Spoiler: Videos about Youtube TOS Enforcement A major thing has started happening and a lot of Youtubers have begun noticing. Youtube looks to be now greatly enforcing law established. This sounds like a good thing, but it's being taken to an extreme. Youtubers are now being cut off from making money or having videos taken down for merely cursing, showing things that are mildly adult, so called 'Sensitive Material', or just making an innuendo. Marking all these things as 'unadvertiseable material'. Basically saying you are not allowed to have an opinion, at all! Look at this. Most of it is reasonable, but some if it is proof Youtube is purposely censoring us. The issue is that Youtube is now taking away the power to create and be creative away from the people. Censoring people, which is basically what Youtube is doing to it's users, will not make things better, but worse. Especially for those who do Youtube for a living. Many users that do make a living off their videos are facing the cold reality of possible homelessness because of Youtube's actions. If this happens, it could create a domino effect where less people, both users and watchers of video content, will start going on Youtube less. Thus making the site, Youtube, suffer the ultimate consequences. Please watch the videos in the spoiler before discussing. These videos are only a few of the many videos put up talking about this issue.
I'm going to say this is Youtube shielding themselves from potential lawsuit caused by advertisement of such content being shown to groups of people for whom it is not appropriate. ie. Children. Also, this only extends to monetization. This isn't actually prohibitive of such content being posted. Reading is important.
The issue with what you just said is that they already have a adult filter in place. Unless you are a signed in and have proof of being 18 or older as to use the site, you cannot see videos marked as adult content. Thus making that point moot. Though it's not advertisements, it's the videos they are hitting and marking as unadvertiseable on. Also, Youtube hasn't just taken montization away, they have actively started shutting down accounts over this. They literally are hellbent on destroying anything that breaks the rules of their 'new set of guidelines'. This is turning into on of those Safe Space kinda things which you are literally deprived of opposing it, let alone having an opinion on anything. It's not about being safe for children, it's about literally not allowing content creators to be... well... creative because it could 'offend' someone.
I would have to agree. Most of the topics considered inappropriate could be considered sensitive-in more ways than one. And having a lawsuit that ruins the entire image of Youtube would be far worse than having a few youtubers complain.
You know, Youtube already holds the right to deny access to any person or any account, for any reason. Basically every online organization has this right. Youtube does not need to make any new rules to close accounts or remove content. They can already do so freely. Use of the space and media that Youtube provides is not some sort of civil right, but a service granted freely by the organization. Much like access to this forum is a service granted by us. We hold the right to deny it to anyone, for any reason. Be it uncivil behaviour, or a decision on our part that we don't like someone's face. Monetization is slightly different however, it's no longer a service given by the organization, but a contractual agreement between a user and the company which sites a partnership and monetary exchange for aggregated advertising space. ie. - Youtube is bound in partnership while the channel continues to operate within the bounds of the contract agreement. - Channels in partnership with Youtube are representative of the image of the company and brand. - Youtube wishes to (and basically must) maintain a minimum standard for content. The above is true for pretty true for most media networks, most closely though to television broadcasters. Essentially what this comes down to is further constraints on what Youtube allows in their partnered content. For any non-partnered content, Youtube already had the right to shutdown channels are remove videos freely. This basically has no bearing on that. I mean, literally. It's just not relevant. There's also a bunch of relevant nonsense for third-party networks running partnership with channels on Youtube, but not actually directly affiliated with the organization, but since they use the medium as a method of delivery, they're still applicable to most of the above. Although the agreements they hold with Youtube give them a bit more leeway. I'm not quite sure about the technicals there.
