If you’ve watched a video—any video, really—chances are you’ve spent a fair amount of time on YouTube. In fact, if you’re reading this at all, I suspect YouTube plays a role in your life in some form or another, as it does in mine. What has grown increasingly intriguing for me, both as a content creator and as a regular viewer, is not merely the scope of topics available on the platform, but the formats through which they are presented. There is a remarkable breadth to YouTube videos—not just in what they say, but in how they say it. And that, it turns out, is no small thing.

You might think that when you click on a video, you do so because of the subject matter. But upon closer inspection, something deeper is at work. Imagine for a moment that you could line up ten videos, all addressing the same subject, perhaps the same factual information, yet you might find some utterly captivating and others intolerable within seconds. This doesn’t just speak to taste—it speaks to the structure, tone, pacing, and emotional language of the video. The content, as it turns out, is only half the story.

Even more curious is the idea that if you gathered a hundred people to watch those very same ten videos, their preferences would vary wildly. What one person finds riveting, another might consider unbearable. This flies directly in the face of every self-proclaimed YouTube expert who insists that there is a singular, proven formula for “audience retention” or “clickability.” The idea that there is one correct way to present information is, frankly, absurd. We are not all wired the same.

Take, for instance, the concept of B-roll. For those unfamiliar, the A-roll is the main footage—usually a person speaking to the camera—while the B-roll is the supplemental footage that cuts away to something else: an image, a video clip, an animation. In theory, it serves to enhance or illustrate what the speaker is describing. A person discusses a difficult study session, and the B-roll cuts to a tired-looking student surrounded by books. A mention of a beach vacation prompts a dreamy scene of someone walking along the shore in flowing white linen.

These clips are meant to add atmosphere or emotional context. But for me, more often than not, they do the opposite. I find B-roll to be a distraction—an intrusive visual that clashes with the image I’ve already constructed in my head. When I listen to someone speak, my imagination naturally forms its own pictures. Injecting another person’s curated visuals into that process often creates cognitive dissonance. It pulls me out of the experience rather than enriching it.

The problem becomes even worse when these B-roll images flash by in rapid succession, accompanied by loud sound effects or over-caffeinated narration. The pace becomes frenetic, the input overwhelming. For a viewer like me—someone who did not grow up in the age of hyperstimulation—this barrage of sensory shifts is more exhausting than engaging. It’s not a matter of right or wrong, but rather of neurological conditioning. Younger generations, raised on fast edits and perpetual novelty, may find this style energizing. For them, a slower pace may seem dull. But for those of us seasoned by quieter decades, the opposite is true. Our attentional systems were forged under different circumstances.

There is, in fact, growing research into how our media consumption patterns shape our brains. Whether this is good or bad may be debatable, but what is not debatable is that it is. The human brain adapts to the stimuli it receives regularly. And what it finds natural or jarring depends greatly on its media diet.

This is why content creators must deeply understand their audience—not just in terms of interests, but in terms of age, background, and aesthetic preference. A video designed for an audience of teenagers may fall flat with someone in their fifties, and vice versa. These differences are not superficial. They are cognitive. And they matter.

Consider the pacing of movies. Compare a film from the 1950s to one made today. The former often feels like it unfolds in geological time. Long takes, thoughtful silences, lingering dialogue. Today’s films move at a blistering pace—scenes shift rapidly, music swells, explosions punctuate emotional beats. What once was considered engaging is now labeled slow. But these shifts happened gradually, imperceptibly. And YouTube has inherited—and in some ways exaggerated—this momentum.

Beyond editing and imagery, the style of delivery can make or break a video. Personally, I gravitate toward conversational videos. One person, maybe two, talking naturally. I’m immediately repelled by what I can only describe as the “wacky comedy duo” format—two overly animated people bouncing dialogue back and forth in exaggerated tones. It feels staged, insincere. People don’t talk to each other like that in real life, and the artificiality is glaring. Perhaps others enjoy it. But for me, the spell is broken.

Even worse is the clickbait tactic of delaying the point. A video promises to tell you something, but instead delivers a long-winded buildup, peppered with distractions and tangents, carefully designed to stretch out the watch time. Eventually, the promised nugget is delivered—usually. But by then, the trust is eroded. I understand the algorithmic game being played, and I resent it. I feel manipulated, and the presenter’s credibility plummets accordingly.

Faceless YouTube channels present their own conundrum. Without an on-camera presence, the video consists entirely of B-roll—sometimes generic stock footage, sometimes animated graphics, sometimes even gameplay. Strangely, I’ve found myself more engaged with channels that use synthetic voices—clearly AI-generated narration—rather than an actual human speaker. Perhaps the neutrality of these voices leaves more room for interpretation, or maybe it’s the absence of performative enthusiasm. I wouldn’t have guessed I’d prefer a machine’s voice, but there it is.

Of course, a great deal of my YouTube time is actually spent listening rather than watching. While driving or walking, I consume content as if it were a podcast. In these cases, visuals are irrelevant, which makes the overly visual formats frustrating—especially those filled with annotation or visual jokes I can’t see. Yet again, it depends on the topic. If it’s a casual conversation or a philosophical discussion, audio is sufficient. But if it’s a tutorial or game analysis, I may need to return and watch it again later.

YouTube, whether we like it or not, has become a part of modern life. As a viewer, you are inundated with options. As a creator, you are vying for slivers of human attention in a chaotic digital landscape. The platform is young, yes—but already mature enough to show generational divides, artistic divergences, and evolving standards.

There is no singular formula, no perfect style. What works for some will alienate others. We are not dealing with universal rules, but with aesthetics—diverse, contradictory, and often shifting. This makes the entire ecosystem endlessly fascinating to me, both as a creator and an observer.

So I’m curious—what kinds of YouTube videos do you enjoy? What styles leave you cold? And why? Not just for my benefit, but because I believe this is one of the most compelling cultural questions of our time. We are still in the early stages of this audiovisual evolution, and there is no endpoint in sight. Only divergence. Only change. Only adaptation.