A Hundred and Forty Ideas, and Three Videos
Imagine opening your idea list on a quiet day and scrolling to the bottom.
A hundred and forty ideas.
And in the whole of last year, you filmed three of them.
So you start reading. An idea you wrote two years ago and can no longer decode. An idea that needs a drone in a country that bans them. An idea someone else made last year, better than you could. And an idea you're certain you'll never film, which you keep anyway because deleting it feels like a loss.
You close the list feeling something heavy you can't name.
Its name is: you don't have an idea backlog. You have a graveyard.
Why Nobody Deletes
Deleting is free, and an idea takes up no space on a hard drive. So why do we keep ideas we know perfectly well we'll never film?
Three reasons, all of them psychological.
First: "it might be useful one day." True in theory and false in practice. An idea that hasn't been filmed in two years won't be filmed.
Second: "I worked hard writing it." So deleting feels like throwing away effort. It's a plain fallacy: the time is gone, and keeping the idea doesn't bring it back.
Third, and the most dangerous: "if I delete it I'll have nothing left." A long list feels like safety and a short one feels like emptiness. So you hold on to the count rather than the content.
Seven Signs It's Time to Delete
You Can't Remember Why You Wrote It
You read the line now and think: what did I mean by this?
Delete it. The only exception is remembering within ten seconds. After that, let it go.
Two Years With No Movement
An idea that survived every review and never got filmed isn't a patient good idea. It's an idea you don't want to film, and every review proved that again.
You Don't Know Who It's For
An idea with no specific viewer will never find an angle, however long you sit thinking about it.
You Were Excited and the Excitement Faded
First excitement is the best thing you have about any idea. And if it hasn't come back, it won't come back through thinking or postponing.
Someone Made It Better Than You Could
This one needs honesty with yourself.
If you've seen someone cover it with a depth you can't match, and you have no different angle, delete it.
And a different angle isn't a new title or a prettier edit. If you have personal experience or access they don't have, that's a different idea entirely and not a repeat.
It Needs Something You Won't Get
A drone in a country that bans them. An interview with someone who doesn't give interviews. A budget ten times what you have.
Delete it now, rather than letting it block you every time you open the list.
It Doesn't Look Like Your Channel
A good idea that isn't yours. Film it and you confuse the people who follow you, and you yourself won't like it a month later.
What You Never Delete
Anything that scares you.
The idea you keep postponing because it's a lot of work, or because it exposes you to criticism, isn't a dead idea. It's a hard one. Put it in a postponed list with an actual date, not in the bin.
Don't delete a seasonal idea whose moment hasn't arrived.
And don't delete an idea that doesn't work whole but has a part that does. Take the part, delete the rest.
And the difference between a dead idea and a hard one is the single most important distinction in this whole subject: you don't want the dead one, and you both want and fear the hard one.
One Question That Settles Everything
Stand in front of each idea and ask: if I had a free week and a camera, is this in my top five?
If the answer is no, and it hasn't been in your top five for six months, delete it.
Because an idea that never reaches the top five will never be filmed.
And If Deleting Is Hard for You
There's a simple middle path.
Make one file called "deleted" and move things into it instead of wiping them.
The real benefit arrives a year later: open that file and read it. You almost certainly won't regret a single one.
And that alone will teach you to delete directly next time.
In Short
Delete what you can't explain, what you've gone cold on, what doesn't look like your channel, and what needs something you'll never have.
And keep what scares you.
Fear is a sign the idea deserves making, not a sign that it's dead.