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kratoz29 , to technology in DeArrow is an open source browser extension for crowdsourcing better titles and thumbnails on YouTube.
@kratoz29@lemm.ee avatar

Hmm I wasn’t aware it “fixes” titles as well… I am using it on Smart Tube to have better thumbnails, do I have to activate this myself to correct titles as well?

Anyway 99% of my ST usage (aside watching videos, as in, adding stuff to watch later) comes from my Shield TV home screen, I add stuff there to “My List” Shield row based on my recommendations row… And I am pretty sure DeArrow does not work there, only within the app :/

Sir_Premiumhengst , to technology in DeArrow is an open source browser extension for crowdsourcing better titles and thumbnails on YouTube.

This is genuinely amazing. Thanks!!

yamanii , to technology in DeArrow is an open source browser extension for crowdsourcing better titles and thumbnails on YouTube.
@yamanii@lemmy.world avatar

That example, losing the artwork of the Kurzgesagt videos is pretty bad though.

ChairmanMeow ,
@ChairmanMeow@programming.dev avatar

Is it? The original artwork was fairly clickbaity imo.

ajay , (edited )

It replaces it with the much more pleasing artwork from the actual video. Someone has gone through and picked nice frames for many of those videos.

GhostlyPixel , to technology in DeArrow is an open source browser extension for crowdsourcing better titles and thumbnails on YouTube.
@GhostlyPixel@lemmy.world avatar

I loved the idea of this extension and used it for a few months, but ended up disabling it because it made YouTube take significantly longer to load a page on my daily laptop, which admittedly is pretty old.

DarkThoughts , to technology in DeArrow is an open source browser extension for crowdsourcing better titles and thumbnails on YouTube.

It's no one's fault. It's a system that creates a race to the bottom.

Hard disagree. It's everyone's fault who actually supports the practice in some form or another.

DeArrow hopes to stop this cycle. It's time to return to a more peaceful experience.

It would just "hide" the clickbait, which would cause people who block clickbait, to suddenly click on clickbait, further supporting the clickbait norm through additional clicks that weren't there before.

Blackmist , to technology in DeArrow is an open source browser extension for crowdsourcing better titles and thumbnails on YouTube.

When you browse Netflix, they use different thumbnails for the movies depending on the profile they’ve made for you. Even if it’s as blatant as “white person from the movie”/“black person from the movie”. If you ignore a movie for long enough, sometimes they even swap it out for a different image to trick you into watching it.

I’m amazed that YouTube doesn’t try and do this somehow. Instead, every video somehow has the same stupid thumbnails of arrows, meaningless text and gormless faces, and I hate it.

But then I block all ads anyway, so it may be that they’re actively trying to make me go away.

DarkThoughts ,

I'm amazed that YouTube doesn't try and do this somehow.

They do. They even give the creator statistics on which thumbnail generated more clicks (completely ignoring other factors so it's a misleading metric anyway).

MrScottyTay ,

There’s no active a/b testing though. The creators have to specifically change the thumbnail for everyone at once. From what I understand.

helenslunch ,
@helenslunch@feddit.nl avatar

They do exactly this. You’ve never seen the same video appear twice, and the second time it has a different title and thumbnail? That’s how they figured out how effective clickbait is.

SilentStorms ,

YouTube let’s creators A/B test different thumbnails, but they can’t upload a bunch of them to feed to different demographics or automatically cycle them like Netflix does. I’m sure that’s coming though.

Omniraptor , (edited )

To be fair it’s not a mysterious “they”, it’s just an option available for channel owners to set alternative thumbnails and then check which does better. I don’t think YouTube does this by itself if the uploader doesn’t enable it

ikidd , to technology in DeArrow is an open source browser extension for crowdsourcing better titles and thumbnails on YouTube.
@ikidd@lemmy.world avatar

Default part of the Piped interface, BTW, along with Sponsorblock.

Feathercrown , (edited ) to technology in DeArrow is an open source browser extension for crowdsourcing better titles and thumbnails on YouTube.

I love this extension, although the install process can best be described as labyrinthian. It’s crazy how many videos have the altered metadata compared to how many people I’d expect to use the extension; I guess we’re all active on Youtube, likely to contribute, and may see similar videos.

Highly recommend!

AnAmericanPotato , to technology in DeArrow is an open source browser extension for crowdsourcing better titles and thumbnails on YouTube.

A simpler, less ambitious alternative is Clickbait Remover: github.com/…/clickbait-remover-for-youtube

It replaces thumbnails with stills from the video. You can select between beginning, middle, and end.

