Why I See the Future of YouTube as Hopeless for Most Creators
The future of YouTube is absolutely hopeless for most creators. I'm going to lay out, after 15 years on YouTube, why I see that happening, where we're going in the future, and I'm going to give you a very clear solution for what to do instead. The best part is, I'm doing exactly this myself. I deleted everything on YouTube last year. I had gotten over a billion impressions across all the different platforms — Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, TikTok, and more. I deleted everything last year because I see what's coming. AI is getting so effective that it's annihilating the need for a lot of content, and you haven't seen anything compared to what it's going to be able to do in the future.
If you've seen how much AI has progressed in the last few years, you know what I mean. A few years ago, I had to make thumbnails and come up with my own hooks and video titles. Recently, AI created a thumbnail for me in just a minute. I had just told AI my video idea, and it instantly gave me fifteen titles and the hooks — it did all of that. So right now, AI is actually making content creation easier, and most creators are trying to teach you how to use AI to do better content creation. But you've got to look at where this is going. AI can already generate videos. And AI like ChatGPT, when people go and talk to it, is eliminating the need for people to even go on YouTube.
AI Is Cutting Out the Need to Use YouTube at All
One of the big things that used to draw people to YouTube was educational and how-to content. People would think, "Oh, I want to figure out how to do this. I'll go to YouTube." For example, with dating: "I'm struggling with dating — let me go to YouTube and find somebody that can help me." You don't need to do that anymore. AI has gotten so good, you don't even need to go to YouTube. AI will tell you the same kind of stuff about dating, and you can give AI your entire dating profile and it will instantly come back to you with feedback. AI is doing this in so many other areas. You've got ChatGPT Pro, which is insane for doing research.
Crypto, for example, is a perfect area of YouTube that in my view is absolutely hopeless, because crypto YouTube totally depends on people being utterly clueless about these different coins and watching people who are so-called authorities or influencers tell them what to do. I make crypto videos, so I would know. And yet now AI can do such incredible research that you don't need to even watch crypto YouTube content anymore. I just wanted to do some research for a video, so I asked Gemini. I went into Gemini, and it was so much better than watching a video. I asked what some of the most viral or interesting things happening in crypto today were, and it had all the data — bam, it just cranked all of it out right there. I don't have to go on X and listen to all these people. I don't have to pick who to follow. AI just pulls all the data and drops it right there. That's the future. So the future of YouTube, to me, is absolutely unsustainable, because AI is cutting out the need to even use YouTube for most things.
The Algorithm, the Comments, and the Bots
On top of that, you have a ton of people already doing YouTube who already have audiences. And if you're not saying exactly the right things, you are just never going to go anywhere in the algorithm. I hate to break it to you, because you might be pretty idealistic if you're a content creator. I had channels with thousands of dollars a month in passive income where I literally didn't have to do anything. My old videos — because I put thousands of videos on YouTube — would continue to get search traffic. And I deleted all of that because I see where this is going. I see that my effort on YouTube is continually producing diminishing returns. In terms of monetizing YouTube, it is continuing to get more difficult.
These days I'm not reading anything anyone says to me on YouTube for free anymore. It doesn't matter what you post in the comments. The comments are your place to say whatever you want, and the video is my place to say whatever I want. If you want me to listen to you, you can join the Jerry Banfield Family on Skool. And you can see, even with my community, your first thought might be: why would I join that? I can just ask AI anything I want to know immediately. Why would I bother with a community?
Well, to me, the future of monetization on YouTube is communities — bringing real people together. But there's a huge problem with that also. In my community you can have a direct interaction with me, which can be nice — you can share, discuss, give me comments, share your situation, and ask for advice. However, online interaction and posting is turning into one AI response talking to another AI response. Have you noticed that? You go on X, and it's like somebody just talked to AI and had it crank out something for them. Then they post that, and somebody replies by talking to AI and dumping an AI post back in there. In a lot of cases, people probably aren't even reading these posts. They're just putting them into AI and asking, "What did this guy really say? Now give me a response." People are just talking through AI.
That's bad for YouTube, because a lot of YouTube was built on comments and organic discussion and people not having AI to use. The future of YouTube is being hit from every angle, where you don't even need to get into the comment section on a YouTube video because you're just going to find bots there. And the more people disengage from YouTube, the more it becomes an empty bot farm. If you haven't noticed, bots are a huge problem on YouTube. From what I've seen, bots are pushing huge amounts of videos — if you'll put the right narratives out there, bots will push your video. If you promote certain kinds of diets or certain crypto coins or certain narratives that certain people with no ethics at all want promoted, they will use bots to push your videos. The bots will give YouTube all kinds of positive data, and then YouTube will show the video to more real people because of that. So if you think you're just going to go on YouTube, share your thoughts, and not end up having to say certain things to get views, I hate to break it to you. My channels are a great example of that.
