I created my own YouTube algorithm (to stop me wasting time)
Using the YouTube API and Amazon’s AWS Lambda
🚀 Escaping the YouTube algorithm
I love watching YouTube videos that improve my life in some tangible way. Unfortunately, the YouTube algorithm doesn’t agree. It likes to feed me clickbait and other garbage.
This isn’t all that surprising. The algorithm prioritises clicks and watch time.
So I set out on a mission: Can I write code that will automatically find me valuable videos, eliminating my dependence on the YouTube algorithm?
Here’s how it went.
🗺️ The best laid plans
I started by visualising what I wanted the tool to do. I wanted something that would (i) rank videos based on likely relevance for me and (ii) automatically send me suggested videos, which I could select from.
I figured I could make some major productivity gains if I could batch-decide the videos I was going to watch each week and eliminate infinity scrolling YouTube browsing.