This whole article should go without saying – it shouldn’t need to be made, but screw it, I need to vent about this. YouTube comments are, as the title states, absolute garbage, in many ways worse than most of the internet as far as open commentary goes, and it’s really pathetic that this is the case.
Oh yes, this is another rant, so get ready. More disjointed stream of thought typing, at it’s finest!
You upload a video? Expect trolls. You comment on some other video? Expect hate for your opinion. Especially in the case of heated subject matter like politics or religion, but also, amazingly, in things like video games and other entertainment. Everyone seems to be out to prove to anons just how much smarter they are than everyone else on some subject, or make wild claims about, well, most anything. Who knows what kind of crap you will see if you look in the comments of most any video.
Decent conversation is almost impossible. The moment any kind of sane discussion is attempted, it will inevitably be derailed. At that point, what’s even the reason to have comments available? Why bother? If you are a video creator, the moment you disable comments you will be accused of censorship, so that option is out. If you choose to comment on a video, and are also a content creator, heaven help you from trolls raiding your videos with stupid comments, dislike ratings on videos, etc… it’s not a good day for anyone in the end. Very few areas of YouTube seem to be immune to this.
Why? Because the internet loves to hate for hates sake. When Google tried to force Google+ into the fold, they attempted to quell this trend by forcing people’s opinions to be attached to their real identities. That went over terribly, and the end result of all of this was a greater ability for random troll accounts to come up and spread more stupidity.
I imagine this is the reaction to the average person after I block them for being an idiot…
Oh, sure, there are tools to mute and block people, but that’s after the fact – and usually when you do that someone just comes back on another account calling you some kind of coward for blocking them. Same crap that happens on twitter, and it’s a pretty damned pathetic thing that this is the best some people can do. Sadly, you used to be able to do better, including not allowing replies to a given comment – that feature has since been removed, meaning any comment you leave can and will inevitably be replied to in a way that just leaves you thinking “why do I even bother?”
All in all, it ruins the experience. The idea behind comments is to be able to carry on some level of discussion about the video or it’s subject matter. Instead, it’s just trash and hatred, worse than most anywhere else on the internet, due to the sheer volume of people who use it.
The idea is to have a good time, is it not? Dealing with this shit isn’t fun to most people. No one enjoys getting an email or seeing a notification that’s just some asshole being, well, an asshole.
There is a saying, never look at the YouTube comments. In this case, I implore you to look up random videos, especially ones on current gaming subjects, and just read the garbage that is posted.
Related, check out my article about comment hijacking.
I’ve seen how retarded YouTube comments can be too, although in my case my well thought ot comments always get buried under tonnes of crap. I believe my comment was hijacked once as well which is arguably worse than being ignored.
I unfortunatly must agree with you! You know despite the fact that all comments on my channel are under approval (moderated before being published), almost 80% of them are just trash talker who just wants to put themself on the first stage… So that’s why that there is only very few comments on my videos despites that some have a good amount of views… So my technique yes does works to avoid “fight” inside my channel, but it doesn’t prevent stupidity to happens, at least it prevent comments hijacker… But it still being an exausting thing, that is also one of the many reasons of my hiatus, i’m seeking a another formula, because right now, seems like that only haters are interested to read/watch what i do… Which is a shame and a very depressive situation.