Why I Came Back to YouTube After Deleting Everything
You might ask: well, why did you come back to YouTube after you deleted everything, here in 2026? Honest answer — I couldn't find anything better to do with myself. I tried doing local stuff, and I didn't get anywhere trying to help people write books or build a local business in nine months. So I started up YouTube channels because I got divorced. I'm living by myself now, and I can't live off my wife anymore, so I need to make some money. I went first to what I already knew made money for me, which is YouTube. And I've been surprised to find that it actually is pretty easy, if you create very certain types of content, to get some organic reach today — because a lot of YouTubers have given up. It's obvious how hopeless it is.
It is absolutely naive to think you're just going to put a great title and a great thumbnail on a video and get any kind of views. There are so many other people doing so much better titles and videos and thumbnails than you're ever going to come up with, you might as well quit. Hopelessness is actually very valuable, because you quit doing wasteful activities. I've seen that my YouTube is pretty hopeless. I know I'm not willing to say whatever I need to say to get paid on YouTube. The way I see it, the future of YouTube is that pretty much only the people who are saying whatever they need to say to get paid are going to get paid. That's what I've seen, and the Mr. Beast era has really reflected that — you do whatever you need to do, go to any lengths to get attention, say whatever you need to say to get paid, and anyone not doing that is pretty much irrelevant.
The Solution: Use YouTube to Focus In Person
Now, that said, I still think having a YouTube channel and doing videos that are out there to try and help people is valuable. Even if I don't have a lot of people watching some of my videos, like my YouTube coach videos, I at least have the chance to help someone, and that feels good. I at least have the chance to express myself, which is useful. But what I see as the future is focusing in person. One of the best things you can use YouTube videos for is to help support you in focusing in person. To me, this is the solution.
When I started on YouTube in 2011, there was a huge opportunity because hardly anyone was creating content, and the number of people interested in watching content consistently went up. However, since the peak in 2021, the number of people watching content has actually dropped. A lot of people are pulling away from even watching YouTube or any kind of content creation or consumption. Take me: I'm not on Instagram. I'm not on Facebook. Even on YouTube, my consumption of content is very conscious and very limited. If I'm not getting a video specifically recommended to me by somebody, I'm not just scrolling the YouTube feed anymore. This is why YouTube has gotten so hopeless for most creators. The thought that you're just going to get discovered in the feed because you made a great video is ridiculous. I've seen so many heartbreaking examples of people who put a month into a video, tried everything, and then their video got 200 views.
So the way I see it, the best thing YouTube is good for is helping you focus in person. YouTube is a great place to share, express yourself, and see what you want to talk about. But doing what you do on YouTube in person is valuable, because what's scarce right now is in person. For example, a dating coach. You want a dating coach? You can go online, and there are all kinds of so-called dating gurus that will talk to you, charge you for their communities, and charge you a fortune for their coaching. But if you want a local dating coach, that's scarce. I know exactly two dating coaches in St. Petersburg, Florida. And I guarantee you, if one of these guys had tried to do dating on YouTube, he would have made nothing. This guy is making ten grand a month doing local dating coaching, and he has a handful of clients — the majority of them paying him thousands of dollars a month to basically be like a paid boyfriend for them.
The Local Dating Coach Making Ten Grand a Month
I talked about that on my Jerry Banfield dating channel. There's not any sex involved — he's basically filling the role of a boyfriend and then trying to help these women get out there, meet men, and be ready for an actual boyfriend. And this guy is cleaning up. This is a guy you'd walk by in the street, and you wouldn't believe that he's making ten grand a month coaching mostly hot women on how to date and showing them how to date, showing up for them like a boyfriend until they find their man. These women are paying this guy fifteen-plus hundred dollars a month. This is the future.
I can tell you firsthand that what you have to do on YouTube to earn $1,500 a month is significant. I know, because what I've done is post several videos a day across six different channels, and that's got me to earning $1,500 a month. Do you know how much time I have to spend, and how much knowledge I have loaded into AI? Do you know how much experience it takes to crank out several videos a day across different niches, monetize a couple of channels to make a few hundred a month of ad revenue, and then have some one-on-one calls people pay for, all adding up to like $1,500 to $2,000 a month? Now, yes, I did start up within three months and got over a thousand dollars a month, and now I'm at around $1,500 to $2,000 a month.
What It Would Take for Me to Get Paid Big on YouTube
However, here's what I see. By the end of the year, I want to make something like 50 or 100 grand. So I asked: how am I going to do that? Well, if I want to do that on YouTube, I need to say what I need to say to get paid. I know what I need to say to get paid, and I know how to find what to say to get paid. I know which things to talk about and promote. The problem is, I have integrity, and I'm not just going to say whatever I need to say to get paid. I'm not going to promote garbage crypto coins and take a bunch of money in exchange for doing that. I'm not going to promote diets that are pushed by bots and that, in my experience, don't work in real life — like I talked about on my Jerry Banfield channel. I'm not going to push these manipulated narratives. I'm not going to create content that garbages people's lives up and pushes narratives like "dating's broken," or "life is so hard and hopeless," or "the job market's wrecked." If you push stuff like that to people who are mostly lonely and angry, you can get paid. If you really want to get paid on YouTube, you need to lean into drama and gossip, talk all kinds of junk about people, and react to garbage viral content that puts out extreme points of view. So that's hopeless. That's why I'm defining how hopeless this is — because unless you want to show up and do all of that, you will find that the opportunities are so much better in person.
