I sent this to a buddy of mine, because I just thought it was interesting how two video thumbnails came up right next to each other, which both had two girls of similar appearance.
Both with their eyes closed, and both video thumbnails are right next to each other on the suggested feed.

My buddy also commented on the fact that they both have something on the left side of their head, with their left arm raised.
Then it also occurred to me that there's also some guy staring straight ahead in both photos. (LoL)
Makes you wonder if the algorithm sometimes puts videos with similar thumbnails next to each other, no?
What if you could create a thumbnail similar to a high traffic video?
Would there be some potential to be featured next to that video?
Something interesting for someone who cares to test it.
I spotted that first correlation some months ago, and ever since, I've been noticing it all over the place.
Today, I watched this video on a monkey howling and spinning (high class material), and some of the suggested videos have thumbnails of people and animals making a similar "O" face.




Like, when all your suggested videos are literally looking similar in just their thumbnail, it kind-of seems like that's a ranking strategy.
Obviously the actual content is vastly different, but it's strange that there is so much emphasis on something like this, as a potential ranking factor.
I guess if you reverse engineered it, you could just look at a video you wanna be featured next to, then take a glance at all the thumbnails, and see if you can spot a pattern.
Just thinking out-loud, here...

Both with their eyes closed, and both video thumbnails are right next to each other on the suggested feed.

My buddy also commented on the fact that they both have something on the left side of their head, with their left arm raised.
Then it also occurred to me that there's also some guy staring straight ahead in both photos. (LoL)
Makes you wonder if the algorithm sometimes puts videos with similar thumbnails next to each other, no?
What if you could create a thumbnail similar to a high traffic video?
Would there be some potential to be featured next to that video?
Something interesting for someone who cares to test it.
I spotted that first correlation some months ago, and ever since, I've been noticing it all over the place.
Today, I watched this video on a monkey howling and spinning (high class material), and some of the suggested videos have thumbnails of people and animals making a similar "O" face.




Like, when all your suggested videos are literally looking similar in just their thumbnail, it kind-of seems like that's a ranking strategy.
Obviously the actual content is vastly different, but it's strange that there is so much emphasis on something like this, as a potential ranking factor.
I guess if you reverse engineered it, you could just look at a video you wanna be featured next to, then take a glance at all the thumbnails, and see if you can spot a pattern.
Just thinking out-loud, here...




