In the past several months, I've moved to using an RSS Reader + Watch Later Playlist + DF Tube extension (you could use whatever to nuke parts of the UI you dislike). This has greatly improved how I use YouTube. This method allows me to be significantly more intentional with what I'm watching and how much time I'm spending. The only frustrating part is that YT shorts still come through RSS, but they are much easier to avoid in a reader than YT's UI.
I'm curious if there is anyone who has any resources or anecdotal observations on why and how individuals/groups are spinning up bots that seems to be pushing the internet to this new reality. I've found a pretty interesting analysis of Meliorator[1], which is specific to foreign influence. But it seems like there are pieces missing for me.
Is engagement and ad revenue so great that it's worth setting up infrastructure to pump out this type of low effort 'content'?