No Amount of Content Makes Up for Real In-Person Relationships
Here's what's beautiful about in person. Being a YouTuber, lonely and filming videos in a studio like I'm doing right now, is often pretty sad. You're just in your house talking to yourself. But when you're in person, you're meeting people, you're connecting, you're building friendships. If you're single, you can find somebody to date. It's amazing. What I've noticed is that no amount of content will make up for a real in-person relationship. No amount of videos I watch will make up for having a massage. No amount of dating videos I watch will make up for having an in-real-life dating coach who takes me to real events where I meet real women, then analyzes and talks with me.
I paid $1,200 for a dating coach. Now think about how many dating videos I watched on YouTube where I did not join their community. Think about how many dating videos I watched where I didn't pay them anything. I had one woman locally — actually two people offering coaching. The one guy I was telling you about before, I turned down his coaching because my friend offered me a better deal: more value for less. For $1,200 — or maybe it was $1,800, I think it was $1,200 — she took me to something like six in-person events. We went and had dinner together afterwards one night just to talk about everything. The experience of doing in-person dating coaching with her was awesome. And there are probably only a handful of people in St. Petersburg, Florida, at least that I could find, who even offer dating coaching. Meanwhile, there are thousands of people acutely struggling with dating in St. Petersburg, Florida. So you always need to be looking at where the opportunity is. And then what you can do with YouTube is get out there and share your experience with other people. I think that's a great way to use it.
So if I wear a shirt in person — which I'm planning to order — that says "Jerry Banfield Dating Coach," then I have a Jerry Banfield Dating YouTube channel to back it up. And I actually got a date, and part of it was because I had a dating channel. I got this woman talking about dating, and I ended up having two weeks of dating her. The first week was awesome. I talked about that on my recent Jerry Banfield Dating video — about how I respected her and she felt rejected. That's the full story on that video. Long story short — or maybe we'll make this long story longer — being out there in person with people, having real conversations, is so meaningful to your life. Being a YouTuber is often a very empty-feeling, sad kind of thing.
I remember watching a guy a year or two ago who did a video about a week in the life of a full-time music YouTuber. This guy's whole life was sitting at home editing videos and sitting at home talking on Zoom. That's part of why I deleted everything before. I've made a lot of videos, and I've made millions of dollars from YouTube and online content creation. What I can tell you is that I used to charge $300 for an hour-long Zoom call, and I got so burnt out doing Zoom calls talking about the exact same thing every day that I literally stopped offering them. I intentionally said, I don't care how much money I'm getting for this — I hate doing it. Whereas doing stuff with people in person tends to be really fun, and magic tends to happen in person. That, to me, is the future.
AI Will Come for Entertainment Too
AI is going to be able to wipe out even entertainment. You might say, "Well, Mr. Beast is never going to be irrelevant on YouTube." Even Mr. Beast's views have started to drop off. A few more years into the future, assuming they set up the licensing, you're going to be able to just go to AI and say, "Generate me a version of Star Wars where Han Solo doesn't show up at the final Death Star battle." Or, "Generate me a version of Star Wars where it's all about Leia instead of Luke Skywalker." You're going to be able to do stuff like that with AI, and that's going to make YouTube entertainment mostly irrelevant. A lot of YouTube entertainment may shift more towards AI-generated stuff. And the people who are able to still survive in an environment like that are going to have to be saying what they need to say and doing what they need to do to get paid by all the bots. So YouTube is absolutely hopeless for most creators.
The One Kind of Content Still Worth Making
However, I will note, while it's on my mind: just making a vlog is something that is very useful, regardless of whether you get views on it. I have my @JerryBanfield channel where I just make vlogs every day, and I did one recently called something like "It Doesn't Matter What I Title This." One thing that can be very helpful for you is to make a vlog just to preserve your own life story. One of the most valuable things going forward will be real human stories, because AI is going to be able to generate almost everything else. A real human attached to a real story — that will be one of the only kinds of content that even matters anymore. So to me, the one kind of content that's worth creating on YouTube is a vlog. Just talk about your life every day. It's therapeutic for you to talk, it's therapeutic to see your life and to share it out there. But I don't think relying on YouTube for money, or holding onto the idea that you're going to be a content creator, is sustainable going forward. And if you want to come give me your comments and feedback and support me, join the Jerry Banfield Family — I'm in there with you.
I hope this helps some of you. I've seen some of you previously in the comments saying you're so burned out, that you feel like it's all over on YouTube. It is — YouTube is ending for most creators, at least financially. You can still make and share whatever you want, and you might be able to get an audience, but the ability to make money off it will be very limited in most cases, because people are not buying. Why would anyone buy a digital product or a course when people are sharing the same information for free on YouTube, and when AI can tell you the same thing? If you want to see more of how I think about building a channel in this environment, I've shared a lot in my YouTube Coaching playlist. And if you don't see how hopeless the future of YouTube is, look at the typical response of almost everybody who's going to watch your videos: they're not going to do anything else with you besides watch the video.