I’m right there with ya, OP… it is astonishing to me how people can learn to make videos and yet be completely in the dark about the concept of editing them.
I also recall youtube telling me they would rank longer videos higher. This in some sort of effort to make them more like TV, I guess. I have TV. I do not watch TV. I’m on the goddamn youtube because I want something different.
Someone mentioned Vines, video fragments limited to 6 or 7 seconds. At first I considered that a really stupid concept, but as the form has evolved, there are some massively entertaining ones. They really encourage super-tight editing.