Enshittification and AI Slop
If my work brings you peace, consider supporting a real human for $3.
It
was hard enough in 2025, but in 2026, it has truly become a jungle out there.
As you all know, we are content creators on YouTube. We have the
YouTube channel Serenity of the Mind or
@serenityofthemind, which we started four years ago. Our son talked
us into doing a YouTube channel to keep our minds off of the constant
news of the world falling apart. We found it was fun, and we hoped to
make a little income to supplement our meager retirement.
Well,
back then, Pexels and Pixabay were free video stock platforms with
lots and lots of wonderful cat videos and photos. Today, it they are like a
desert in comparison to four years ago. Not only that, but now they
have tons of iStock stuff that they steer you toward. Other stuff
besides funny cat videos to make compilations from has now become
hard to find. The backgrounds aren’t nice anymore, and when you say
"I want a beige background," you get several rolls of
iStock. The last thing we used to get from Pixabay was sound effects;
now you risk a content claim, and Pixabay says this now gives you a
content claim on YouTube.
So,
I started having Shy Artist paint backgrounds for us
and speech bubbles. We are working on it, but it takes a lot of time
and right now our channel is a desert because we cannot make enough
fast enough to keep it going. But at least we still had some
reasonable short, funny cat videos to use for cat compilations. So,
in 2025, we added funny anime emojis, comic splashes, and comic
words. We paid for TunePocket, ZatSplat, and Uppbeat so our music and
sound effects would be safe behind licenses by large companies. But
we still got our cat videos from Fiverr.
Fiverr
has become very difficult. The content provider has more rights than
the person purchasing stuff. So they give me stuff I didn’t ask
for, and when I ask again for the kinds of funny cat videos I need,
they get nasty and tell me, "I gave you what you asked for,"
and I get a low mark as a purchaser. And today, in regards to
Pixabay—where I found Cottonbro, whose cute white cat made our
channel and let us know to do cute and funny cat compilations—he is
no longer on the platform because someone stole all his beautiful,
beautiful videos. I am very, very upset about that. That is the other
thing: how would I protect my own cats from the Scraper AI? They can
steal my cats—Emily, Jessica, Polaris, Daisy, Athena, and Lily—sell
them, and sue me for having my own cats.
The
other bad thing is the AI slop. I don’t want to believe that my
Fiverr people are selling me AI slop, at least not on purpose, but
nonetheless, I have some that are obvious even to an old person with
old eyes. So now I have taken to using Gemini AI to see if it is a
Gemini AI-created cat video, or to Hive Moderation to see if it is AI
slop.
We
will get into more ways to protect yourself in other blog posts. The
information is so large and exhaustive.
What
we are trying to do is find real cats to use in our cat compilations
on our channel. We are also trying to find ways to protect our own
cats and artwork. So far, the search for viable cat shorts to make
cat compilations is dismal. Most of them are AI slop, and ones that
sort of discourage AI slop, like Storyblocks, have cats that look
like... well, I found one on a video stock platform that was good,
but for the cutest Siamese mom cat feeding her lively little kittens,
it was 219 dollars for one short clip of film. I hate to say this,
but I make even less money now than I did when I was working as a
security guard. No way I can afford that. And, more and more, Youtube
is attacking AI-made slop and repetitive stuff. Before I leave, I am
giving you one more piece of advice.
Here
is how to "clean house" and protect your
existing library from the Scraper AI and the AI Upscaling bots:
1.
Bulk Unchecking "Shorts Sampling" (The Theft Shield) This
is the most important step for your cats. If this is checked, a bot
can "legally" scrape 5 seconds of your video and loop it.
Step
1: Go to your YouTube Studio and click on Content (the
video list).
Step
2: Check the very top box (next to the "Video"
header) to Select All. If you have more than 30 videos,
click the blue link that says "Select all."
Step
3: Click the Edit button in the black bar
that appears.
Step
4: From the dropdown menu, find Shorts sampling.
Step
5: Change the "New Value" to Don't allow
sampling.
Step
6: Click Update Videos. You’ll have to check
a box that says "I understand the implications"—click it
and let the machine work.
2.
Disabling the "AI Enhancements" In early 2026,
YouTube added Video Quality Enhancements (AI Upscaling) to old
videos. You can turn this off for the whole channel at once.
Step
1: Click the Settings gear at the bottom
left of your Studio.
Step
2: Go to Channel > Advanced Settings.
Step
3: Scroll down to the section titled "Video
Quality Enhancements" or "AI Upscaling."
Step
4: Uncheck the box that says "Let YouTube
automatically enhance visual quality."
By
doing this, you are effectively hanging a "No Trespassing"
sign on your art.
buymeacoffee.com/serenityofthemindyt
Have a great day and Stay Serene!