Can confirm. Technically, they have the right to shut down channels that are partnered, due to the partnership being At Will. That is, either side can terminate it whenever for whatever reason. Not quite. It's about not paying money for content that they can't get good returns on. After all, it costs money to store the video, and it costs more to serve it to viewers. As such, they serve ads on these videos to make up for this, and to get a hefty profit too due to economies of scale. Not all videos are equal though: some generate less views than others, and thus less revenue than others. When it comes to partners, there is an additional cost: paying the partners to make the content. As such, it is the partner's role in the contract to make content that can be monetized via ads. This means enough views, and few enough complaints. Not all videos are equal though. Except this time, instead of some faceless uploader, there's someone to place the onus on. And so Youtube does, and it does this by placing restrictions on what videos will be monetized. If your video isn't getting the ad revenue, you're not getting paid for it. If you stop making videos that can be monetized, you're literally losing them money, so you lose your partnership, or your account, depending on expected losses. It's true, this does somewhat reduce the leeway accounts have on Youtube. But it's not Youtube's job to make sure you can post "artful nudes" for 13 year olds to experiment to, whether you want to get paid for it or no. It's also not your job to use their services, or to give them money for said services. To quote a certain interjecting child,
Well, --THIS WORD REMOVED TO MAINTAIN AD REVENUE-- you too, YouTube. It's not like --THIS OPINION REMOVED TO COMPLY WITH YOUTUBE'S TERMS OF SERVICE--. In the First Amendment, it says --REMOVED FOR CONTRADICTING OUR PERFECT SYSTEM--. Therefore, companies shouldn't --GOOGLE UBER ALLES!! GOOGLE UBER ALLES!! WE'RE BUILDING A WALL AROUND WHAT WE DISAGREE WITH, AND OUR USERS WILL PAY FOR IT!! DOWN WITH FREE SPEECH!! PROFIT BEFORE REASON!! SUBTLETY IS FOR THE WEAK!! CONFORM!! OBEY!! DRINK YOUR OVALTINE!!! HEIL GOOGLE!!--
Youtube is there to make money, not to cater to your wants and desires. At some point, the general populace has forgotten that companies don't owe us anything beyond what we've payed for. How self-entitled we've become. Let me stop you right there and point out, - The 1st amendment does not apply to privately owned internet media. (In fact, it quite explicitly states in EP's ToS that it doesn't apply here. You can express your opinion, but only if we feel like letting you do so.) - The world does not conform to US law. - The 1st amendment doesn't event apply in any private place. (ie. Someone's property. The owner of the property is at liberty to prevent you from expressing any opinion they do not agree with.) - In fact, most of them don't. If someone we're to tell you you can't go into their house with a firearm, you would not have the right to bear arms in their house, 2nd amendment or not. What companies shouldn't do is violate laws. That's pretty much rule #1 of 1. What they should do is act in their own best interest. Whether the interests and the means are of benefit (or at least, seemingly so) to their clientele is an entirely separate matter. There have been some shining examples of companies that have acted in favour of their customers, but rest assured, their motives have been purely economic. That being the point of a company in the first place. Even non-profit and not-for-profit organizations exist to satisfy monetary needs. It's the execution that varies.
Anyone mention the advertisers yet? They also have the right to choose not to have their advertisement on content they deem appropriate. Behind the scenes, I have no doubt there was much discussion between Google and the advertisers (you know, the ones actually supplying the money in the first place...) about what they do and do not want their products associated with. I don't blame them for not wanting their products associated with things they do not agree with - for a current example, see Ryan Lochte. It's not just on YouTube.
So you're saying that freedom of speech is non-existent on the Internet, and YouTube has every right to implement utterly Orwellian policies because it's a private entity? I don't buy that for a second. Would you say that YouTube should be allowed to ban users based on ethnicity, because it's a private company? Of course not, because it's wrong. Honestly, people like you are the reason that this is happening in the first place. Private companies, especially mega-corporations like Google, shouldn't be exempt from upholding basic human rights, and profit should not be placed before freedom. Otherwise, we'll all be reduced to the same level of political freedom as Our Town, and, well, look how that turned out.
An assault on personal freedoms? No. A misguided, poorly-planned, and potentially disastrous business decision? Absolutely.
Is Youtube allowed to ban users based on ethnicity? Certainly. It can just be potentially disastrous to them from a political standpoint. They in no way obliged to provide service to anyone. It's not their job to do what you like. Their job is to print fat stacks of cash. Your enjoyment happens to be a means to an end.