It doesn’t change titles but it lets you force capitalization to lowercase, titlecase, or sentence-case. Keep in mind that this has no logic to retain capitalization of proper nouns no matter which option you choose. I set mine to lowercase just to have some kind of consistency, because I got sick of random ALL CAPS TITLES.

I haven’t used DeArrow myself. Crowdsourcing titles sounds interesting but I appreciate that Clickbait Remover behaves exactly the same way with 100% of videos.

Tier1BuildABear ,
@Tier1BuildABear@lemmy.world avatar

De arrow also lets you do those things and customize which of them it always does.

It’s also the same guy that does sponsor block :)

Not trying to steer people away from yours, it’s good to have alternatives, just sharing the info

cupcakezealot , to technology in DeArrow is an open source browser extension for crowdsourcing better titles and thumbnails on YouTube.
@cupcakezealot@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

i love dearrow more than i love sponsorblock and ublock tbh <3

batcheck ,

Yes, amazing extension in combination with what you said. I actually find myself watching a lot less videos on YouTube. This is because even knowing something is click bait, I still impulse click on it. Also, it has renewed my love for info YouTube channels because i realized that I prefer watching those, but usually they are not click baity and I used to skip them before DeArrow.

Also, highly recommend this extension combo if you have kids who consume YouTube

Kushan , to technology in DeArrow is an open source browser extension for crowdsourcing better titles and thumbnails on YouTube.
@Kushan@lemmy.world avatar

I used this within smart tube for a while, but honestly I kind of missed some of the clockbait titles. There problem I faced was that it wasn’t clear when a title had been replaced or not, so when you did find a video with a relatively clockbait titles, it gave you a bit of a false sense of security. I also found that sometimes the crowd sourced titles were just boring, albeit accurate.

Maybe I’m just weird or maybe I’ve just been browsing YouTube for so long that I’m used to it, but for now it’s an addon I’ll skip, though I’m very glad it exists.

Frog ,

I turn it off and on to see which changed. An indicator would be nice. Maybe an icon that I can hover over to reveal the original thumbnail and title.

I get where you are coming from. If I follow a channel then I already get a feel of what the content will be even if the title or/thumbnail is clickbait. Also you lose part of the channel’s charm. Exaggerations can be really funny.

It works a lot better for the trending section for unknown channels.

rowdyrockets ,

The icon and hover to reveal previous title has been available in the extension for a long while.

Frog ,

Sorry. I was using it with Freetube, not the extension.

Thank you for pointing that out.

yamanii ,
@yamanii@lemmy.world avatar

I also found that sometimes the crowd sourced titles were just boring, albeit accurate.

It’s the equivalent of the comedy geniuses that remove words from comics thinking it’s always better.

VitabytesDev , to technology in DeArrow is an open source browser extension for crowdsourcing better titles and thumbnails on YouTube.

Sad it does not support Invidious. Else I would be using it.

lefixxx , to technology in DeArrow is an open source browser extension for crowdsourcing better titles and thumbnails on YouTube.

I wished this morning existed way before it was out. I have been using it from day 1. I love it.

Lemminary , to technology in DeArrow is an open source browser extension for crowdsourcing better titles and thumbnails on YouTube.

I like the concept and I have it installed, but I don’t contribute to it because I find it challenging to think of better titles. It’s not easy like with Sponsorblock that I regularly submit to. For example, sometimes I need to watch most of the video first to be accurate, and by then I’ve already moved on to the next video. Other times it’s simply hard for me to condense the content of the video accurately into so many characters when the original title is way off.

I do like the way it makes all the titles lowercase, though. I find that changes the tone of the video feed quite a bit.

jonne , (edited )

This might actually be one of the few things AI could be used for. ChatGPT could download the transcript and just build a short summary.

Although chances are you’re just replacing one shitty thing with a different shitty thing.

Lemminary ,

Yeah, I think there was something like that floating around. I imagine it’s costly, though, but it’d be nice to have.

wildn0x ,

YouTube has already been helpful to a degree. Sometimes I’ll open their AI summarize and it will give all the details along with timestamps. There are videos where I saw the summary and passed on watching because the video was mostly filler material.

yamanii ,
@yamanii@lemmy.world avatar

ChatGPT could download the transcript and just build a short summary.

Then you wouldn’t watch the video and the creator just lost.

Takumidesh ,

If your video can be replaced by a title, it probably wasn’t with watching

Ilandar , to technology in DeArrow is an open source browser extension for crowdsourcing better titles and thumbnails on YouTube.

The way some of the titles are changed is quite funny to me. It’s like if you saw a big scary looking ghost on Halloween and then you rip the sheet off and it’s just Huey, Dewey and Louie stacked on top of each other.

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