Does Youtube Cause More Harm or Good? - Frank Hechler

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 Does Youtube Cause More Harm or Good?


As of the past couple of years, youtube has become one of or if not the biggest forms of entertainment on the planet. Many may have heard of huge statistics on the number of hours the average person uses on the site. There are many reasons that youtube is great, such as the huge range of tutorials for things ranging from making origami to building go karts. However, many think that youtube is a waste of time and the majority of content doesn’t help people.

Firstly, what are the benefits of youtube? The creators are just (for the most part) somewhat regular people, or at least can be. Anyone who has an internet connection and a camera can make videos and upload them to youtube. This is great for people who want to show their skills to the world, or even just make some people laugh at a funny moment. There are an incredible amount of people on the platform, both creators and viewers, so you can find basically whatever you want to find. Learning, whether it be educational or not, couldn’t be easier with youtube. For me, I learned many things from youtube such as card magic, some origami, cooking, skateboarding tricks, and more. People can find tutorials on any topic they have any interest in. There are many skills that very few people knew about that became much more known and popular because of youtube. Butterfly knife tricks, speedcubing, card throwing, parkour, etc. There are also tons of purely educational content for helping with school. Instead of hiring a tutor, students can just find a tutorial on youtube on how to solve quadratic functions, for example. Studying for tests can be much easier, since you can find anything you forget on youtube. Even teachers now sometimes use youtube videos for their students.

Now, with all that in mind, what is the dark side of youtube? While there is a lot of great instructional and/or entertaining content on the platform, the majority of viewers use youtube for entertainment purposes. Memes, prank videos, gaming videos, etc are generally the most watched videos on youtube. While there is nothing inherently wrong with them, they are just like any other entertainment in the sense that they are very enjoyable to watch, they can be a huge, huge time waster. Youtube’s algorithm is made specifically to get viewers to click on videos, and stay on the site as long as possible. The algorithm is very good, and keeps people on the site for hours on end. Unlike tv shows that are usually 45 minutes an episode, viewers always feel like they can stop after one 5 minute video, but then end up watching 50 of them. With tv shows, viewers know they have to watch for 45 minutes. 

Another dark aspect of youtube is (at least in my opinion) the political side. While I think the political side of youtube is fine for adults, the majority of youtube watchers are children and teenagers and very impressionable. From my experience at least, once I watched one political video, I would be stormed with tons of others recommended to me, and it would make a perfect echo chamber tailored just for me. Once it saw where I was on the political spectrum, it would never show any content from the other side. However, it did not force me to watch anything, and it was all my decisions, but the algo highly encouraged watching them. While having political opinions is great, forming them as a kid on youtube is very toxic imo. While I don’t like it, I also don’t see any good solution for it. Banning all political content would hurt so many creators financially and silence their voices, banning youtube entirely would also do the same, etc.

From weighing both the positives and negatives, I think youtube does more good than harm. Youtube is a tool. You can waste time on it with dank memes for hours on end, or you can learn new skills, show off your talent or spread positive messages to the world, and even make money off of random people on the internet.


-Frank

Comments

  1. JoshOctober 11, 2021 at 3:14 PM

    I agree with this viewpoint, especially considering the amount of information and the number of skills I have been able to attain thanks to YouTube. Although I think that YouTube is a great tool, as you mentioned, there are a lot of downsides to the platform as a whole. I think that younger viewers may be impacted in a harmful way in many cases; being exposed to political ideals, and just being able to access content not meant for their age can be harmful to their development and viewpoints. Although this may be true, I think that your view of this issue is correct, since without YouTube, there would be lots of other steps to take before accessing information.

    -Josh

    ReplyDelete
  2. LeylaOctober 11, 2021 at 3:41 PM

    Hi Frank,
    Whenever I am presented with this question I never come to a solid conclusion. I agree that, personally, YouTube has done more good than harm, but when I start to think about it's involvement with the rest of the world it's more difficult to come to a definite answer. YouTube can be used to spread acceptance and let others know they are not alone by sharing personal experiences publicly, but it can also be used to negatively to manipulate people on the internet. It really depends on how you use YouTube. I appreciate your blog post because I have discovered many of my passions and maintained hobbies by watching videos. Some people constantly associate YouTube with this evil, brain-controlling, social media platform. We have to be mindful of it's powerful algorithm, but like you said, there is a dark side and a brighter side.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Henry WangOctober 11, 2021 at 3:43 PM

    Hey Frank,

    I also agree with this perspective, as I think Youtube is benefiting more than it is harming. As the internet rapidly develops as humanities greatest tool, enabling one to connect with others in a click of a button, many positive things occur, such as learning websites and entertainment websites, but also bring out a dark side. Like nuclear energy, it was an astounding discovery, allowing a tiny amount of material to provide a huge amount of energy, but it also was turned into a weapon, one that could end humanity all together. Youtube is a great place to learn about anything, from fixing cars to developing websites and it will always be a great website to spark an interest in a new subject. But like many other things, it has many downsides you mentioned, such as young viewers being exposed to inappropriate content, viewers watching an unhealthy amount each day, and the politics discussed on the platform. However, you can never satisfy all, and I still think that Youtube is much more of a tool than a harmful parasite on the internet.

    - Henry

    ReplyDelete
  4. TristenNovember 19, 2021 at 9:18 PM

    I've always wondered about this topic. I've been watching YouTube ever since I was a kid. It's helped me through homework problems, but also procrastination. The instructional side of it is helpful and bright, and while the other side might be interesting, it's distracting and often gets me off topic easily. This question is pretty difficult to answer, so I admire you for taking it on.

    -Tristen Ting

    ReplyDelete

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