Why I “Disklike” YouTube’s Thumbs Down

Any given channel on YouTube can generate a level of success based on two things: creating good content, and adjusting to YouTube’s ever tweaking algorithms.  This means that content producers that put out consistently high quality content that appeal to a wide audience technically should be able to have successful, growing channels.

Even channels such as John Sudano, who covers songs exclusively with Smash Mouth lyrics, or HowToBasic, who smashes eggs and fists chickens, share in this success.  Some may not say that these channels are a measure of good quality.  Some may say that anyone could do these same things to garner views.  The fact is, they were to first to cash on in this specific style of video that can entertain an audience in a very specific way, which is a feat within in itself– especially in this day in age where creating original premises for videos is a challenge.  These channels also retain their audiences by staying fresh by means of keeping up with popular trends, as well as putting out videos at a consistent rate.  I won’t say luck doesn’t have anything to do with their success, but it’s clear these channels are also very self-aware.

If you know anything about how YouTube’s algorithms work, you’re probably aware of the power the like/dislike buttons hold.  Generally, the more likes a video gets, the more it will be put into recommendations, and how far up it will rank on search results of appropriate tags.  Meanwhile, the more dislikes a video has, the more it will be hidden from people searching for content like it.

The problem with the dislike button is in the name.  When you hover over the button, it reads “I dislike this.”  I find this inappropriate, as it gives the impression that viewers can have almost free reign to allow their biases and personal preferences to shove certain content out of other viewer’s eyes, regardless of the content of the video.  I personally hit the dislike button on very few videos.  I don’t mean this to sound self-righteous.  I just simply don’t continue watching videos that don’t interest me.  I feel that just because something doesn’t appeal to me, it doesn’t mean that it’s bad content.

There are plenty of channels out there that deliver high quality content that don’t fit my interests.  They deserve to be seen.  There is also an equal number, if not more, content creators putting out simply bad content:  Videos that don’t deliver on the premise that their titles, descriptions, or thumbnails describe– i.e. clickbait.  Videos where the creator obviously put in less effort and knowingly produced something of less than appropriate quality.  Videos that are just there to garner views– filler.

Personally, I don’t have the best, sharpest, most expensive camera for my filming, but I definitely try to make up for it in my editing and production.  I don’t claim to know everything about this whole thing, with my six subscribers and all, but I know how it feels to get unwarranted dislikes on something you’ve tried very hard to make well.

Viewers can get off so easy on just disliking a video and moving on.  The content creators, however, suffer, especially when it is essentially baseless criticism.  In my opinion, a dislike should demand some sort of written reasoning for offering it up, and not just a “this video sux.”  It would be a feat difficult to moderate and maintain, but this wouldn’t be the first time YouTube has wanted to pioneer something ridiculous along these lines.

Let me take this time to remind some people that being offended isn’t an immediate pass for them to dislike something either.  While YouTube does have community guidelines regarding things like hate speech and the like, it shouldn’t cater to people who simply like to hide away from issues they don’t like:Sensative Subjects

Heck, I don’t like mushrooms, but I don’t go around flagging cooking videos that happen to toss in some shiitake.

Game Show

The money came out of the tills and into the bag; the bag into his hands.  He knew there was more, but there wasn’t enough time to get it.  The poor girl behind the counter looked scared enough.  She must be new here.  What poor luck for her.  At least she knew what to do in this situation.  Press the panic button, give them what they want.

The traffic outside would at least slow down the police from getting there.  That was also part two of him and his partner’s plan.  Out of the bank doors they went, then around the corner into the alleyway.  They had already seen that the cameras were easy to avoid. Off with the masks, and out to the opposite side of the block.

There was no getaway car.  It would be too easy to track, license plate and all.  There were plenty of cabs in the city that would serve them the same purpose.  Standing on the side of the street to hail one, they would be indistinguishable from every other business-casual office worker that day, heading back from lunch.

One showed up.  They slid into the back seat, one by one.  Tell them where you need to go, and shut the door without another glance outside.  The vacancy light goes off, and they would be home free behind their tinted glass windows.

The bright lights come on, followed by the extravagant music.  A video camera points at them from the front seat, and the driver, gleaming smile and all, looks back at them.

What the fuck is this?

“Welcome to the Money-Mobile, where we ask you stupid questions for the chance to win our chump change on the way to your destination!”

No, we just need to go.

“Sorry fellas, if you guys don’t want to appear on the show, we have to let you out.  We’ll comp you a ride with another taxi, but you will have to wait for it to come.”

No, no.  We need to go now.

“Well let’s get this started then!  You two fellas look like you’ve had a hard enough day.  Let’s make it a little better with a chance to win some money.  But before that, here’s some messages from our sponsors!  –Alright guys, we need you to sign these waivers and release documents so we can put you on TV.  You’re all cool with that, right?–”

 

 

 

Mechanical Cacophony

In a world where people turned to robots to carry out battles, it wasn’t long before the AI within the robots developed feelings themselves.

It started out in a fairly humble manner.  Well, as humble as two hunks of metal tearing into each other would be.  Originally, the robots were controlled by humans.  When makers started to develop partial AI control for their bots, they started seeing improvements in the overall precision they could carry out.  The next obvious step would be to allow artificial intelligence to fully take control of these machines.

Those who could develop the technology first were ahead of the game.  However, others caught up fast.  Necessity is the mother of invention after all.  Some would say survival is something necessary.  Eventually, fights evolved into contests based on how well programmed one’s AI was.

