Divorcing YouTube

Why am I walking away?

Last Monday I cut the cord, severed the link: I stopped watching YouTube.

No scaling back, no setting a timer to allot a certain number of viewing minutes each day. I simply stopped. Cold turkey. No more.

From this time forward, YouTube and I are divorced.

This is Your Brain On Dopamine

Hello, my name is Richard, and I am a YouTube addict.

I never thought I would write those words. As a man with a bushy gray beard, I believed myself invulnerable to the lure of electronic addiction. My experience with computing technology goes back to the days of Arpanet, a full decade before the birth of the internet. I’ve watched invasive technology creep into our lives; I’ve seen my students and children surrender their lives and minds to social media companies; I’ve wept to see right hands clenching that addictive “eye of Sauron,” the small “essential” phone that delivers dopamine hits as it reads your minds and learns to control your behaviors.

I dodged the bullets of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp. I pop up like a harbor seal to post occasional content on Twitter, but — and I would appreciate it if you didn’t tell my handful of followers — I rarely read what others post.

I believed myself invulnerable to the lure of social media. YouTube destroyed that illusion.

Video Sharing vs. Social Media

Social media is twenty-first century tobacco. Scientists warn of its dangerously addictive qualities, concerned citizens advocate for legislation to curb its many abuses, company executives testify before congress about the harmless nature of their product. I am certain that Google — YouTube’s owner — would like us to believe that the platform is something qualitatively different than a mind-rotting, data-collecting, behavior-controlling social media company: YouTube is simply a harmless space where people can gather to share and watch videos.

Nevertheless, we would do well to remember that the platform employs technology to maximize the amount of time it can carve out of our days. Google wants your eyes locked to your screen, watching videos, and (most importantly) the advertisements that it bakes into and around those videos. Each minute of viewer time deposits a fraction of a cent in Google’s bank account. According to Wikipedia, YouTube viewers watch more than a billion hours of video each day on the platform.

That’s a lot of advertising revenue.

Google engineers respond to this economic incentive, spending their days refining the algorithms that learn who we are, determine our interests, and present content that we will find hard to resist. Google wants happy users, engaged users, users who would rather spend their days watching cool videos than just about anything else.

YouTube is crack cocaine for the brain.

Mindfulness vs Mindlessness

None of these claims are controversial; any doubts about the goals of social media companies and the technology they employ to pursue their pernicious aims, have long been dispelled. We recognize the addictive nature of social media, and we know that social media companies will do whatever it takes to monopolize our attention. If you happen to be one of the few who have no idea what I am talking about, watch Netflix’s 2020 documentary, The Social Dilemma. Unfortunately, despite knowing that we are all rats in the social media maze, most people refuse to quit chasing the cheese.

My purpose here is not to tell you to abandon social media; my aim is more personal: I want to explain why I am leaving

In preparing to write this article, I opened my Google account to see if it would tell me how much time I spent on YouTube before the divorce. Naturally, as I sought this information, Google recommended that I watch a couple of YouTube videos that would explain how to obtain these statistics. I resisted the temptation and simply roamed around my Google account page for a while. It is supposed to be possible to find watch time statistics for mobile phones, but I was unable to find these numbers for my laptop — my preferred method of accessing the internet.

I wasn’t surprised. I doubt if Google really wants users to know how much time they spend hooked up to YouTube on a daily basis. Fortunately (?!?) Google maintains my video viewing history, and with some simple addition, I uncovered some distressing statistics.

I spent 125, 238, and 74 minutes watching YouTube videos on the last three days of my addiction. On average, I visited the site and watched videos four times a day. Based on these numbers, I imagine that I spend nearly three hours each day watching YouTube videos. It never seems that long, because I tend to watch three or four videos, go away for a few hours, and then return to watch a few more. I keep circling back throughout the day, hoping that YouTube has fresh new content for me. I keep returning, like an addict, for another dopamine hit.

And each time I return, the YouTube algorithm gives me enough to bring me back.

I won’t bore you with a description of the videos that captured my attention. In the good old days — before unscripted reality television gutted the enterprise — we used to rail against the vapid mindsuck of network television. Say what you like about the evils of Hollywood, but you must admit that the shows we watched were created by professionals. Television studios employed professional writers, directors, camera operators, and actors to deliver a reasonably polished product. Rare is the YouTube video that offers real production value.

Rarer still is the video that has anything important or valuable to say.

On a social media platform content — fresh content — is king. If you are a YouTube creator and you aren’t posting new videos several times a week, then you are fading. The algorithm demands new material, and as long as you can provide that content, then the YouTube fairy will sprinkle magic dust on your account. Say little, but say it often. Video-making devoid of the thought process.

You Are Who You Spend Time With

It is axiomatic in the self-help community that aspirational individuals surround themselves with highly-motivated friends. You are, the idea suggests, the average of your five best friends. If your friends are unmotivated, uninspired slackers, you will have a difficult time marshaling the energy to achieve your goals. On the other hand, if you are surrounded by passionate people who are striving pursuing difficult objectives, you will be inspired and motivated by their company. You will get a boost toward whatever excites you.

Assuming this idea is true, what does it mean that I choose to spend as many as four hours each day in the company of the mediocre? I use to pride myself on my reading great literature, philosophy, history — authors who represent the finest thinkers of the ages. Now I spend fifteen minutes watching Graham Stephan reacting to another YouTube video or (one of the worst of the genre) someone filming themselves as they do nothing of interest for a day — the ubiquitous “vlog.”

I might justify the hours I spent on YouTube as a hunt for quality — I was looking for the good stuff. Unfortunately, as a troll through my history suggests, I rarely found it. Most — not all — YouTube videos are dross. I watched too much rubbish because the platform lulls you into a state of mindlessness, encouraging you to keep clicking and watching as the light runs out of life. My time would have been better spent with Cicero, Dostoevsky, or Chaim Potok.

I want to think big thoughts. I am interested in the world and the way we humans navigate our surroundings. Literature, written by great thinkers, inspires and guides me. Graham’s quest to find Jack a date…not so much.

Farewell…

Am I done with YouTube forever? I doubt it. There may come a time when I will require information from the platform. Perhaps I will need to refresh my memory about how to change the headlight bulb on my Mazda 5 (one of the most devilishly complicated and unnecessarily convoluted repair tasks in the automotive world). YouTube has the answer and I will take a look before I try it myself. Perhaps I might want information about a camera lens I am considering purchasing. I may be back to study some reviews.

I intend to lock YouTube into a box — for me it will serve as a source of information rather than entertainment. In short, I plan to use — rather than be used by — YouTube. No more mindless, hour-devouring surfing, no more checking in with my favorite YouTubers. We’re done.

I may see my old partner at a friend’s party, or haunting the Google search results, but I don’t intend to be lured back.

It’s a divorce.

When not condemning pernicious technologies, Richard Goodrich writes about history and culture. Keep up with his work by subscribing to his monthly newsletter, What’s New in Old News.

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