If you are a person who used to watch YouTube videos back in the 2014 era, then you can probably relate to this.

Back in those days, people used to share genuinely good content on YouTube. Tutorials, tips, and tricks that actually worked. Most importantly, creators were not trying to hook us like a fish with a clickbait thumbnails.

And real conversations used to happen in the comment section that were actually related to the video itself.

I still remember the days when the person who made the tutorial video would personally reply to my silly doubts in the comments. Sometimes I still wouldn’t understand it properly, and the creator would continue the conversation through email. We used to have actual discussions from there.

Those were the real days when the comment section was actually used for conversations.

Nowadays, people are using the YouTube comment section as a marketing channel. They indirectly promote their products in the comments, and as someone who has been consuming YouTube content for the last 12–14 years, we can sense an advertisement from miles away.

There is also a lot of hate in comment sections these days regarding personal views, religion, sports, people, and many other things. It honestly hurts to see people becoming keyboard warriors and getting into pointless word fights with someone they will probably never meet in their entire life, probably not even in the next 6–7 lives if rebirth exists.

We can also clearly see a massive increase in YouTube bot activity. There are agencies running hundreds of desktops that watch videos like humans, like videos like humans, and comment on videos… BUT NOT LIKE HUMANS.

In my opinion, AI-generated comments all look exactly the same. We can clearly sense them from a hundred miles away.

And another funny thing is, open any famous creator’s YouTube video and look at the comments. You’ll find people commenting things like “1st like,” “3rd comment pls pin me,” or “Day 6969 of asking [creator name] to pin me.” I honestly find it funny, but at the same time, it feels like such a waste of time for the commenter. Then again, if they truly valued their time, they probably wouldn’t comment things like that in the first place.

I don’t think the mistake is completely on the commenters though. A lot of it comes from YouTube’s algorithm itself. The platform boosts videos with the highest engagement rates, and creators naturally try to maximize engagement as quickly as possible so they can show those metrics to brands and secure collaborations.

At the end of the day, everyone here is for money, even me, and even you.

But still, YouTube has definitely lost its charm in the comment section.

Now I have to scroll way down just to find an actual meaningful comment.

Maybe that’s just the future.

Anyway, these are just my thoughts and opinions regarding the YouTube comment section.

Until next time, stay strong and keep learning.

– Rocky