I complained about the same problem a while ago. There are a few recommendations for alternative YT interfaces that don't seem to be as messed up yet: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45503218
And apropos of nothing... there's another link on the front page at the moment ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45850430 ) talking about Apple crossing the red line of customer satisfaction. This got me thinking... to Alphabet, you're not the customer, you're the product. YouTube is a sugary trap to lure eyeballs into the advosphere.
YouTube is one of the better ones -- sort of -- in that you can simply pay with a very small amount of money rather than by wasting a ton of time on ads.
Only "sort of" though since they still use the same spammy algorithm-driven timeline and Shorts and stuff, and are clearly still trying to maximize your total watch time. Given that I just pay a fixed fee, I wish they'd use a different algorithm that only seeks to keep my engagement with YouTube from dipping too low, rather than the default which is clearly designed to turn a 23-hour-a-day user into 24.
And apropos of nothing... there's another link on the front page at the moment ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45850430 ) talking about Apple crossing the red line of customer satisfaction. This got me thinking... to Alphabet, you're not the customer, you're the product. YouTube is a sugary trap to lure eyeballs into the advosphere.