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recommender system

concept · in 69 videos (2009–2026)

Software that ranks and suggests what people see on platforms, 'the algorithm'; in 2016 the community's plussing tricked YouTube's comment algorithm into more civil commenting. The brothers fault such systems for maximizing time on site and valuing engagement over accuracy, and in 2026 Hank said algorithms are amazing at showing us what we want and terrible at showing us what we want to want.

Videos by year: 2009: 2 · 2014: 1 · 2015: 1 · 2016: 2 · 2017: 3 · 2018: 7 · 2019: 5 · 2020: 4 · 2021: 5 · 2022: 6 · 2023: 3 · 2024: 10 · 2025: 9 · 2026: 11

Also known as: the algorithm, algorithms and the companies that control them, the YouTube front page picks

Threads

Also named in the threads: Project for Awesome 2007 edition: the final Brotherhood 2.0 project (2007) · Hank asks viewers to comment on, rate and favorite Project for Awesome 2007 videos (2007) · The Anthropocene Reviewed book: announcement and publication (2020) · Hank: AI like ChatGPT will be great at getting people to dislike each other more (2022) · Hank and John's We're Here newsletter (2024) · John's 2024 depression and his month away from the internet (2024)

Questions

Often together

What comes up in the same parts of the videos; the number is how many parts.

attention economy (25) · TikTok (19) · YouTube (32) · Instagram (9) · Facebook (9) · Twitter (14) · curiosity (3) · online advertising (4) · social media (4) · sensationalism (2)

What the videos say

The most important statements of each year; all statements.

2009

  • 2009-04-12 · The Death of Youtube?? Redesign Coming — John finds it strange that people think YouTube has a responsibility to the little guy: corporations are not in the business of being awesome, they exist to make money. — 00:01:20
    • John finds it hard to be mad at YouTube for wanting to stop losing money, but is a little mad at advertisers for thinking user-generated content can't sell Lucky Charms. — 00:01:55
    • John says one reported change makes him furious: a feature letting viewers dim the space outside the video screen. He hates that idea. — 00:02:47
  • 2009-04-16 · The Day the YouTubes Died — Hank: In song, Hank remembers hoping friendly editors would feature him on the front page, a dream that may now be dead as YouTube tries to please the corporate mass. (playful, hedged) — 00:00:01
    • The chorus says maybe YouTube can become like Hulu and avoid its demise, but if it costs the little guys, Hank might say his goodbyes. (playful, hedged) — 00:01:10
    • Hank thanks viewers most of all, because YouTube is not what Google does but what the community does, including in the comments. — 00:03:45

2014

2015

2016

  • 2016-07-19 · Pretty Bad Ways to Start a Conversation — John says that is why most YouTube comment sections show the most controversial comments first, not the most interesting, generous or nuanced. — 00:02:34
    • John says Hank's hankschannel video asking people to reply with a plus sign to comments they agreed with tricked YouTube's comment algorithm, making commenting more civil and productive. — 00:03:07
    • John says the plus sign was small and imperfect but made a real change, and he will use the plus-sign reply from now on. — 00:03:20
  • 2016-07-22 · Ending the Age of Outrage (at least in ourselves, if not in the world) — Hank says he has been inspired by the positive effects of the plussing the community has been doing. — 00:02:26

2017

  • 2017-04-21 · The Adpocalypse: What it Means — Hank says that afterwards all the algorithms tightened: some channels rebounded but many fell further, squeezing creators of good but not super-happy-family-fun content. — 00:02:29
  • 2017-04-28 · Can You Trust Mainstream Media? — Hank says online we see our feed rather than a front page, and feeds are controlled not by experts but often by our worst instincts: the hive mind turns the front page into drama, controversy and demonization. — 00:01:17
  • 2017-12-26 · LEAVE IT IN 2017 — John: Social media feeds don't make you happier or better informed because they aren't trying to: algorithms are designed to maximize time on site and ad impressions, and do it very well. — 00:01:13

