It's not like when the factory stops because the workers strike, or there are no sports game because the players walked out. There's more youtube than I know what to do with no matter what.
But there is so much out there I could watch if they all got hit by a bus one day.
Since the purpose of a strike is fundamentally to prove the employer needs its employees [nearly] as much as the employees need their salary, a strike which proves the opposite would be really self-defeating...
The brand loyalty isn't there. It isn't that YouTube has anything magic other than quantity.
I want to explore. I want stuff that's familiar, similar and also unrelated that I would potentially like. Their "related" stuff is always so similar that it falls into "more of the same". You used to be able to explore without entering search terms via trending and categories, but the same channels and types of videos dominate those avenues. If you don't like the type of stuff there, you'll spend a lot of time being disappointed for maybe one video that was alright.
It's ok to recommend more of the same, but give me a way to see stuff that isn't the same.
They might be hoping for something similar: their content is not easy to find a substitute for.