They do it because it rewards their creators for putting content on their platform that helps them push more ads. It is a benchmark that is required, but it's not relevant in the sense that having millions of subs matters. Look into the pscore stuff and you'll get a better insight to how their platform operates. Accounts with shitloads of subs have mostly inactive subscribers that do not engage with their content so they don't actually help in terms of getting a push from the algorithm. It's the engagements YT cares about. Like/Follow/Sub/Comment. So it is important for new creators that are looking to monetize their work, but that's it. Afterwards it's all about the engagements. So it's not actually the sub count the causes creators to push for more subs, it's just another engagement metric that will tell YT people like their shit so much they'll push the right buttons. This is why the downvote brigades are always so useless in terms of burying content. The creators don't care if you like it or not, just clicking one of those counts as an engagement and helps the channel. It's useful in terms of showing the public what we do/don't like, and that's why they changed the format after Xiden stole the oval. Oh and you're absolutely right about the stuff at the end of your comment. They make very little from ads. Only the biggest most consistent ones get much out of it and once you're at that level, you're stupid not to do those things you've listed to get the real money. Things like video length and whether your content is attractive to the companies bidding on ad space are bigger deciding factors on how much money you make off ads.

They do it because it rewards their creators for putting content on their platform that helps them push more ads. It is a benchmark that is required, but it's not relevant in the sense that having millions of subs matters. Look into the pscore stuff and you'll get a better insight to how their platform operates. Accounts with shitloads of subs have mostly inactive subscribers that do not engage with their content so they don't actually help in terms of getting a push from the algorithm. It's the engagements YT cares about. Like/Follow/Sub/Comment. So it is important for new creators that are looking to monetize their work, but that's it. Afterwards it's all about the engagements. So it's not actually the sub count the causes creators to push for more subs, it's just another engagement metric that will tell YT people like their shit so much they'll push the right buttons. This is why the downvote brigades are always so useless in terms of burying content. The creators don't care if you like it or not, just clicking one of those counts as an engagement and helps the channel. It's useful in terms of showing the public what we do/don't like, and that's why they changed the format after Xiden stole the oval. Oh and you're absolutely right about the stuff at the end of your comment. They make very little from ads. Only the biggest most consistent ones get much out of it and once you're at that level, you're stupid not to do those things you've listed to get the real money.