In an article I wrote back in April, titled “I’m Quite Certain YouTube Is Re-Subbing Me To Channels I’ve Unsubscribed To!” I discussed that YouTube was showing in my subscription feed channels which I was certain I’ve unsubscribed to.
Well, it’s still happening. I’m not just sure it’s happening this time, I *know* it is happening. I’ve been cleaning up my subscriptions to music game related channels recently, and have only really stayed subscribed to maybe 2 out of 20 some channels.
[Update: read a follow up to this article here!]
Well, what do I see in my subscription feed yesterday but one of these channels that I had unsubscribed to. It wasn’t hard to miss as this channel uploads videos in bulk, which is what caught my attention. Sure enough, I go and triple check that I was unsubscribed to the channel, and I was.
Let me stress this one more time, for anyone who may not get it: My subscription feed is still showing channel uploads from channels which I was once subscribed to, but have actively unsubscribed to. This is something that simply should not happen.
Right, this is the point where I made my usual post on twitter mentioning @youtube for whatever it’s worth.
Hey @YouTube … you're still doing that thing where you show in my subscription feed channels I no longer subscribe to.
You won't show me all the content I WANT to see, but insist on showing me content I've chosen to no longer want to be updated about.
WTF. Seriously.
— 민일성 (@Kurisu_Yamato) July 24, 2018
You see, it’s absolutely hilarious to me that channels which I’ve actively stated I do not want in my subscription feed are still showing, yet YouTube has decided over the past few years to limit what channels you have chosen to see in your subscription feed. A feed which should only be content you have chosen to see, and should consist of all the content you have chosen to see.
We'd like to help. Have you tried signing out and sign back in to your account to see if that fixes the issue? Also, could you send us a screenshot to have a closer look at this? Keep us posted.
— TeamYouTube (@TeamYouTube) July 25, 2018
Well, the funny thing about that is, YouTube got back to me on it. I debated if I should just ignore them, but I thought it might be worthwhile to reply just see what they have to say, and that’s what I did. I sent them cropped screenshots of the subscription feed and the channel in question, showing where I was not subscribed to them. I could have sent full shots, sure, but I felt it was not necessary to convey the point. After all, the fact I was showing my subscription list should have been understood.
Signing in and out causes no change. sometimes re-subscribing and de-subscribing again helps, but channels do seem to show up again from time to time. It's actually quite random.
Attached are snips of my screen showing sub feed and a view of the subscribe button on that channel. pic.twitter.com/Xwz2vj3Qod
— 민일성 (@Kurisu_Yamato) July 25, 2018
Granted, perhaps showing the whole screen would have been better, I felt I didn’t need to – my explanation of the context shouldn’t have been hard for anyone to understand.
The response I got, however, was somehow what I wasn’t expecting yet exactly what I should have suspected – it seems whomever was handling support at YouTube yesterday afternoon didn’t catch the fact that this was my subscription feed, and gave me the usual advice for what one would do if they saw something objectionable in their “recommended” feed.
To remove such videos from recommendations, tap the 3 dot menu > Not interested > Tell us why. Doing this influences how YouTube suggests videos to you in the future. Here's an article that talks about managing them: https://t.co/ocFUSDi9B1. Hope this helps!
— TeamYouTube (@TeamYouTube) July 25, 2018
Again, perhaps it’s my fault for using cropped screenshots but with the number of times I said “in my subscription feed” context should have been clear. Twitter doesn’t allow people much expressiveness, even with the increase to 280 characters, so maybe my phrasing was off?
Or, maybe the people at YouTube help felt that was the best they could do, and realize there is a bug in the system that needs to be fixed by someone paid much more than the support guys are.
To remove such videos from recommendations, tap the 3 dot menu > Not interested > Tell us why. Doing this influences how YouTube suggests videos to you in the future. Here's an article that talks about managing them: https://t.co/ocFUSDi9B1. Hope this helps!
— TeamYouTube (@TeamYouTube) July 25, 2018
I’ll fully admit, this is a minor thing, but it’s annoying. You subscribe to channels for reasons, and you unsubscribe for reasons. We want to see only what we want in our feed, and the fact that the manually cultivated subscription feed has this issue (which others have confirmed is happening to them to as well) is a problem that should be addressed. While they are at it they could go back to showing us all uploads as well. Again, the feed is supposed to be what I want to see, and that’s it.
Or, you could just keep making the platform more annoying to use. I’m sure the people in charge of YouTube will continue to do just that.
I have the same problem. Did they ever fix it for you?
Sort of. I don’t have the unsubbed channels still showing in my subscription feed anymore, but get this — I can tell YouTube all day long I’m not interested in a given video or, even more strongly, to not recommend a channel to me and about a week later sure enough the same video or, even worse, that channel I care nothing for, will start popping back up in my suggestions.
Don’t even get me started on how the suggestions will now repeat themselves over and over…. isn’t that space they could, you know, suggest a different video? I’ve seriously seen some videos pop up 7 times on the same page thanks to that….
Honestly I need to write a follow up about all these things. Obviously it’s annoying me and obviously others, like you, are experiencing both the problem here and others.