2018

  • 2018-01-05 · Making a Better YouTube — Hank: Reason three: YouTube is really good at getting people to watch videos; that is what its somewhat insidious algorithm is designed to do. — 00:01:28
    • Reason five: YouTube's problems are those any sufficiently big social video platform would have: getting advertisers in, monetizing for creators, and too much open uploading to review it all. — 00:02:01
  • 2018-01-09 · Your Attention — John says algorithms and the companies that control them are big and powerful, but each of us still chooses what we watch, listen to and read. — 00:03:10
  • 2018-03-20 · The Russian Reversal — John finds it helpful to take a Russian-reversal look at any big force, such as the social internet's algorithms: are they informing us, or are we informing them? — 00:02:37
  • 2018-04-13 · Who is in Control? — Hank: In Gernsback's future you chose your news; now neither you nor any person decides your feed, but a program, increasingly self-built, serving the platform's needs rather than yours. — 00:00:43
    • These machines are given desired outcomes, but how they reach them is up to them, and their goals are tightly held industry secrets. — 00:01:00
    • For the platforms anything that gains attention is good, and whether they regard truth, social stability or their users' health is, for now, entirely up to them. — 00:02:54
  • 2018-05-25 · Please Unsubscribe — Hank understands why YouTubers protect the sub feed: it is the one place controlled by humans, not computers, the one place left where they know what's going on. — 00:00:59
    • Hank tells YouTube it created a contract with creators: the sub feed has to work this way, the one place where users are and need to be in charge. — 00:02:31
    • Creators need one place where they know their communities can find their videos, without worrying what a computer thinks; that needs to not change. — 00:02:45
  • 2018-07-03 · How Does This End? — John thinks YouTube faces big problems: it relies too much on flawed algorithms, and its monetization system often values advertisers over audience. (hedged) — 00:01:29
  • 2018-10-23 · Why Are Humans Suddenly Getting Better at Tetris? — John: There is no 'the Internet', especially with personalized feeds: there is only each person's own Internet. — 00:03:24
  • …and 1 statement more in 2018 — all statements of 2018

2019

2020

  • 2020-02-25 · A weird YouTube thing? — John concludes the 1:10 ratio was not necessary or inevitable and probably partly human behavior, and that online, human and algorithmic behavior aren't really separable. — creator comment
    • John says the five-star asks really did make new nerdfighters, because the algorithm then valued a video's average rating, so people found videos they otherwise wouldn't have. — 00:01:27
    • John says one of the chief joys of his professional life is no longer having to chase the whims of YouTube's recommendation engine. — 00:01:27
    • John has no idea what YouTube's algorithm values now but suspects it isn't as simple as showing a video to 10 people per like; maybe it is and he's cracked the code. (playful, hedged) — 00:01:27
  • 2020-07-17 · So Much to See — Hank: Today the medium is no longer television or radio but the platform, the algorithm, which deeply controls what content gets made and for whom. — 00:01:11
  • 2020-08-25 · Somebody once told me… — John: After Noah's claim that Trump will be re-elected, John says many social media algorithms value engagement over accuracy, so engaging predictions beat well-informed ones; sports talk radio shows it offline too. — 00:01:27
  • 2020-10-13 (said on 2020-10-05, implied) · Me from the Past: A Pizzamas Miracle — John: On 5 October 2020, John predicts the platforms will keep recognizing that usage rises with uncertainty and fear, so the feeds they show us will increase that uncertainty and fear. — 00:02:26

2021

2022

  • 2022-09-23 · Apparently you can make a short from a video comment now!!! — Hank says this is more of a thing on TikTok, because you don't choose what to watch: you are fed only extremely popular content, so less engaging posts about a creator's live show or themselves rarely reach you. — 00:00:00
    • Hank says it can be done on TikTok, but it is harder, because every view is algorithmic and no human choice decides what you want to watch versus keep watching. — 00:00:44
  • 2022-09-23 · The Real Difference Between YouTube and TikTok — Hank says systems that allow discovery of new, talented creators are important, and TikTok-like feeds are great for discovery and for building early in a career. — 00:02:45
  • 2022-09-28 · How My Book Became a Hit with Elderly People — John: With only the large print edition in stock, Amazon's algorithm marketed it as the primary edition, and people bought more of it than they had of the hardcover. — 00:01:55
    • The algorithm concluded people prefer the large print edition and has shown it disproportionately for four months, making it a USA Today bestseller. — 00:02:24
    • Because the large print edition sells well, Amazon recommends the book to people who mostly buy large print editions, who tend to be elderly, producing more large print sales. — 00:02:53
    • John's point: a tiny algorithmic quirk created a self-reinforcing cycle, a phenomenon also seen elsewhere on the internet. — 00:03:22
    • Second lesson: algorithms are directed by humans and humans by algorithms, in ways we do not fully understand. — 00:03:22
  • 2022-10-21 · This 'Math Test' Changed How I See Humanity — Hank says that, due to the nature of humanity and its algorithms, such questions are the ones we are most likely to see. — 00:02:55
  • 2022-10-25 · Instantly Debateable — John says videos with higher engagement-to-view ratios on YouTube or TikTok are shown to more people, and the same is true on his Twitter. — 00:00:29
  • 2022-12-23 · You Cannot Trust Yourself (Hank's End of the Year Worries) — Hank asks whether to just follow what interests him, as in the channel's first ten years, or keep wondering if algorithms hack his pro-social biology toward misinformation and loneliness; he needs both. — 00:02:16

