YouTube shame pop-up

Today when I visited YouTube I faced an empty homepage, with a pop-up stating "Your watch history is off".

I wasn't the only one who noticed. But to what end? I guess in an attempt to shame me into turning it back on?

I turned off YouTube's watch history feature off some time ago. Since doing that the homepage has been a mixed bag of videos ranging from the same thing I just watched (but from different people) to just random stuff.

But that was fine. I normally go straight to my subscription page and watch from that. When I did end up on there it was usually via reflective click on the logo.

But why take this approach has me scratching my head.

The watch history feature is directly tied to feeding the algorithm and providing "relevant" video recommendations. I'm sure it also feeds into the profile they build up on you as a user. That's why I turned it off—And you have too dive in to turn it off. I doubt anyone has done this by accident.

So for users like me this is, dare I say, an improvement. Removed is the temptation of being drawn into mindlessly clicking through. Exactly what we wanted.

I wonder how soon the usual homepage will be restored? Is the next step to blank out my subscriptions?