The Strange World of "Reaction Videos"
While I am not a big YouTube watcher — except as it applies to listening to music in the background, but I don't really count that as being a "watcher" — one of the things I've increasingly been noticing is that YouTube is basically like a microcosm of the greater world.
That is to say, there is a handful of creators who are doing extremely well for themselves, and then there's everybody else who's basically struggling to get any kind of visibility and traction at all.
Perhaps this is not surprising: it seems to be how the world self-organizes, no matter how or where you're setting up something. It's even true here in the Hive community.
The thing that sometimes baffles me a little bit is so-called "Reaction videos"… which so often seems to be about the same few hundred YouTubers — typically with a million or more subscribers — "reacting" to each other's videos in what seems to me to be just a giant circle jerk.
And if they are not making new videos reacting to each other, they are interviewing each other.
First of all, I find myself questioning why that constitutes any form of entertainment... to see one person reacting to what another person said.
From where I'm sitting, that seems more like lazy creating than anything else. Create your own stuff from scratch, using your own ideas and insights. And even if what you're doing is essentially reacting to a different opinion at least spend some time explaining what your opinion is, rather than just pick on somebody else's opinion!
In olden times we called it "a slow news day!"
On a broader scale, I find myself considering the question of whether it really takes that little to entertain someone. Don't you want to see something new? Something original?
Of course truth in disclosure suggests that I should mention here that I am not a big fan of vlogs as a form of expression, mostly because I find that it is much faster to read a block of content than it is to watch and listen to it.
But that probably has more to do with my age than anything... having grown up during an era where speed reading was an important skill, and there was no AI to summarize books and research papers for us.
But let's bring the bunny back around and return to these "reaction videos" and how there are entire channels on YouTube that only post reaction videos.
Clearly it must work, as a way to attract viewers or people wouldn't be doing it. I've tried to watch various, but I still don't get it!
Thanks for stopping by, and have a great weekend!
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Created at 2025.10.05 02:32 PST
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I rarely watch videos. I find reading much faster. As you said, it’s probably an age thing.
My theory is that people today are less able to digest information and form their own opinions. They prefer to regurgitate someone else’s, hence the rise of reaction videos.
Reaction instead of reflection. Hype instead of substance. Opinion instead of analysis.
And a loud voice instead of a reasoned counter-argument.
I seldom watch videos on here "mostly because I find that it is much faster to read a block of content than it is to watch and listen to it." I have a hard time learning from videos as often I need to read something over and over. I far prefer written content.
Reaction comment!
So I saw this post and I was all like 🤔
But then I read it a bit and then 😬😵💫😓
So he started talking shit about people and 🤨🥺
When he made his point I was totally 🤬
But I guess over all this post is 🫡
Like, follow and subscribe and buy from my advertisers! 🥳🤑
🤮