Why I stopped making YouTube videos
You can't really complain about a system if you continue to participate in it
YouTube isn’t what it used to be. In the early 2010s, YouTube was a great place for independent content to get out there. Now, it’s basically no more interesting than cable TV. YouTube used to be a way to break through the gatekeepers of cable TV and open up new types of discourse, and now it’s just part of the same gatekeeping regime.
You may have come to my channel originally from my CFA Program video. It’s still my best performing video, even though it was shot with a cheap laptop webcam, I really need a haircut, the lighting is way off, and the audio is pretty grainy.
But that’s what was great about YouTube! Anyone in their home could make some good content, and the content on its own merits could get attention, rather than needing the approval of some cable TV producer or some newspaper editor.
The early 2010s were a great time on the internet. Now, it’s different.
You almost really have to make clickbait nowadays to get attention on YouTube. I could get a LOT more traffic if I made videos like “OMG how to become a TRILLIONAIRE in 5 seconds trading forex LOL!”
(Why is it always forex with these scammer weirdos…)
I’m not going to do that, first of all because I find that unethical, and secondly because I have a brand of my own that I want to protect, and that is not how I want to represent myself.
YouTube also has made a big fuss over the last few years about cracking down on “misinformation.” I’ve got a number of thoughts on that, but before I get to that, let’s take a look at what they consider acceptable.
YouTube hosts literal Taliban propaganda:
YouTube hosts prank phone calls to the suicide hotline:
YouTube hosts speakers who try to argue that pedophilia and molesting children isn’t that bad (ok seriously WTF?)
As far as YouTube cracking down on “misinformation”, I don’t want to hear it. Don’t even try arguing that.
I want to address that head on though. The big elephant in the room is COVID. Some things said about COVID truly are silly. That being said, blatantly obvious wrong information (5G towers, etc.) is also being used as a pretext to prevent accountability for people who were in the wrong, yet still enjoy the public spotlight.
“Misinformation” is now just a term thrown around callously as a way to stifle debate and prevent accountability. Maybe you disagree, and maybe you think that debate should only be restricted to a certain set of government or academia approved talking points. Or, maybe you think our current set of unelected bureaucrats in academia, the media, social media, think tanks, and agencies are just doing a fantastic job, truly on par with the NASA team that got us to the moon.
I do not, and considering the myriad of failures from 2020 onward—not least of which was the disaster that was the fall of Afghanistan and leaving Americans stranded there—I want as much accountability as possible.
Most of my content is on cryptocurrency, the CFA Program, or sometimes I’d talk about my time in the Army to give advice to new Officers. Because of that, nothing that I talk about is necessarily controversial enough to get me in trouble with YouTube, but that’s not the point.
So when you have:
A platform that pretty much only rewards clickbait nowadays, with the more ridiculous clickbait the better as far as their traffic algorithm
Unethical behavior where Taliban propaganda or prank calls to the suicide hotline are apparently okay, but you can’t have a robust debate on current events, which I argue we need more and not less if for no other reason than to hold failures accountable
An attitude problem with YouTube’s leadership that is unresponsive to any constructive criticism and only replies with “we’re a private platform so if you don’t like it, go somewhere else…”
I’ve decided to go somewhere else. I’m over it. This isn’t a system I want to participate in. If that means that I get slightly less traffic, so be it. I find this system grotesque that Taliban propaganda is okay apparently but Americans are restricted on what we can or can’t say on events in the world.
Maybe YouTube changes. If so, I may consider resuming making videos on there. Until then, I’m going to stick to Substack or up and coming platforms.
The bottom line is that I can just complain about YouTube all day, or I could take my content somewhere else—and this isn’t 2014-2020 anymore where the internet was hypercentralized with basically 3 companies in the Bay Area (Google, Facebook, Twitter) controlling all information flow globally. This will not be the case going forward. I’ve written about the rise of Web 3.0, and I believe that places like Substack, Telegram, or newer video platforms like Odysee are part of proto-Web 3.0.
YouTube needs content creators; content creators don’t need YouTube. I’m out.
-Alex Cook
Side note: I did say that I was working on another project called the Web 3.0 Digest. For a number of reasons, that needs to get sidelined indefinitely. I highly recommend following some of the anonymous Bow Tied Jungle accounts, as they frankly are just more up to speed on this subject than I am, and they likely have more time to cover it than I do. You can find my already published content here: