How come I can only find the videos I want on YouTube thought recommendations?

[Tony Ramirez]

Really, when I try to search for specific types of videos I get so frustrated. I been trying to find videos of women hanging out with each other but all I get are men hanging out, crossdressing videos, rap videos, mind craft videos, stupid Friends TV show clips and Darh Marh videos. His was so annoying that I had to install a extension to block them.

Then yesterday I was searching for videos in Russian with a similar term an a related video showed up. I ended up finding two channels of what I was looking for. I could not for the life of me find them in the search.

Even with Asmr and yoga videos, when I search I don't find great ones but the ones that are recommended end up being better and they don't even show up when I actually searched for that specific type of ASMR video in the past, instead I just get the frustrated results from before.

 

[Misery]

This is just a theory, but my personal guess is that Youtube as a company really doesnt want you using the search. The reason is because it's so, SO much easier to promote things to you... particularly the "Shorts"... if they can just keep you on the front page. And that's the content they want you to engage with (because it benefits them, and the Shorts in particular directly compete with Tiktok, their primary opposition).

I suspect this is also why the search page is formatted the way it is. Any other part of Youtube, the page is filled with STUFF. But when searching, it's an awkward straight line down the middle, and that's it. It doesnt need to be that way, they could fill the screen with results in the same format as the front page. But they dont.

As it is, I agree, the actual search function is comically useless much of the time. I've found that the real way to get what I want is to curate the heck out of everything, so the stupid front page only shows me things I want to begin with, and nothing else gets in, simply because I've bent the algorithm into the shape I want.

Of course, getting it to that point was the hard part.

 

[Tony Ramirez]

That's so true. I found so many new channels and recommendations just by staying on the home page and by the recommendations while watching the video not by using the actual search which just frustrates me.

 

[Jumpinbare]

is comically useless much of the time. I've found that the real way to get what I want is to curate the heck out of everything, so the stupid front page only shows me things I want to begin with, and nothing else gets in, simply because I've bent the algorithm into the shape I want.

Could you explain curating and bending the algorithm?

I've noticed even GOOGLE, which is supposed to be the model example of what a search engine is, is seriously broken. Using quoted text and - and + signs doesn't work like it used to.

 

[Misery]

Could you explain curating and bending the algorithm?

The process is actually pretty simple, but it needs to be done constantly and rigorously.

When you're either on the front page, or when you're in a video view and looking at the recommendations on the right side, any video will have that 3-dots symbol in the bottom right that shows up when you hover over it. Click that, and you've got two options: "Not interested" and "dont recommend channel".

They sound kinda the same, but they arent, and if you want to REALLY curate you gotta know the difference. Not interested sorta flags the SUBJECT of the video. Like, I dont like political stuff in my feed, for instance. I prefer that Youtube stick to my hobbies and the various spooky things I watch all the time. So, when I see videos of some politician doing anything at all, boom, I click that option. This says "I dont like this subject" without saying "I dont like this channel". Important because a channel that puts out a specific video you really dont like, could still later prove to be a good channel, if the video you didnt like was a rarity from them (particularly when it comes to sponsored videos, creators absolutely will put out videos that even they hate in order to follow the contracts... gotta pay the bills after all).

"Dont recommend channel" does the very same thing, but it also entirely prevents the channel in question from showing up again. Do this if you are 100% aware that nothing in there is ever going to be good. I personally do this with channels that are just news stations, as I simply dont watch the news.

With those together, things such as news or election coverage or anything like that *never* show up in my recommended video lists at this point.

On the flip side, to get the algorithm to spot that you DO like something, do a couple of things:

1. Watch the video all the way through. Start to finish.
2. Give it a like. This isnt JUST to boost the content creator, it's also flagging the video as "hey, I like this video", which to the algorithm translates to "hey, I like this subject and/or this creator".
3. Watch videos about that subject more frequently as opposed to other things. Playing favorites really does matter here.
4. Put things on your favorites list, or in any playlist that you create.

The best part about all of this is that the algorithm wont be ultra strict about what it gives you, but it will still GENERALLY align to what you want. Like, I watch a lot of spooky stuff, particularly analog/digital horror, and so it will recommend me that stuff, but it will also at times recommend me things that are ADJACENT to those topics. So, things that arent exactly those, but that have a lot of elements in common with them, allowing for more exploration. This does mean it will misstep every now and then though.

There's a lot more to it than that, the algorithm is a horribly complex beast, but this is all based on my own experience with it.

I've noticed even GOOGLE, which is supposed to be the model example of what a search engine is, is seriously broken. Using quoted text and - and + signs doesn't work like it used to.

Honestly, Google is no longer the best way to search.

