If they're not fined more than they profit then they're not going to change it.

The incentives of YouTube and Youtubers are aligned against the better interests of society; but that's true of a lot of capitalist activity -- the only way it is going to change is via mass action of the populous (direct action [which might be as simple as changing viewing habits], or legislation).

"Stop with this trending nonsense, stop with this "your friends liked" nonsense, stop with this "in case your missed it" nonsense, take your hands off me and just let me mindlessly click and watch whatever videos I feel like watching and react to the tweets I want to react to, I don't need your damn help knowing what my friends are doing or feeling like I need to like something because the platform detected that Jim liked it six hours ago since my last login".

For all this talk about FOMO, it's impossible for me, personally, to NOT look at the culpability the platforms have in it by nagging me all the time about what everyone else is doing and be annoyed by it. I know what they're doing, I see it. I don't need your helicopter parenting to know that, twitter. Keep the trolls in line, keep the lights on, otherwise get out of the way.

- Sort by time.

- Sort by creator/channel.

- Sort by creator selected content type (fallible).

- Search (a la Google, which sucks on Youtube).

- ???

I wonder if these would be sufficient? Maybe something like Reddit/HN is necessary; some human aggregation and interaction. Would a Reddit style interface work well for video?

A landing page with trending videos (upvotes, comments, threads, etc.), links out to popular subjects/sub-reddits, and so on. Perhaps with an interface like HN which forces people together in one kind of communication (in threads), generous wait periods for new members, and so on...

I suppose that only considers the viewer's use-case. What about monetization? What about creators?