
There are three constants in life: death, taxes and the “lofi hip hop radio — beats to relax/study to” YouTube stream. That is, until YouTube falsely hit the Lofi Girl channel with a DMCA takedown, bringing the beloved streams offline for the first time in over 2 years.
With over 668 million views, the stream was one of YouTube’s most popular places for people to go when they wanted to listen to calming, yet engaging music while studying or working. Listeners sometimes used the stream’s live chat like an anonymized, distant study group, reminding each other to take breaks and drink water. So when the stream suddenly stopped, fans were worried.
YouTube is cluttered with hours-long streams of calming music, but the live nature of the “lofi hip hop radio” streams sets it apart. On the YouTube stream, which current …