We're in the age of AI now. I know this might ruffle some feathers here, but I actually strictly use two things to find stuff: Bing (also called Copilot now), and ChatGPT itself, directly from OpenAI's page. Not only do I pretty much always find whatever it is I'm after (with ONE search and no scrolling), but it also means that I can get info *without having to load the page*. Like, I play a lot of Minecraft, and I use the game's wiki site a lot. But searching through wikis is such a freaking pain, I hate doing it. But I can simply ask Bing a very direct question about the game, and it will not only find the wiki site (or whatever) that the info is on, it will then simply TELL ME the very specific info I was after. It will also provide a link to wherever it got the info, if you want to doublecheck or read more. Or, just ask followup questions. I actually personally use the Edge browser, which means that the sidebar just contains the Bing AI so I dont even have to load a new page to ask stuff.

ChatGPT does not give links (yet) but is better for long-form answers (as Bing is more limited in answer length).

I honestly never liked Google. Traditional search engines always just irritated me to no end. Always having to use screwball terms and the + and - things and aaaaaaaagh.

No more of that nonsense for me though. Finally. It's so much better and more time efficient this way.


Sorry, that was long.

 

[Jumpinbare]

Back in  my day (I really like saying that), I made heavy use of quotes (had to match exactly) and - to eliminate hits with specific term, and + to require the specific term. And I actually got pertinent results. Technology shouldn't go backwards.

 

[Misery]

Back in  my day (I really like saying that), I made heavy use of quotes (had to match exactly) and - to eliminate hits with specific term, and + to require the specific term. And I actually got pertinent results. Technology shouldn't go backwards.

I dont think technology went backwards... in my experience it took a monstrous leap forwards. But Google is stuck in a previous era (at least, for now. I guarantee you, this WILL change, that search engine wont remain what it is for much longer). Google, specifically, DID go backwards.

Google got lazy AND greedy, since they believed themselves to be invincible. No need to improve... because everyone already used it... and no reason to fix stuff. Heck, let it degrade, because nobody will catch up to them anyway, they thought. With that confidence they also fill up the results with ads. Look carefully when you search on there. You might be surprised at just how many of those results were "curated", not for you, but for the company. It does a decent job of trying to hide this fact from you. Often, with Google as it is currently, the REAL results will require either a bunch of scrolling, or at least one page switch. And even then, the real results are often not what you wanted.

Also this all makes me think of this:

 

[Jumpinbare]

I actually usually use duckduckgo, but it's accuracy isn't better

 

[kriss72]

I actually usually use duckduckgo, but it's accuracy isn't better

Sometimes I wonder if duckduckgo is just a layer to make you anonymous to google or if they actually have their own search engine that goes through the Internet? (I honestly don't know)

 

[Jumpinbare]

Sometimes I wonder if duckduckgo is just a layer to make you anonymous to google or if they actually have their own search engine that goes through the Internet? (I honestly don't know)

Me too neither.

On a whim, I went to yahoo a few minutes ago. I used to use them before google got big. I typed in a sample search with a +"quoted term" with +, a - single word and a single word + term. At least the first page listing matched my conditions! I had read somewhere that yahoo search is older than google. Apparently, they haven't abandoned basic search rules. I'll try them a while and see

 

[kriss72]

Me too neither.

On a whim, I went to yahoo a few minutes ago. I used to use them before google got big. I typed in a sample search with a +"quoted term" with +, a - single word and a single word + term. At least the first page listing matched my conditions! I had read somewhere that yahoo search is older than google. Apparently, they haven't abandoned basic search rules. I'll try them a while and see

I remember the time when Yahoo's interface wasn't primarily a search engine, but actually had like categories of stuff you could click through to get to what you wanted with a description of the content of each page - about the same time as you could buy a CD collection with "the content of the Internet".

 

[saturnv]

Sometimes I wonder if duckduckgo is just a layer to make you anonymous to google or if they actually have their own search engine that goes through the Internet? (I honestly don't know)

Last I checked, duckduckgo gets their results from bing.

I share the frustration with google's decline to uselessness as a search engine. I think part of the problem is that there is not a lot of good pages left out there to find. It is a sea of spam. Then there is the potentially useful information that has been captured in silos by companies like Facebook and Discord that isn't on the public internet to be found by search engines.

Marginalia is a search engine that tries to find non-commercial web pages. For example, the pages from the olden days in which someone would be really interested in a topic and make a page for it as a hobby. It is fun to use.

I use Kagi at work. I resisted the idea of paying for a search engine for a long time. I don't like the privacy implications of linking all my searches to my identity, which is why I only use it at work. It is worth it for that though. It has features like quotes, boolean operations, and excluding certain sites from the results.

 

[Jumpinbare]

Thanks! Marginalia is exactly what I was looking for. Honors the " + and - as well as extra filters!

 

[Judge]

Try a video competitor, like: Dailymotion.

 

[Hypnalis]

Google was changed intentionally. and by design.
Where it is now isn't an unintended side-effect of monetization. It's part of the monetization process.