2023

  • 2023-03-03 · The Law That Made the Internet — Hank reports the Supreme Court is hearing a case arguing YouTube is not liable for the content of videos on its platform but is liable for recommending that content to people. — 00:01:30
    • Hank says the argument that YouTube is not just hosting content but creating a new kind, the recommendation, seems a little bit right to him. (hedged) — 00:01:50
    • Hank says the problem is where to draw the line: is a Google search a list of recommendations, would every platform with any recommendation system be liable, and would the internet work at all? — 00:01:58
    • Hank says there is something of a difference between an algorithmically generated YouTube front page for each user and getting recommended results when he searches. — 00:02:21
    • Hank says recommendation can definitely be seen as creation, but he doesn't think a 1996 law did a good job of anticipating that. — 00:02:38
  • 2023-08-18 · The #1 Tip for People Who Use the Internet — Hank says people reply to shocking takes, which modern algorithms read as engagement and time on platform, so the less common, worse opinions are often intentionally promoted. — 00:01:40
  • 2023-10-27 · I Keep Thinking About Taylor Swift — Hank says the trouble is that viewers who start with Complexly's content still get these fake videos recommended, because their titles about aliens being real are exciting. — 00:01:20

2024

  • 2024-03-08 · I Believed These Four Lies — Hank says the incentives of the social internet's content recommendation systems make that hard for everyone, and he does not know what to do except try very hard. — 00:09:26
  • 2024-03-22 · The Internet Needs to Change — Hank says the algorithmically recommended internet is a slot machine for users and even more so for creators: the rewards are potentially huge, the threats feel existential. — 00:00:29
    • Hank thinks there are real advantages to having largely given human curation away to extraordinarily intelligent machines. — 00:01:42
  • 2024-04-12 · Feeling Like a Failure (During an Eclipse) — Hank worries about our collective decision to hand power to algorithms: then platforms, which often don't know how their algorithms work, decide, so it is no human's choice what exists. — 00:03:14
  • 2024-08-23 · Is Google Training AI on YouTube Videos? — Hank says YouTube treats creators not as website users but as business partners, which is almost always how it feels, but not in this situation. — 00:29:28
  • 2024-08-27 · How The Internet Is Rigged — John's thesis: the user-generated internet has always been rigged against the users who generate it. — 00:00:44
  • 2024-09-17 · My Consciousness. Their Capital. — John says that for most internet citizens, algorithms decide to a remarkable degree what we think about and how we feel. — 00:00:00
  • 2024-09-20 · Do I Regret TikTok? — Hank says much of what we consume is directed by AI algorithms, which shape what he believes and thinks about and, more importantly, what content media and creators make. — 00:01:56
    • Hank says algorithms, media and creators work together to keep us on websites at any cost, and the cost seems real: worse mental health, a more antisocial society, more divisive arguments. (hedged) — 00:01:56
  • 2024-10-02 · What I learned from the weirdest day of my life — Hank thinks the time we spend at the mercy of brain-hijacking algorithms working with talented, ambitious humans is a huge problem, and he is spending more time imagining solutions. — 00:03:53
  • 2024-11-22 · Populism, Media Revolutions, and Our Terrible Moment — Hank says many-to-many communication plus algorithms rewarding the best attention-grabbers flip things, because there are few legal regulations and none in our minds. — 00:16:58
    • Hank says, from his own world, there is a feedback cycle between creators, recommendation systems and audiences: the system shows what works and creators do it. — 00:26:52
  • …and 13 statements more in 2024 — all statements of 2024

