When YouTube saw us as people and not just metrics...
this post was submitted on 17 Apr 2026
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Showerthoughts
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A "Showerthought" is a simple term used to describe the thoughts that pop into your head while you're doing everyday things like taking a shower, driving, or just daydreaming. The most popular seem to be lighthearted clever little truths, hidden in daily life.
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- More dreams have been destroyed by alarm clocks than anything else
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I love the illusion and enjoy immersing myself in it, but let's not kid ourselves. It has always been about profit.
Sure, but there was also a time where companies tried to make that profit by providing good products and enjoyable experiences customers wanted, rather than simply being a monopoly where users can choose between an obscene amount of ads or yet another subscription
That's an interesting point. Perhaps there was a time when quality was the defining metric and customer enjoyment was considered. In hindsight, this was short-lived, as other metrics became more important in order to satisfy stakeholders. My point is that this is always bound to happen in a capitalist system.
May feel fun to say or something but that's inaccurate. It took YouTube 5 years to break even.
That's standard procedure for a start-up. You rely on investment money and focus on growth rather than profitability.
I don't understand the nostalgia for a YouTube that was supposedly only created for our enjoyment. It never existed. It was always going to squeeze as much money out of its users as possible to satisfy its shareholders.
Again inaccurate.
Business loans (especially tech sector circa the .com bust) most typically expect solvency within 3 years.
It was a big deal that YouTube wasn't profitable nearly 5 years in. They were expected to lose nearly half a billion their 5th year.
What are you talking about? I'm kinda speechless. In tech it's absolutely normal to not be profitable after 3 years. Amazon, Uber, Tesla, Netflix. Just off the top of my head. You can find many more. And we don't even need to talk about AI. Have you seen their profits?
The only company you mentioned that even existed during the .com bubble is Amazon.
Not a single company you listed isnt VC, more importantly. Not someone taking out a business loan.
My dude, you're lost in the sauce. You edited your comment to mention the dot-com bubble after I posted but why would we even talk about that? YouTube wasn't founded until several years later.
Why wouldn't I talk about VC? YouTube was backed by VC a couple of months after its creation.
I'm not going to engage with someone who cannot bother to read what they're responding to. You have a reading comprehension problem here.
Peace out girl scout. ✌️
That’s a pretty textbook ad hominem, so I don’t think there’s much to continue here.
Have a good one, either way.
Edit: Saw that you used an alt account to downvote me twice. That's actually kind of pitiful. You won this argument, okay champ?
I'm blocking you now. Bye 👋
I'm not sure it was about profit when it was an independent website that had no ads. You know, before Google bought it. How was it even making money back then?
YouTube began as an angel-funded enterprise working from a makeshift office in a garage. In November 2005, venture firm Sequoia Capital invested an initial $3.5 million,[20] and Roelof Botha (a partner of the firm and former CFO of PayPal) joined the YouTube board of directors. In April 2006, Sequoia and Artis Capital Management invested an additional $8 million in the company, which had experienced significant growth in its first few months.
That's the neat part, it wasn't
Why have users waste time playing games when they can waste time watching ads instead
Truf
i assume was that some kind of way to pass time when the video was loading?
because for me, nowadays, the video loads almost immediately so .. i don't know how fast you can play snake...
i don't remember that but get what you mean, there used to be time where it was more common for sw developers to put a little bit more love into what they are doing. I mean they still are, that did not actually to away, it's just that they are outnumbered by the sheer volume of the more "serious, professional, sterile" output.
as much as I hate big tech, to be fair, creating and maintaining a huge scale thing like YT is a feat of engineering. and I have to respect that often it requires being pragmatic (ie. saving every byte and removing anything that could possibly fail). so I understand the negative correlation, the huge things probably won't be also the fun things.
Correct. Nowadays streaming video is almost trivial, but in early YouTube days it wouldn't be uncommon to click a video and immediately pause it so it could buffer far enough ahead that it wouldn't get stuck while playing. I don't recall playing Snake, but it easily could have happened back then.
Yeah I'm old enough to remember it. Also resuming or seeking would be risky as sometimes it would erase the prized buffer or break the player altogether. Sweet times...
I don't remember the snake, though...