I don't think the name "search engine" has any description value for Google these days.
They use a combination of the "search" terms you provide plus a large database of your previous behavior to select and "serve" you pages that advertisers have paid for.

It will be interesting to see if subscription AI (e.g. ChatGPT) will actually give us back the ability to search.
It could, but they'd make even more money charging for access and serving up paid-for pages.

 

[Mary Terry]

The process is actually pretty simple, but it needs to be done constantly and rigorously.

When you're either on the front page, or when you're in a video view and looking at the recommendations on the right side, any video will have that 3-dots symbol in the bottom right that shows up when you hover over it. Click that, and you've got two options: "Not interested" and "dont recommend channel".

They sound kinda the same, but they arent, and if you want to REALLY curate you gotta know the difference. Not interested sorta flags the SUBJECT of the video. Like, I dont like political stuff in my feed, for instance. I prefer that Youtube stick to my hobbies and the various spooky things I watch all the time. So, when I see videos of some politician doing anything at all, boom, I click that option. This says "I dont like this subject" without saying "I dont like this channel". Important because a channel that puts out a specific video you really dont like, could still later prove to be a good channel, if the video you didnt like was a rarity from them (particularly when it comes to sponsored videos, creators absolutely will put out videos that even they hate in order to follow the contracts... gotta pay the bills after all).

"Dont recommend channel" does the very same thing, but it also entirely prevents the channel in question from showing up again. Do this if you are 100% aware that nothing in there is ever going to be good. I personally do this with channels that are just news stations, as I simply dont watch the news.

With those together, things such as news or election coverage or anything like that *never* show up in my recommended video lists at this point.

On the flip side, to get the algorithm to spot that you DO like something, do a couple of things:

1. Watch the video all the way through. Start to finish.
2. Give it a like. This isnt JUST to boost the content creator, it's also flagging the video as "hey, I like this video", which to the algorithm translates to "hey, I like this subject and/or this creator".
3. Watch videos about that subject more frequently as opposed to other things. Playing favorites really does matter here.
4. Put things on your favorites list, or in any playlist that you create.

The best part about all of this is that the algorithm wont be ultra strict about what it gives you, but it will still GENERALLY align to what you want. Like, I watch a lot of spooky stuff, particularly analog/digital horror, and so it will recommend me that stuff, but it will also at times recommend me things that are ADJACENT to those topics. So, things that arent exactly those, but that have a lot of elements in common with them, allowing for more exploration. This does mean it will misstep every now and then though.

There's a lot more to it than that, the algorithm is a horribly complex beast, but this is all based on my own experience with it.



Honestly, Google is no longer the best way to search.

We're in the age of AI now. I know this might ruffle some feathers here, but I actually strictly use two things to find stuff: Bing (also called Copilot now), and ChatGPT itself, directly from OpenAI's page. Not only do I pretty much always find whatever it is I'm after (with ONE search and no scrolling), but it also means that I can get info *without having to load the page*. Like, I play a lot of Minecraft, and I use the game's wiki site a lot. But searching through wikis is such a freaking pain, I hate doing it. But I can simply ask Bing a very direct question about the game, and it will not only find the wiki site (or whatever) that the info is on, it will then simply TELL ME the very specific info I was after. It will also provide a link to wherever it got the info, if you want to doublecheck or read more. Or, just ask followup questions. I actually personally use the Edge browser, which means that the sidebar just contains the Bing AI so I dont even have to load a new page to ask stuff.

ChatGPT does not give links (yet) but is better for long-form answers (as Bing is more limited in answer length).

I honestly never liked Google. Traditional search engines always just irritated me to no end. Always having to use screwball terms and the + and - things and aaaaaaaagh.

No more of that nonsense for me though. Finally. It's so much better and more time efficient this way.


Sorry, that was long.

I use Bing, too. I have always hated Google.

 

[Au Naturel]

1. Watch the video all the way through. Start to finish.
2. Give it a like. This isnt JUST to boost the content creator, it's also flagging the video as "hey, I like this video", which to the algorithm translates to "hey, I like this subject and/or this creator".
3. Watch videos about that subject more frequently as opposed to other things. Playing favorites really does matter here.
4. Put things on your favorites list, or in any playlist that you create

Absolutely! This works well. Cow and horse hoof-trimming videos inundate my feed because of it.

I find it works even after just a couple of likes. Subscribing to the channel also amps up the algorithm and guarantees that you'll be notified the next time that channel puts something out. A channel that put out a video on a particular subject will probably put out more.

I wish I could select what material I prefer to watch from a list of categories or keywords and not be a slave to their AI.

Remember, there are some topics, like nudism, that simply don't have much YouTube content. The channels and videos that get the YouTube "age restriction" label or have been demonetized for whatever reason will not show up in their suggestions. You have to hunt them down.