Eli the computer guy […] had this show up in his dashboard: “grow your Channel’s popularity and engagement by promoting your video on YouTube, running a promotion helps attract new viewers who can boost your subscriptions, views, likes, and other engagement” and the way this works is your videos will show up if you pay them. YouTube is trying to get people who make content on YouTube to pay for views now.

Isn’t this kind of basic in terms of content marketing?

One entity makes content then pays another company to promote it?

What else would Luis being doing if he actually had to pay for the storage space YouTube gives him for free? Handing out CDs on the street?

Is he aware that companies like Pinterest already do this?

I can’t say that the sudden huge drop in viewership isn’t suspicious though.

It makes sense if you think about it like basic marketing

But the thing is Youtube already promoted channels through it's algorithm. Having to pay for it implies that something has changed regarding it.

I think what's worse is that the content seemed to be less visible even to his subscribers. The discoverability of your content to new people who are not actively looking for it is one thing, bit hiding it from people who have actively said they want to view it is another thing entirely.

the content seemed to be less visible even to his subscribers

Am I the only one who still uses the subscriptions page? I get a chronological list of all my subscribed channel's video releases. I have seen zero indication that I'm missing anything at all, and I fairly frequently go to channel's pages to check that my subscription list is complete.

I've never clicked a single notification bell, and don't rely on the home page's recommendations/sorting, unless I'm actively seeking out new recommendations.