Technology

Google is making users/consumers not want to use/consume google things by making those things more difficult, more invasive, less user friendly to use/consume.

That's it. That's all.

If I just want to watch a clip that I could before but now I have to sign in because it thinks I'm a not, NO

If it wants me to watch ads for things I'll never buy and actually forces me to, NO.

If it kills the front ends I prefer to use, or kills the ability to watch via proxy, for my privacy and/or security. NO.

If it feeds me Nazi shit without clicking a single link on a new install on a new browser with no profile on a new IP, fucking NO.

Good.

I completely stopped watching him after the GPU fiasco. I always thought he might be super slimy, but I think I can reasonably say that he is.

Reasons I see:

a) the generation that grew up watching LTT is now at age where they don't watch as much YT as they did before b) increasing amount of things happen which put viewers off c) consumer technology peaked and is now "boring" d) new generations don't have as much interest in technology altogether

Let's explain:

a + c) people watching LTT years ago were living in an exiting tech era where it boomed and you had mayor leaps in tech basically on a yearly basis. Moving from floppy disks to CD's to USB sticks. CRT to LCD displays. 16-bit to 32-bit color. Solitare and Minesweeper to Call of Duty 4 and Need for Speed. Symbian and Blackberry to Android and iOS. Tons of manufacturers, tons of competition, tons of new and exctiting stuff.

Let's observe the state today: iPhone looks the same for the past half decade. Android is basically just Google and Samsung. Storage is now all in cloud. New games are recycled and upscaled old games. Every new generation of hardware is same thing just 10% better/faster. New OS releases are just refinements without new features. Most changes are done just for the sake of change. Existing hardware can basically be enough for 5+ years. What is LTT realistically supposed to talk about that is interesting? There is simply no more interesting tech.

This ties in into d) - tech peaked, new generations "just use it as it is", there is no need to tinker with it, prebuilt PC's are more than fine for years to come. Since AI the IT job landscape seems to be in decline, both in demand and in pay. People do other stuff now that is more lucrative.

LTT is dependent on stuff happening so that they can make videos about it. But, stuff kinda just isn't happening. Or the stuff that happens is just not noteworthy news anymore.

The problem is those channels are very similar. I get tired of hearing the same thing again and again. There is really no need for weekly news

Broadly maybe the viewers are just getting sick of all of the shilling for cheap shit that goes on with the ever increasing sponsor segments so many channels have these days. Arguments will be had about just how needed all of those marketing dollars are for the creator to keep doing their thing vs them getting used to a lot of money and wanting even more of it. But the end result is a worse viewing experience for the consumer. I know there are a lot of channels that make good content that I've stopped watching because they spend a quarter of the video shilling junk. Sure sponserblock would get rid of those sections, but it won't send a message like unsubscribing and stopping watching them completely will.

Also maybe this is a larger Youtube usage hit due to their aggressive anti-adblock nonsense and uptick in ads and shitty UI design.

For Linus specifically, he has the above issues as well as having been very publicly outed as a slimy deuce. What his channels put out is not unique enough these days to justify dealing with the shilling and his companies bad behavior.

I can't talk about the others but LTT went form a tech channel to a luxury products channel. I'd blame some of their loss on that and the controversies.

LTT had multiple pretty bad scandals, didn't they? I recently needed to find some technical information and other places had better information. LTT seems to be more of a pop culture tech channel? I don't even really know how to describe what I mean. It's like the reviews are more like fluff pieces I guess? They aren't super duper technical. But I also don't watch them much so maybe I missed something.

Yeah, because Linus is kinda shit more and more. Hes wholly turned me off from his content over the years because of how he acts, what he says, etc. And you can 'trust me bro' on that.

I really like and appreciate people like Steve. I like what he's doing and how he's doing things. He hasn't become a greedy corpo and hes just a very intelligent and caring person who believes in standing up for what's right; Even if that means calling out a friend in the industry.

I feel like Linus is out of touch with reality. He's not at all down to earth anymore.

Fuck Linus.

So many possible reason.

Linus has a history of scummy behavior which turns people off.

Everything gets boring eventually. Especially things that are supposed to be funny.

Google ads are extra obnoxious making the entire platform more annoying to use and most of us will never pay for youtube. Those ads are not even selling products I would be interested in. Investment scams, car accident claim ads, AI voiced robot panda. It just annoying noise.

Nothing lasts forever.

I've noticed this in many of the channels I subscribe to, 5 years ago they had something like 1m views on some videos regularly and now only 300k (or similar decline), all of them. Some of them even made videos about it. My guess, and theirs, is YouTube changed the algorithm and also the introduction of shorts.

I'm watching less 'tube in general because youtube is obnoxious as fuck. They devote so many resources to getting you to watch ads, it actually causes the whole experience to suffer even with an adblock.

My theory is that we have a limited number of hours a day to view content. We also have a growing number of channels and content in general. Algorithms include new content we kight enjoy, and for every new channel we get hooked on, one of the older ones drops off.

Tv shows rarely (ever?) Last forever. Why should channels?

I came here to see if it was the early signs of the demise of YouTube. I secretly want all these content producers to move to a privacy-respecting platform, especially those who produce tech or privacy related content.

Now, for why I don't watch videos anymore, the medium isn't as easily consumed by me. I prefer text. At home, it's noisy and I get interrupted every 90 seconds. I lose interest quickly and fast forwarding isn't as easy as scanning text for a topic shift. My mind wanders on some topics, internally exploring that topic deeper. With text, i can just stop reading. With video, i need to realize that I'm processing a thought and hit pause, then rewind a bit. I get interrupted a lot. On the bus, I need to remember headphones and I hate when people shoulder surf. That's harder to do with text. Give me a plain text RSS feed that I can read anytime.

Lol 90% of comments taking the opportunity to hate on LTT and missing the point of the post. Views are dropping for multiple channels.

Also the LTT hate is mostly "He's so rich and out of touch". LTT is the mass produced TV show for tech YouTube. It's meant to be entertaining and easy to watch for the masses. I like watching most of their videos. Gamers Nexus has its place too but it's a different kind of nerd whose a lil more cynical and obsessed with specs, a lot more niche and it shows in the views.

To each their own.

Some pretty serious things going on in the world today that need our support and therefore attention. I consume less entertainment as a byproduct.

Viewer bot farms is a thing. Is that a declining business now? And the results starting to show now?

the channel has lost its charm. its just puking out videos, but there is no content. no real hardware tests. only drama and clickbait crap. he has lost the techsavvy part of the viewers on his tech channel with pushing garbage into everyones face.

Eh. I lost any interest I had with Linus after the whole Gamers' Nexus thing, and I'm definitely staying away after hearing what Louis Rossman had to say about the guy.