YouTube's recommendation algorithm is a modern miracle if you take care to:

- Like

- Subscribe

- Dislike

…and make copious use of 'Not Interested' and 'Don't ever show this channel to me again'.

I do keep having to whack it with more of that but it's expected. My recommendations sidebar is not actively obnoxious and if it hints at it, well, rinse and repeat. If it's gonna try to pander to me I will set extremely loud boundaries, and there's every opportunity to do that.

Subscription are easily ignored as soon as you have watched some other topics for half a day.

Youtube's algorithm has an exxagerated recency bias and it tends to ignore in my case most of the topics I'm subscribed to as soon as I don't watch those topics for few days.

The only thing it gets right, the only one, is sort of figuring out my usage depending on the time and device I'm using. On desktop I use it mostly for music streaming, on tv/phone I use it mostly for other content, that's the only thing it gets right.

But otherwise, it's an utter mess when Spotify or Tik Tok do an infinitely better job with way less information and guidance.