A narrative is taking hold: algorithmic changes in YouTube diverted users from fringe news and toward verified sources. Result: FOX News gets a boost.

I checked this out by sampling video metadata from YouTube API

Conclusion: it's not really true.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/03/technology/youtube-misinformation-fox-news.html

I took a list of alternative media (AM) sources from this Guardian report https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/feb/02/youtube-algorithm-election-clinton-trump-guillaume-chaslot

I then used the YouTube API to get the IDs for all of the channels included in this video list (~2m videos) --> I sampled 100 videos from each channel --> I filtered out any lamestream media

I then grabbed the last 20,000 videos for each of the "big three" of CNN, FOX, and MSNBC

What we see is that, per the NYT article above, there does seem to be a change point around 2019 when AM sources take a downturn in views

BUT: this doesn't just benefit FOX: CNN, MSNBC, and FOX all see a positive trend in daily views compared to the downward trend for AM sources

Here's a messy plot of the full observation period for which I could get data thus far

I'll supply code and write this up properly in the next few days inshallah

Potentially of interest @rasmus_kleis @kmmunger @j_a_tucker @aasiegel