We taught robots to fight.  We taught them to hate, to desire destruction and violence. The more vicious, the more likely it would not hold back against other machines. Somewhere in the mess of it all, it seemed as if the AIs also developed feelings.  Not literal happy-sad feelings like that, but rather the ability to sense pain.  Nobody knew how it happened, as a robot has no central nervous system, and barely what you could call a brain. Nevertheless, when a bot took damage, it would react as if it had been physically hurt.

Before that time, they had no way of communicating verbally.  The introduction of speakers into the bots lead to a predictable outcome: screaming.  Metallic screams of agony each time some saw blade or hammered strike made contact with their shell. No words of any sort could be coaxed out, either.  It was if they were inconsolable.

When the artificial howls of misery finally ceased, we considered all of our options.  The final consensus was that it would be a good idea to retire out bots, and just return to fighting the ways we had always done it, allowing real people to hurt each other.  Robot screams are just too weird after all.

The House by the Lake

Before you read this excerpt, here’s a quick announcement.  The project this comes from is my Camp NaNoWriMo projected called “The Tallboy,” a biographical fiction based loosely on one of my family members.  I am including other writing projects I’m currently working on into the word count goal because I’m not sure I can reach it on this story alone, and because I can’t say no to the ideas in my head.  For this same reason, I’ve also started a second blog featuring various works of manga.  Check it out!

I grew up in a little house by a lake.  I would probably venture to say that many houses in the area were by a lake.  Minnesota is known as the land of a thousand lakes after all.  So, no matter where you built, you were guaranteed to be not far from a lake, be it big or small.

I think saying it was a little house would be a bit of a misnomer as well.  It probably felt small to me because by the time I arrived, it was pretty much packed full.  When I was born, I gained the title ‘baby’ of the family, and ended up holding on to it because I ended up being the last child that my parents would pop out.  By the time my first memories started forming, my two older brothers and two older sisters were already ‘big kids’ as you might say.  So, there we all were, in that little house by a lake.

My father, Lawrence, was a working man.  As a kid, that meant to me that he was always leaving the house going to work.  He managed a movie theater there in the little town where we lived.  Until a certain age though, I never saw it.  My mother, Marinda, was always at home without a doubt, taking care of my siblings and I.  However, she never had enough time to devote to each of us, especially when it was just here trying to run around after all five of us.

My two brothers, Randy and Perry, were the trouble makers. I can remember my mother running around after them the most, trying to keep them from hurting themselves or others.  My two sisters, Sarah and Ilene, were the oldest siblings.  I remember them being the ones who often were taking care of me; preparing meals, getting me dressed.  They probably ended up changing my diapers a few times too.

By the time I was old enough to go to school, I was also helping out my father at the theater.  It was almost like my playground where I could go to hang out after school.  I was often forced to help, though.  My father would spend most of his time fiddling with the two projectors; feeding the reels, checking sound, alignment, ordering new films.  Then he would run around to the front and take the nickels for the ticket price and let people in.Continue reading “The House by the Lake”

Banshee’s Warning

The scream came.  It chilled me to the bone, because I knew what it could be.  Nobody else lives around these parts, really. The neighbors- they’re miles away.  It didn’t sound like an animal either, at least not like one I had heard before. Not even some beast on the brink of death would utter such a cry.  It had to have been a banshee.

The sound it utters can’t measure up to the horror of the message it brings.  She– it– whatever– would be out there, like some sort of specter, its existence simply something not of this world, and yet here it lingers.   Its presence, however, means that there’s death impending upon your household.  The bitch could barely even be considered akin to a god of death, rather just some sort of macabre messenger.

If only my husband were here, and not away in town.  Though, I doubt he would be able to do anything in this situation.  My kids had crept into the back corner of the room, huddling against each other.  They heard it too.  I told them they should not fear it, as it would most likely mean them no harm.  I didn’t know if that would be the case or not.  I wrapped them in a blanket, hoping to give them the illusion of safety.

In turn, I went around the house extinguishing the candles.  Should the banshee drop by and detect no life in our home, perhaps it would simply pass.  Again, I have no idea if this may have done anything at all.

As the sweet smoky smell of smothered wicks filled the room, I heard a loud clang outside the back window. The sound was corporeal, created by the sound of two solid objects colliding.  Yet, I was unsure of whether to trust it.  It sounded like the cellar doors had been lifted open in the wind, and banged back down by gravity… yet, the air outside had been completely still.

Fumbling around in the moonlight drifting through the window, I found my husband’s pistol buried in the back of the cabinet by the door.  I don’t know how to load it, but my husband always leaves a fresh set of rounds in it for times like this when he’s gone.  I didn’t think I would ever have to use it, and I found it hard to believe when I was doing it then.

With the heavy weapon in my hands, I stood and listened.  Something below the floorboards, down in the cellar, was on the move.  Opening the door with as much caution my shaky hand could muster, I exited the small house and crept around the backside to the doorway leading downwards.

The cellar door opened with a muted creak.  I stopped and listened again, the heavy wooden installation resting partway open in my hand.  Through the tiny window came a ray of moonlight, illuminating a tall figure shifting around the mason-jar filled shelves. Gun held up against my opposite wrist to steady the barrel, I pulled the door open more, this time with a loud creak.  The figure jumped and turned.

“You should’a just let me rob ya’.”  Bellowed the man, almost in a growl.  Before he could take a step towards me, I reflexively yanked the heavy trigger with a loud bang, followed by a breathy shudder from the man.  The sound of metal and wood hitting the floor came to my ears, as a hatchet fell from the man’s hands and into the light cast through the window.  The scream came again, this time distant, waning.