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YouTubers understood YouTube, often better than the company.

in so many ways, YouTube had set the stage for modern social media, making decisions throughout its history that shaped how attention, money, ideology, and everything else worked online.

“Look, if you do what they say, and it doesn’t work, they will deny ever having said it,” Gilbert told him. “If you don’t do what they say, and it works, they will take credit for it. Just make sure the damn thing works.”

A strategic shift was under way at Google. The company had determined its video site should present media tailored just so for every viewer, the way social networks did.

“People want to see and be seen,” he would write weeks later.

the most damning case against the team was that it lacked a way to measure itself. At Google, everything was measured.

Zunger proposed adding a third tier for these debatable clips: keep them up but note internally that they were close to the line. If accounts came close too often, pull them from video recommendations.

“All other things being equal, our goal is to increase watch time,”

At PayPal, the YouTube founders had a reputation as more of the B team.