Watching Gamers
This one applies to those 90s babies and onwards. Don’t deny it a large portion of you have been there. Got a new game can’t find your way out of a level? It’s all too easy to google a tutorial or walk through video. Others of you have found yourselves strangely addicted to simply watching online gamers strut their stuff ‘KSI’ now has over 13.5m subscribers on youtube. His videos are predominately focused upon the FIFA series. Whilst ‘Drift0r’ may only have 1.2m subscribers he is known as the father of Call of Duty for his in depth game analysis. Lets face it, if playing video games is considered a waste of time, then what does that mean for time spent watching people you don’t even know play video games?
Conspiracy theories/ documentaries
Meant to be revising for an exam? Why not quickly youtube some advice for some pre exam tips… Or alternatively pop ‘who actually called Tupac?’ in the search bar and spend your next three hours digesting a wide range of different conspiracy theories. Some of the various Madeline McCann and Princess Dianna conspiracy theories are also very persuading. After hours of digesting and questioning the various theories surrounding these controversies one would seemingly have to question how your time could be better spent.
Money making schemes
‘I made 10k in a week – you could too!’ ‘Try this quick way of making money’ now lets be honest at one time or another we’ve all been there. We’ve seen a link to these schemes and been foolish enough to click there. We’ve watched the video, and it seems risk free and effortless yet alarm bells are still ringing in your head. So… You watch another, and another, and an hour later you realise as you first suspected that they’re all likely to be yet another hoax. Thanks Youtube! Firstly for wasting my time, and secondly for getting my hopes up!
Watching the ‘Youtuber’
Zoella? Joe Weller? DanIsNotOnFire? Ring any bells? Yes, probably. These guys live their lives on camera and for one reason or another keep you guys gripped. How could you possibly get on with your day without finding what Joe Weller had for breakfast? We love these guys too don’t get me wrong, they’re very entertaining but some of the obsessions you guys have with them are a little over the top. I’m sure you can go a week without finding out Zoella’s latest favourite make up routine.
Memes/Vines
It’s not just Youtube’s fault this one, the more recent Twitter and Vine apps have a major role to play in causing distraction with these short videos. Vines are typically no longer than ten seconds, and memes are just a captioned picture but the minutes, hours and days these distractions cause well let’s be frank. You’ll never get back.
Animals doing funny things
If you don’t find animals doing funny things hilarious then there may be something wrong with you. Animals do the funniest of things, period. Whether it be cats opening doors, dogs losing their footing or even penguins encountering a major dilemma these videos won’t stop coming. That autoplay feature on youtube may well have become the bane of many of our lives.
Seriously though watch this.
Snoop Dog’s commentaries on nature
Similar to animals doing funny things but this ones kinda niche. However it continues to drive our levels of procrastination to another level. Once you start watching these you won’t stop. Nature + Animals + Snoop Dog = Hours Gone. These videos just don’t seem to get boring with many of you watching them on repeat. One of the videos has nearly 4,000,000 views. It’s kinda like Attenborough with more laughs and less education. Okay for an hour but days later when you’re still watching the same things you may have to admit a problem is well and truly on your hands.
Strange histories
The history of France, racism, neo-liberalism, democracy. These are all interesting and stimulating intellectual pursuits, they’re teaching us about our world and planet and how we’ve come to exist today. But when one starts to venture into some of the stranger histories and pasts of the world we come to question how useful it is to know the history of ‘Clash of Clans’ (4.8m hits on youtube) or the History of the Bra (3m hits respectively). We do have to question what kind of a positive impact this knowledge will have upon our lives. Continue by all means to educate yourself on these somewhat trivial interests but don’t forget you may never be called upon to recall the live date for the Clash of Clans app.
‘Pokemon go’ fails
Pokemon has taken over once again and this time its gone digital in a typically 2010s way. We’re now seeing fully grown men and women scouring our streets in search of the most precious and rare Pokemon. Tragically we’ve seen some fatalities and some nasty crimes as a result of this phenomena but what is entertaining is to go through some of the videos of the public caught in their attempts to catch the latest Pokemon. Is it sad that many of us have come to be the ones wasting our time watching these guys waste theirs?
Youtube is great and we’re all ashamed of how much time we spend on it but at the end of the day we’re only human.
