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YouTube Videos Could Get Demonetized If They Have 'Inappropriate Comments'
In response to a mother's inquiry into why her son's gymnastics videos were deemed not advertiser friendly, YouTube said on Twitter it has "taken a number of actions to better protect the YouTube community from content that endangers minors." The video-sharing website went on to say something very concerning for anyone who has ever uploaded a video to the site: "... even if your video is suitable for advertisers, inappropriate comments could result in your video receiving limited or no ads (yellow icon)."
Essentially, what YouTube is saying is that if someone leaves a "incendiary or demeaning" comment, or one with "inappropriate language," the video which features that comment could get demonetized and the content creator would not generate money from it. If you've ever read a comment thread on YouTube, it shouldn't take long for you to realize how big of an issue this could become. According to YouTube's "advertiser-friendly content guidelines," the following content may not be suitable for most advertisers: "controversial issues and sensitive events," "drugs and dangerous products or substances," "harmful or dangerous acts," "harmful or dangerous acts," "hateful content," "inappropriate language," "inappropriate use of family entertainment characters," "incendiary and demeaning [content]," "sexually suggestive content," and/or "violence."
The best advice for circumventing this issue is to disable comments entirely, but this would significantly reduce the interaction between the YouTuber and the viewer. "If this is our new reality we're going to need the ability to restrict comments from accounts under 1-4 weeks old," says news commentator and YouTube personality Philip DeFranco. "Sounds like this is prime for weaponization. Also it would probably be best to have an official blog post instead of my tweet as a reference for this change."
Essentially, what YouTube is saying is that if someone leaves a "incendiary or demeaning" comment, or one with "inappropriate language," the video which features that comment could get demonetized and the content creator would not generate money from it. If you've ever read a comment thread on YouTube, it shouldn't take long for you to realize how big of an issue this could become. According to YouTube's "advertiser-friendly content guidelines," the following content may not be suitable for most advertisers: "controversial issues and sensitive events," "drugs and dangerous products or substances," "harmful or dangerous acts," "harmful or dangerous acts," "hateful content," "inappropriate language," "inappropriate use of family entertainment characters," "incendiary and demeaning [content]," "sexually suggestive content," and/or "violence."
The best advice for circumventing this issue is to disable comments entirely, but this would significantly reduce the interaction between the YouTuber and the viewer. "If this is our new reality we're going to need the ability to restrict comments from accounts under 1-4 weeks old," says news commentator and YouTube personality Philip DeFranco. "Sounds like this is prime for weaponization. Also it would probably be best to have an official blog post instead of my tweet as a reference for this change."
...have no problem collecting 100% of the ad money. They will still run the ad and bill for it, it's just a new way to stiff you out of the money.
If they're so obsessed about "protecting the children", then just hide and disable comments across the entire site on the Youtube Kids interface. Then it's just up to the parents to ensure that Youtube is locked in the Kids mode on their devices.
That will work out well. Everybody on YouTube, no matter how nice or friendly, has enemies. There are a lot of dissatisfied, cruel, envious and stupid people around and also some outright psychos. If these people now get handed a Really Big Stick, they are going to use it.
On the plus-side, this extreme stupidity hopefully will hasten the demise of YouTube. It has vastly overstayed its welcome anyways.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
What'll happen is people who hate others speaking their minds will infest their comment sections and troll them, leaving inflammatory comments. This'll get them demonetized, which is about the same as being shut down. Appearing on Youtube is a full-time job if you do it right. It's not vapid internet celebrities either, there is some really incisive content by people like Jimmy Dore that is regularly reported and demonetized by these trolls.
Censorship isn't a school board banning Huckleberry Finn any more. In the corporatist system we have, corporate censorship isn't any different than government censorship. It doesn't make much difference whether the one silencing your dissent is Youtube or Andrew McCabe. The effect is the same.
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
This'll doom channels that are specifically about audience participation, like "leave a comment about what you want me to do in my next video".
If only there was a way for viewers to send comments and suggestions directly to the content maker, like sending a letter in the mail. We could call it "electronic mail" People could have addresses where such "e-mail" could be sent.
All sarcasm aside, perhaps those youtube content creators overlooked how useful e-mail is in their haste to adopt social networking platforms.
"How to solve an important but complicated problem"
By: YouTube
1. Ignore problem
2. Keep ignoring problem
3. Once people bring light to problem, keep ignoring it
4. If it might lose you ad revenue, announce you're looking into it (but keep ignoring it)
5. If it has caused you to lose ad revenue, PANIC! ANNOUNCE YOU'RE TAKING MAJOR STEPS TO SOLVE IT!
6. Implement the worst possible solution to fixing the problem (Make sure the solution can be easily abused to shutdown small channels!)
7. Wonder why people hate YouTube
9. ???
10. No profit
If they can identify the comments and demonetize or restrict the video, surely they can give creators the option to instead opt for the comments to be deleted or blocked when they are detected. Some way that creators can choose to have the inappropriate comments removed to prevent demonetization.
Actually, it's "think of the advertisers" (who don't want their products associated with some kind of comments and might stop paying)
Anyone else? They don't care.
A mother wants to make money off her son's gymnastics videos? This world is really going to hell...
If you get a boner watching a video with a child, the problem is not the video but you.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
That was my thought as well. If I don't like certain social or political commenters on YT, I can just post a few inappropriate comments on their videos and take away their ad revenue.
If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
why punish the video, while the commenter is the one who should be blamed.
wouldn't it be easier to set a time limited (or permanent) commect ban on that id?
basically you could build a bot right now that makes sure everything on youtube get demonetized.
On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero.
Maybe don't put your children on YouTube.
Maybe don't try or expect to make money from your child being on YouTube.
Maybe we all know that social media isn't good for kids anyway.