do we know if they remove them from search or even subscription page let alone on the video itself, or do we only have this image of the front page and are spiraling
I don't want to help older/less viewed videos. I want to be able to see if a video is relevant to me before I click on it.
Yep, I basically use youtube exclusively these days for tutorial and tips for various parts of game dev and stuff dated back around early 4.0 of Unreal Engine is not really useful to me unless I can't find something newer using newer features that would work regardless of the year, I need that date information, up front, before I even begin to click a video so I add the right frame of mind when watching it, dateless videos are literally useless to me.
