> Because in every other way (and every way for the viewer), this makes Youtube worse
It makes YouTube worse for the viewer, but YouTube doesn't have to care because they have a monopoly, so realistically speaking nobody will leave.
Thus they get to appease the brands/big channels with virtually no downside. Even better, the lack of a quality filter provided by dislikes mean people may have to trawl through more shit before they find what they want to watch, thus increasing engagement metrics.
This is the same reason most monopoly-level social media platforms take a relaxed stance on spam or malicious/illegal content (besides edge-cases which have legal or PR consequences) - the spam still drives (and itself counts as) engagement and the network effects are strong enough to overcome the annoyance and keep people on the platform anyway.
It makes YouTube worse for the viewer, but YouTube doesn't have to care because they have a monopoly, so realistically speaking nobody will leave.
Thus they get to appease the brands/big channels with virtually no downside. Even better, the lack of a quality filter provided by dislikes mean people may have to trawl through more shit before they find what they want to watch, thus increasing engagement metrics.
This is the same reason most monopoly-level social media platforms take a relaxed stance on spam or malicious/illegal content (besides edge-cases which have legal or PR consequences) - the spam still drives (and itself counts as) engagement and the network effects are strong enough to overcome the annoyance and keep people on the platform anyway.