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On January 11, YouTube sensation Jimmy "MrBeast" appeared as a guest on the Lex Fridman Podcast. One of the podcast's interesting topics of conversation came up when Fridman asked MrBeast what he would change if he were to hypothetically run YouTube for a year.
Jimmy responded by stating that he was "very happy" with how the video suggestions worked on the platform. However, one thing that he would change was the comments section. He added that he "passionately hated" the feature in its current form. He then compared the YouTube comments section with Reddit, emphasizing how optimized the community engagement was on the latter.
"It's just so bad!" - MrBeast on the YouTube comments section before comparing it with Reddit
Lex Fridman initiated the discussion by asking MrBeast what he would change and improve if he were to run YouTube for a year. The latter responded by offering his thoughts on the platform's video suggestions, saying:
"I feel like, when I open up YouTube on my television, I get the videos I want to watch. I don't know. I don't ever open it and wonder like, 'What are these? What are these ten videos on my home page?' When I click on the video, I don't ever wonder what these are."
The Kansas native then revealed that the main feature that he'd like to improve would have to be the comments section:
"One thing though that I hate with the passion is the comments section on YouTube. It's just so bad! But I know that's not something that going to 10x the growth of the platform."
Timestamp: 00:13:08
MrBeast elaborated by comparing YouTube's comments section with Reddit, claiming that the top comments on the latter were "not spam:"
"But if you think about it, you go to Reddit to read comments and somehow, like, that you know, usually the top 20 posts, on a popular Reddit post, are not spam. You know what I mean? Like, have you ever clicked on something on the front page of Reddit and then the most upvoted reply to it is like, 'Go check out my site right here!' and it's trying to like, scam you out of a thousand dollars?"
The philanthropist claimed that he never came across a single instance of the aforementioned phenomenon on Reddit. He went on to say that the platform offered a better viewer experience, saying:
"Reddit, it's so nice to click on posts and just see what people have to say, and I almost wish like, you had that same feeling when you read the comments in a YouTube video. Instead, it's like, it's so many people just copy and pasting. So many bots that just grab the top comment from your previous video and paste it over. So, the top comments on every video are the same."
MrBeast also mentioned the presence of "scammers" in the YouTube comment section:
"The things that breakthrough that are just scammers, trying to get you to give them a thousand dollars for free; a fake ad."
Fans react to MrBeast conversing with Lex Fridman
Over 3,000 fan reactions were posted in the YouTube video's comments section, with several community members sharing their thoughts on Jimmy's conversation with Lex Fridman. Here's what they had to say:
MrBeast is easily one of the most recognizable figures on the internet. He crossed the coveted 100 million subscriber mark last year and quickly dethroned Felix "PewDiePie" to become the platform's most-subscribed content creator.