It just so happens that, believe it or not, suppressing freedom of speech by demonetizing content they don't agree with is extremely liable to be a terrible business decision, and could lose YouTube millions, not to mention all the prominent YouTubers who make a living on exactly the sort of content that YouTube is turning against, to say nothing of the previously-discussed draconian nature of it all.
Okay, I may of been jumping the gun calling it an attack. I'll admit this, but I do agree it's a bad decision that is costly and deathly for the site. @Minterwute: This isn't an issue of race, ethnicity, child safe material, or anything involving social prejudices. This is Youtube blocking out ability to say things about certain topics and forcing us to censor ourselves, even though Youtube's slogan from the start was quite literally: BRODCAST YOURSELF. As in, allowing the user to show themselves and express themselves as long as they didn't break certain established rules. This is fine, and I did say that a good amount of the policies enforced, are understandable. Things such as Harassment, Cyberbulling, gory content, full nudity, drugs selling and featuring, and porn are understandable to strike or take down a channel over. However, a few of the policies that have been applied in the recent year to the algorithm are misguided at best, especially with how they have the bot run. They do have an appeal process applied but it's also faulty at best. People who have done nothing wrong on their channels have been hit by this algorithm rather unfairly. Also consider the fact that Youtube has been doing this under our noses for a full year. That is very shifty. You'd think if this change was to be made that Youtube would have the common decency to at least announce this sooner to us. I do understand that Youtube does have the power to do as they wish, but there are some decisions, no matter how good it looks from a business standpoint, that are dangerously misguided and can kill the business it was trying to help.
There is no freedom of speech on the internet. Leastways not on any privately held website. It doesn't even apply on EP. Explicitly so in our ToS. Citation: Similarly, you are in no way entitled to use YouTube. (Or Facebook. Or Twitter. etc.) You are given access in exchange for your revenue potential. You seem to be under the impression that use of YouTube is somehow a right. It isn't. It's a service given by a private holding.
A couple of corrections: First, Freedom of Speech refers to the fact that the government can not suppress your ability to express yourself. This means that you can say what you want, but the government doesn't prevent consequences from private parties, given those consequences are illegal for other reasons. Notably, this doesn't stop people from restricting what you can say, or when you can say it via explicit or implicit contracts, or by removing you or your content from their private property. Secondly, demonetizing content isn't preventing that content from reaching any given audience, so it isn't even violating their freedom of speech. If their goal is actually saying something, then this doesn't stop their expressing said views in the least. Lastly, the whole point of this change is that not doing this was also losing YouTube millions. Sure, losing a few content creators reduces their revenue, but not having to manually inspect each channel that gets reported and then deciding what to do with it saves them far more millions on customer support.
A few... A FEW?!? Many of the most successful content creators on YouTube rely on the sort of things that the TOS are against. And as a result, not only would the content creators lose their largest sources of income, but YouTube would most likely LOSE more money from the lack of content than what they'd save on customer support. YouTube is essentially biting the hand that feeds it and then spitting on it.
On the scale of YouTube, this is only a few, yes. YouTube has literally tens of millions of partnered content creators, so losing even a few thousand is less than a single percentage point of creators. Even more importantly, all of the genuinely big content creators were following these rules already so as to attract a larger viewer base, so the percentage is far lower among the partners who are actually bringing in the majority of the views. A separate thing that's worth mentioning is the wording of the change. Notably: That is to say, if your video is nothing but dick jokes, you're not going to be making money off of Thomas the Train Engine ads, but you will probably still make money off some ads anyways. Unless of course you post nothing but videos of dick joke compilations. At which point I can't say I'm sad about that particular channel being demonetized. Keep in mind that YouTube is under no obligation to help other people make money, moral or otherwise. The reverse is also true, and content creators are not obligated to help YouTube make money. If a competitor shows up and picks up the banned/disgruntled youtubers so they don't need to start doing what Google says, then that's great. Competition is always good.
