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YouTube Loses Major Advertisers Over Offensive Videos (rollingstone.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Rolling Stone: Verizon, AT&T, Johnson & Johnson and other major companies have pulled advertisements from YouTube after learning they were paired with videos promoting extremism, terrorism and other offensive topics, The New York Times reports. Among the other companies involved are pharmaceutical giant GSK, HSBC, the Royal Bank of Scotland and L'Oreal, amounting to a potential loss of hundreds of millions of dollars to the Google-owned company. The boycott began last week after a Times of London investigation spurred many major European companies to pull their ads from YouTube. American companies swiftly followed, even after Google promised Tuesday to work harder to block ads on "hateful, offensive and derogatory" videos. Like AT&T, most companies are only pulling their ads from YouTube and will continue to place ads on Google's search platforms, which remain the biggest source of revenue for Google's parent company, Alphabet. Still, the tech giant offered up a slew of promises to assuage marketers and ensure them that they were fixing the problems on YouTube. Due to the massive number of videos on YouTube -- about 400 hours of video is posted each minute -- the site primarily uses an automated system to place ads. While there are some failsafes in place to keep advertisements from appearing alongside offensive content, Google's Chief Business Officer Philipp Schindler wrote in a blog post that the company would hire "significant numbers" of employees to review YouTube videos and mark them as inappropriate for ads. He also said Google's latest advancements in artificial intelligence and machine learning will help the company review and flag large swaths of videos.
They can either honor the ethos that brought all the eyes to the videos or they can die slowly trying to suck the cock of Wall Street while losing viewers to other video channels. That whole market forces thing is a bitch.
Such sissies.
When your entire revenue is dependent on quantity with minimal quality investment you lose control. When you lose control things go down hill fast (just see what MySpace and Geocities eventually became). And there is currently no AI that can discriminate between poetry, let alone what certain markets find offensive.
From the other end: Although I don't understand why a potential advertiser would not want to promote their product in front of any audience. These types of things are bound to happen when you depend on a single vendor serving an entire market spanning pretty much every human endeavor, you're bound to be servicing both the best and worst parts.
Ad companies and YouTube channels alike need to turn to smaller, controllable and direct revenue models. If you make a private deal with an ad company both sides get what they want. Now the revenue is just being distributed to primarily the worst portions of society and decent content which is a minority of the 400h/min streams only gets a stupidly small share.
Custom electronics and digital signage for your business: www.evcircuits.com
I'm so glad Johnson and Johnson is removing any doubt that they could be associated with such extremists! Now we can get back to associating them with knowingly giving woman and babies cancer and not giving two shits about it.
So let me get this straight -- racists, misogynists, and terrorists are going to benefit from an ad-free experience, and yet my 6 year old daughter has to put up with ads for mortgages and makeup and other adult stuff when she wants to watch kids videos? WTF did we ever do to you Google that dirtbags get an out from Youtube ads, but the rest of us have to suffer?
Yaz
Ask the content creators if they give a shit? Youtube last year around sep cut most ad rev to 1/8th-1/4th what it was before.
This force most of the stable channels to reach out to more interesting venues of content. They all became obsessed with ups and likes and total views. Some of the smaller dudes have basically had to beg for money on patreon to keep going. When nurdrage has to beg for cash something is wrong.
There was a time when I really enjoyed browsing youtube videos. And I didn't really mind a little advertisement break here and there.
But what killed youtube for me - was the now forced (unskippable) ads that often last well into 30 seconds or more, just for checking out a video. I like seeing if I want to watch this or not, now there's a forced ad on every second video I decide to check.
Now, before my dear Slashdotters say "well, you can use adblocker" etc, please keep in mind that a lot of us watch youtube on our "smart-tv" devices, Nintendos, Xbox's Youtube app etc.
What this world is coming to - is for you and me to decide.
These companies have been putting so much effort into detecting "hate speech," but the number of times that my wife has had to hit the home button on the Roku to stop a horror movie trailer or something equally inappropriate on content appropriate for preschoolers is truly appalling. But we're not triggered, we just deal with it so we don't count.
Wow, look at HSBC withe their moral superiority. The same bank that launders money for drug lords and the Russian mafia.
Because if "offensive" is defined as "anyone who supports Donald Trump or refuses to accept the new SJW definition of 'equality'" then I have a bit of a problem with that.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
Have gnu, will travel.
if you're logged in to google account and running an adblocker while watching Youtube videos; they will eventually mysteriously error out.
But, if you're not logged in and run one, they play fine all day and ad free.
We are under a constant assault by a Snowflake jihad whose understanding of freedom of speech is limited to what they agree with. In America this is probably the darkest time in over 200 years with regards to the Bill of Rights. We are living in an age of the self-righteous perpetually offended punk, a punk without a hint of self-understanding or irony.
Channels like FeministFrequency are really offensive, sexist, and bigoted. But YouTube tries to live up to free speech ideals, so they try to tolerate people like Anita as much as humanly possible.
Lovely Google ad yesterday for hot women who are "guaranteed to contact you first". Was something vaguely adverstising as a "bride" site. I guess female prostitution is ok. Should women leave Slashdot?
You were going to say that no matter whether it was relevant of not (which it isn't)
It's absolutely relevant if it's true. Youtube is being very cagey about exactly what videos it means here. The meaning of words like "derogatory" vary SIGNIFICANTLY depending on who you're asking.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
Given Europe's attitude towards hate speech and how they enforce "right to be forgotten", I'm surprised that they haven't already erected a GFW at this point
...said the main living in the glorious country where the simple apparition of a nipple is considered a major mediatic catastrophe, where breast feeding is a public offense, and where anything remotely sexual is sure to traumatise the next few generations of youth. (and where nude bodies are probably terrorism-level material).
To each country and culture its own taboos.
