I have an old Google account that I only use for one specific thing today: YouTube recommendations.
Their algorithm is actually decent. Which is not something I hear myself very often. And while it can be a trap, it does actually recommend me a fair bit of high quality content as long as I stay away from the obvious traps, make sure to block channels I don’t like, and use the feature “not interested” on videos that I don’t like.
However. I would like to only use my web feed client and no Google account at all, but I would then miss out on the recommended videos.
Is there some privacy respecting alternative to this that I’m not aware of?
I mighta misunderstood what you want; freetube gives good & relevant recommendations if you’ve selected a video, like you’re watching something and then you see related stuff in the sidebar.
if you want to open freetube and then it recommends you things to watch, unprompted, that’s not a thing. honestly, wouldn’t want that to be an option at all.
when you turn off the “viral” shit, block a buncha slop channels (super easy - stupid face in the thumbnail? blockety block) and make your subs the home page, it becomes a joy to use.