Yeah I watched some 'forgotten weapons' and 'demolition ranch' videos, and it was wild how quickly my feed changed from science and history stuff to conservative talking points. I spent a rather long time marking videos as 'do not recommend this channel, I dislike this video' etc, before things returned to normal.
Another simple way to address this is to remove uninteresting videos from history, then recommendations go back to normal. We have to do it on our kids account periodically.
I just fully revoked Google from keeping any data on my viewing habits and for some time now my YouTube main page has been a rehash of popular videos from my subscribed channels (and the occasional cat video). I sure don't miss the craziness desperately trying to get me to watch as much as possible.
I watched something right wing, I can't remember what, and for years YouTube was bombarding me with crazy half-truths and memes. I tuned them out just like most of the other bullshit I get bombarded with all day, but I wonder how many people have been radicalized this way..