2025

  • 2025-03-14 · Probably the Luckiest Thing in my Life — Hank says both brothers think about directing attention, getting the algorithms to do what they want, but John takes it to another level. — 00:03:38
  • 2025-06-06 · The Secret Inside my MIT Commencement Speech — Hank says social content platforms are great at steering curiosity, but sometimes toward fear, the most impossible problems or the hottest rifts in society. — 00:15:04
  • 2025-06-20 · 'Influencer' Must Die. — Hank says distribution is often seen as algorithm hacking and metrics, which matter, but it is also empathy and the craft of building an audience, which fits no existing craft. — 00:03:59
  • 2025-06-24 · Am I Cigarettes? — John describes the algorithm-first, attention-monetizing, corporation-hosted social internet as extractive capitalism in which the thing extracted is consciousness itself. — 00:03:12
  • 2025-06-27 · You’re Not Addicted to Content, You’re Starving for Information — Hank: Unlike food, the internet can make a personalized Dorito for each person that learns what they like and morphs, growing worse for them down a misinformation rabbit hole as long as they keep eating. — 00:09:35
  • 2025-07-04 · This Graph Changed My Life — Hank says the cable news ecosystem and the algorithmic news ecosystem both benefit when we believe this fallacy, and nobody else does. — 00:05:02
  • 2025-10-17 · We Never Know What Anything Means — Hank says the recommendation algorithms of YouTube, TikTok, Threads and Twitter already erode trust without wanting to: told to keep people on websites, they made us hate each other more, fraying society. — 00:03:50
  • 2025-10-31 · We Did It… — Hank says John's Philippines video was doing poorly: fewer viewers than usual clicked its thumbnail, so YouTube showed it to fewer people, a feedback loop. — 00:00:58
    • Hank says the terrible thing about algorithmic platforms is that they amplify tiny signals, as YouTube does in serving ever more enticing content. — 00:04:19
  • 2025-11-21 · I Wasn't Always Like This!! — Hank says the best way to help Complexly and the world is to indulge curiosity and not let algorithms, which serve fear, anxiety and outrage to keep us engaged, shape our choices. — 00:05:43

2026

  • 2026-01-02 · I Got a New Disease and I Kinda Liked It. — Hank says algorithms are amazing at showing us what we want and terrible at showing us what we want to want. — 00:05:48
  • 2026-02-13 · Project for Awesome 2026 Kickoff! — Hank says the idea he would most like in people's heads is that the most capable machines ever made exist to find the media easiest to pay attention to, whose pull can be good, like beauty, or bad, like rage, fear and superiority. — 05:32:39
  • 2026-02-15 · Project for Awesome 2026 part 5! — John: Agreeing with a viewer, John says the first few Project for Awesomes were not fundraisers at all but an attempt to take over the YouTube front page and hijack an algorithm that was then unsophisticated. — 03:03:00
  • 2026-05-01 · Despair is Not Wisdom — Hank says John's video this week (week of 27 April 2026), about lots of people working to make life better, ends up viewed by around a third of the people who see most Vlogbrothers videos. — 00:04:42
    • Hank calls it one of the most interesting and important things about living now: these algorithms do not amplify our wisdom. — 00:04:42
  • 2026-06-02 · The Instagramification of Human Experience — John: Horrible images cease to shock with exposure, and with algorithms generally you need ever more upsetting, outrageous or horrifying content to feel anything, which the internet will inevitably provide. — 00:01:56
  • 2026-06-05 · The Things We Don't Discuss — Hank says TikTok reports higher view numbers to look impressive and partly to manipulate creators into feeling more successful. — 00:03:59
  • 2026-09-15 · YouTube Says This Video Has 683,183 Views, It Actually Has 312,584 — John worries that as YouTube, like other platforms, centres on personalized algorithms, watching becomes lean-back and people participate less, through likes, comments or art made in response. — 00:03:24
  • 2026-09-18 · John was Wrong about YouTube Views — Hank says this is not what anyone means by a view, and he finds it inaccurate and manipulative, both to creators and to brands. — 00:05:55
  • 2026-10-02 · the most powerful attention-consuming tools in the history of the world — John observes that personalized algorithms, the most powerful attention-consuming tools in history, are offered to you free all the time because your attention is that valuable. — 00:00:29
  • 2026-10-30 · The Last Normal Year — Hank says turning machine learning algorithms on human attention seemed a little thing, but they show not always what you like, sometimes whatever you will watch, perhaps out of fear or anger. — 00:05:53
    • Hank says AI controls what we see: not LLMs, though they are increasingly part of it, but AI decides which YouTube thumbnails we see, what is in our Threads, Twitter, Facebook and Instagram feeds, and what comes next when swiping. — 00:07:09
  • …and 10 statements more in 2026 — all statements of 2026