For Germany, it might be hate speech, for France it might be "right to be forgotten", and for the USA it's anything which isn't missionary position with the sole purpose to procreate.
Beware of the nude-nipple-terrorists, America !
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
It's only half the story. The other half is that legitimate news reporting and videos that are "merely political" are having ALL ads removed, not just ads from the companies that are complaining.
Several legitimate video bloggers and independent reporters are reporting that their videos are being "de-monetized", effectively shutting down any sort of non-mainstream reporting.
So basically youtube is now into the political suppression business, pulling ads for videos that otherwise meet all of their guidelines except for not meeting political opinions of some advertisers.
Getting mad at Google when you've decided to use their automated tools to place your ads is kinda stupid. Place your ads intentionally instead of automatically and you won't have this problem.
A thousand pounds of wood moving at 300 feet per minute. Don't get in the way.
I just researched the Starbucks thing, Ave it turns out they are talking about refugees, not illegal aliens, so it's safe for you and your friend to go back to paying way too much for your not very good coffee again.
Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
I'm probably flagged as a conspiracy theorist by google (ff/ddg incognito always). I have a whole section of google news of anti-trump stories and have been bombarded by them since 4 months before the election (they started over night). I've never clicked on a google news story (I simply don't care if it doesn't affect me and there's nothing I can do) other than the rare space related and only skim headlines. I get most of my news from wikipedia.
Why are you objecting to ISIS videos in terms of Trump?
Because the language Google is using sounds like this includes WAY more than just ISIS videos. Words like "derogatory" take on a whole new meaning in Silicon Valley on on college campuses today than they do in red state America. So it's very important to establish EXACTLY whose definitions we're using here and exactly what videos are going to be blacklisted.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
Trump (really Bannon, Trump's just the mouth piece) managed to make racism OK again. I'll Let that one sink in...
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
Words like "derogatory" take on a whole new meaning in Silicon Valley on on college campuses today than they do in red state America.
Why not set up your own video streaming site that caters to red state America? You could call it "RedTube."
"BSD: Free as in speech. Linux: Free as in beer. Windows 10: Free as in herpes." --Man On Pink Corner in #52607549.
You could just report it. Google sells massive numbers of ads in a block. They don't review each and every one. It's not possible. They're not publishing a once a month magazine with 100 pages tops ya know...
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
What is "offensive" is defined by the companies who are paying Google to place their ads.
It's defined by the "progressives" that whine the loudest when somebody speaks out against one of their pet causes. The social justice warriors of today are the same breed as the religious right from 20-30 years ago. If these companies had any business sense or corporate responsibility, they would just ignore them instead of trying to appease them.
All while I dared make and publish a review of Mafia III (not a professional review, just a bunch of game video captures with commentary) and I promptly got dinged by their algorithm for about 10 seconds of silence where "Somebody to Love" could be heard playing in the background, in-game.
A copyright owner using Content ID claimed some material in your video.
This is just a heads up
Don’t worry. You’re not in trouble and your account standing is not affected by this.
There are either ads running on your video, with the revenue going to the copyright owner, or the copyright owner is receiving stats about your video’s views.
Video title: Mafia III - 5 months later (Review)
Copyrighted content: Somebody To Love
Claimed by: SME
So... I work for a few hours, put together a review, expect my 50 cents of revenue (I don't have many subscribers or views anyway, it's more like a side hobby of mine) but noooo... because there's an excerpt of music in the background for 10 seconds, I shit you not, I checked. It's 10 seconds of song.
...gis sdrawkcab (usually not responding to ACs; don't bother posting as AC)
You can't really accuse YouTube of accepting the "SJW definition" of anything, because they have started restricting access to trans make-up advice videos and anything with the world "gay" in the title. They are getting a beating on Twitter for it but don't seem to be relenting.
If anything, it seems like they have taken the alt-right definition of "offensive".
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
Oh grow up.
Because if "offensive" is defined as...
If you're ignorant then you've been trying to be and you're exceptionally foolish jumping right into the converstation, putting forth your deeply held opinions without the slightest connection to the story.
If you're not ignorant then you know EXACTLY what is going on, you are just trying to stir up shit about people you hate (and by the way you're a fuckwit), namely SJWs
You very well know that big money spending advertisers have pulled advertising because their ads have been displayed next to and contributed money to material that the advertisers really don't want to be associated with or fund. Really not fund.
Like the British government not wanting to fund precisely the sort of terrorists who actually try (and occasionally succeed ) to attack.
And you response is basicaly "wah wah SJW".
Fucking moron.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
What if the truth is offensive to advertisers. Banned?
They don't support extremism. If you suggest extremism might be a thing in their presence, they will swiftly bar you from any and all contact with them, and call all their friends to ensure your cash flows stop and you die a slow death.
Support my political activism on Patreon.
Do people actually associate advertisements with the videos that they play with? I mean, the content creators have no say in what advertisement plays, so there really shouldn't be any association between the ad and the video, but rather, with the ad and YouTube.
I don't have an issue with Youtube showing ads for revenue but they do a piss-poor job of targeting ads to content. Mostly I watch classical music on youtube and get ads for something accompanied with awful jarring music. It annoys me an I does a disservice to the advertiser... clearly the ad would be better displayed elsewhere.
love is just extroverted narcissism
I think that has something to do with browser publishers deprecating the Fullscreen API on cleartext HTTP sites to make it harder for a man in the middle to impersonate your device's operating system. (Search keyword "secure contexts".). Do the pages an where embedded YouTube video falls to go full screen use HTTPS or cleartext HTTP?
Does this mean I can watch PewDeePie without adblock and without commercials?!
Example: Is this offensive?: https://www.youtube.com/watch?... https://www.youtube.com/watch?... https://www.youtube.com/watch?...