I need some advice...

All right,
Just seeking some general advice from all you fellow enthusiasts and YouTubers.

As a lot of you probably already know, I put a decent amount of my time into YouTube channel and my videos, especially throughout the summer. And since I don’t have friends at school or anything that share my interests (though I do feel really proud that a good amount of my high school class watches my videos and appreciate what I do, even though there are some that give me hell for it), I spend a lot of time when I’m not swimming or working out or enjoying the outside world, I’m down in my dark basement working on my system, and yes, that’s somewhat of an accurate way to describe my basement. Pretty dreary. During the winter it’s not as noticeable as it is now.

But anyways, so I’m looking for some advice. Regarding none other than YouTube itself.

I have spent the majority of my summer vacation working on my brand new system, trying to get a new intro done for videos, maybe even a channel intro too, and also to figure out what the heck an end screen is (yes, even though I am a really good video editor that is one thing I can’t figure out for the life of me).

So, when kids at school contact me and say, “Hey, (my real name here), your YouTube channel is awesome and really cool!”, I can’t help but feel pride in my work, because people really appreciate what I do, even though they might think it’s weird. But those other enthusiasts, whom I call the “bigger and better enthusiasts” seem to lack that same appreciation. And this makes me feel bad. Now a lot of you probably think that’s silly, but as a kid who’s shy, socially awkward at times, and has friends but not those who I spend time with outside of school, I rely on this community for support, because while it is online and not really friends, I do get a lot of support from you all and that makes me happy.

So these people have huge fanbases right? Not really. But whenever they upload a new video I comment on it. But when I upload a video, most of the time those people won’t even reply, let alone leave a comment, and that hurts me, because it seems like while I respect them and their hard work, they don’t respect me back, and that hurts me a little bit inside, because it’s like doing some hard work for your parents and not getting a thank you.

By the way, I’m not referencing anyone on TFP, I know you all are a great help and support to me, my channel, and my system, and I appreciate that! :smiley:

Now I’m probably blowing this out of proportion, but still, it irks me. I completely understand that a lot of people have work/school/sports, etc. or might just not be that active on YouTube, because that’s even me sometimes. But that doesn’t mean I’m gonna quit YouTube or anything like that, I’ll still keep making videos because they’re fun, informative, and I honestly don’t care how many views and subs I get, but still, this seems to bother me for some reason or another. I know it’s probably something I shouldn’t worry about, but still.

Any thoughts?

In my (limited) experience, I’ve began to take advantage of the “end screen” feature on YouTube. However, I’ve not done it on any of my fire alarm channels, but rather on this channel, (yes, I do own that channel and many more BTW). I can’t find a good video from that channel that I liked that takes full advantage of this feature, but if you look at the end of the more recent videos posted to that channel, you could probably get a rough idea on what it is.

Also, some people in the fire alarm community (e.g. SAFETECH, FireAlarmTech9, and S.E.R. Safety) do take advantage of the end screen as well as many channels I’m subscribed to outside of said fire alarm community (mostly major channels that have subscribers in the millions).

End Screens are the links at the end of the video, the soon to be replacement for annotations, you can see some on my video here: https://youtu.be/_vyfIq3bf0k?t=5m14s

They can be added at the time of uploading by clicking the “End Screens & Annotations” (see image 1) button in the top bar after the upload and processing is finished, OR after uploading using the end screen button (see image 2)

The thing that I hate about end screens is you need a verified link on your website to add to it. I think you may need to be a YouTube Partner (be able to upload 15 min+ and add ads)
I think because of the age of my channel and my long time partner status, and always ‘Good Standing’ I sometimes get features before the mainstream (eg. polls were able to be added on my videos before others could).

Image 1:

Image 2:

Remember, a lot of the bigger F/A YouTubers 1. Get a lot of spam comments, so they may ignore notifications, or have them disabled, so they might not reply to a comment. 2. May not watch a lot of fire alarm YouTube, or only once in a blue moon as a lot of them are older and busy with work, life, etc. 3. Or may just not comment on videos often, I watch a lot of YouTube, and rarely comment, I used to also rarely like, but I do that more now as it helps people I like in the algorithms. 4. Like me, when I watch YouTube I watch under a different account then I upload to, and I think a lot of others do that aswell.

My videos pull 100ish views and I may get a comment or two, and maybe 1-2 likes. My most viewed video @ 6000 viewsish only has 8 comments, 23 likes and 10 dislikes after 4 years. Don’t worry too much if you don’t get a lot of interaction on your videos. That doesn’t mean people don’t enjoy your videos or they disrespect you. I always expect the least, and when you get more than what you expected, it makes you happier.

Are you sure about that? 'Cause I believe I’ve been told that you can no longer add annotations as of May 2, 2017.

Oh, well I never really check, and I assumed you could still add them as it said “End Screens & Annotations

Yes, frankalarms39 is correct. Annotations are no longer supported. I am a verified channel, so I do have the capability to use end screens. I don’t use monetization because I believe it’s kind of like cheating on a test by having the answers, but that’s just me. I have over 50,000 views so technically I could probably use it, but I don’t feel I really need it, even though I’m out of money right now myself lol.