Since 2010, the video sharing platform YouTube has released a video entitled YouTube Rewind every year. For the first two years, the video simply featured a list of 10 of the most popular videos on YouTube for that current year. However, since then, the videos have become a conglomeration of memes, viral videos, music and breaking news that had become popular in the year rather than just a list. Generally, these videos are well received by the public.

However, “YouTube Rewind 2018: Everyone Controls Rewind” quickly found its way to being the most disliked video in YouTube history with more than 13 million dislikes, 3 million more than the previous video with the most dislikes, which was Justin Bieber’s music video for “Baby.” The video was very ill-received by viewers, being the first video to reach 10 million dislikes in history.

YouTube Rewind, produced and created by YouTube and Portal A Interacted, have increased the number of popular YouTube personalities seen in the videos. However, the videos have also featured popular talk show hosts such as James Corden and John Oliver as well as starred personalities such as Will Smith and the Rock. The addition of these “non-YouTuber” is one of the many complaints viewers have had over the recent rewind released on Dec. 6.

In addition, the exclusion of certain events and individuals has caused fans to feel as if YouTube is taking the easy way out by not including controversial topics such as PewDiePie versus T-Series, the fight for the YouTube account with the most followers, or KSI v.s Logan Paul, one of the most successful live events on YouTube.

“Youtube Rewind: The Shape of 2017” was received with similar views when it was released on Dec. 6 , 2017. In fact, the video found its way to the 14 most disliked YouTube videos of all time. However, the backlash towards this video was not as heavy as that of this year. It appears that the accumulation of criticism for last year’s rewind and the continuation of the same problems found in this year’s video has caused many viewers to be unhappy.

The video itself was meant to be a nice callback to popular items of this year such as the video game Fortnite. However, the execution of the video was obviously not what YouTube had in mind. While the theme of the video was “everyone controls rewind,” viewers believe that YouTube is out of touch with its viewers and their interests and are more worried about sending out a positive vibe in order to appease and gain advertisers. In any case, the video did contain a few decent elements including a combination of animation and live-action sequences which gave a nod to the animators of YouTube.