When I go through my YouTube favorites playlist, about a third of them are now removed. I’ve been adding things to it for over a decade. If there’s something you might possibly want to watch again in the future, download it. Bit rot is a real thing.

But at least YouTube tells you something was removed, although I do wish they would tell you what it was which was removed. I was an active google music user for the life of the service (RIP) and sometimes I would have a vague thought that it felt like my playlist was missing something but they never actually told you. It was infuriating.

The cloud is ephemeral, do not rely on it.