YouTube's New "One Channel" Layout

I have been a YouTuber for 5 and a half years and have been through the peak of the site... and now the trough of it. They rolled out a new design early this month and it is.... terrible. Not to mention a big middle finger to the contributors and partners like ME.

A Look Back at Previous Channels
In case it is not known, my channel is focused on a hodgepodge of videos of transportation and scale models built with LEGO bricks and the like. I achieved partnership in 2010 so many of these screencaps lack the perks but show the drive that I had to become one... I did, but that's when things turned southward.
The first design I caught up with had MANY, MANY features. I wasn't a partner then but was to some extent up and coming. Note: hobbies and media (I was in adolescence at the time, which is why I was quite expressive), being a "Director" (Wait, what's that now?), etc... and more in the subsequent screenies. This my friends is how YouTube became popular.
You could add friends, and publicize a "Video Log" which at the time meant a key playlist of favorite videos. Friends was abolished around 2011. 
Bulletins was a designated section for messages to all friends. Per the 2012 design, you can post them but they show as status updates basically. Favorites was its own column as well.


Slight cosmetic changes came as this 2009 cap shows. Most of everything stayed the same.
The biggest change at the time happened in '09. Many people didn't favor it but I found it almost as versatile so I settled for it.
The 2012 design. Removed a lot of features. When I became a partner (2010) there was so much that could be done to the design above, but that got stripped and in the end partners were like ordinary tubers. In the 2009 design only partners could stick a banner on top but this time one had to encode it to the background image.... Yikes. Also this "HTML friendly" banner was now open to anyone, lowering the incentive of a partnership.
And a drum roll for the 2013 design, which I pulled away from as soon as I sampled it:
Look at the difference. No individuality anymore and it looks like the homepage. Text that is supposed to catch some attention is all so microscopic. The channel looks like... you guessed it... a Facebook profile. You can't autoplay videos anymore either. Partners now have absolutely no distinction except for the ads on the videos, and maybe they can customize one little gadget if they sponsor it or pay dearly for promotions.

 In a nutshell, you are looking at face to face how YouTube has changed. The channel has become more abstract; and, now as I have said, Partners, who are supposed to be treated like kings, have no distinction. Right here on this entry, looking at the thumbs at face value, you can see how before there was so much information, so much going on and now it's too simple that it's really down to the bare bones.

On one of the blogs, a user commented saying that the "new" features are sugarcoated features we had before... and true that. The "cover photo" is the same banner we could have had before, so it isn't new. The "unsubbed trailer" is actually a featured video gone bad (as I said, you can't autoplay anymore, and as such, won't be as able to sell your channel as easily to the viewer). "Availability on other platforms".... well then what is m.youtube.com for anyway? And YouTube on TVs? I've been to many friends' houses and have never used a television  to watch YouTube videos.

Enough being one sided... You cannot entirely blame YouTube, however. Society has gone downhill with attention spans as thin as a hair for most people. So simple stuff like this will appeal to them; the fewer gadgets the quicker they could go through it. But wait... YouTube didn't become popular because of this abstract design; they were made popular by how they were in 2007. And you could see the marked contrast in how the site looked back then.

I watched the company video announcing the change, once... twice... and I wonder how in the world people could be succeeding from this. A channel should allow the people to advertise and BROADCAST themselves... Oh wait, "Broadcast Yourself" doesn't seem to be the slogan anymore. But instead it's all apples among apples. What amazes me is a comment on one entry saying that someone lost traffic dealing with the new features... and I'm not surprised at all given the new face of branding.

...which brings me back to the pictures of my channel in 2007. It was a hangout and a means of communicating with viewers, subscribers, and other channels that we called friends. Now, the only communication is through videos. I don't even see where you could send messages to the tuber anymore either. I wonder if you guys remember "YouTube Groups" as well...

In the end...
I am not lashing an attack towards Google or YouTube with respect to this change. I am writing this to really ask one thing to the web developers. Please..... PLEASE.... rethink the way we partners and Tubers are being allowed to communicate on the site. Many users are stating that they are disappointed with the new way the site looks and will be happy to leave if this is forced upon, so I am not alone. Someone commented on an article saying that there is no motivation to be a partner anymore since they watered down that too to its bare bones. These are anything but steps forward... they are regressive. Not to mention these changes are oppressive to the YouTube experience. I would not like to see the death of such a successful site, all in the hands of an internet giant.

Sincerely,
Disgruntled YouTube Partner.



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