2 ms·

> A serious YouTube competitor that doesn't demonetize content they find disagreeable would be very healthy, IMHO. It's probably not YouTube demonitizing conte

> A serious YouTube competitor that doesn't demonetize content they find disagreeable would be very healthy, IMHO. It's probably not YouTube demonitizing content that they personally find disagreeable. It's most likely advertisers that find it disagreeable that their ads show up next to objectionable content: advertisers don't control precisely which videos their ads show up next to - they just target them to certain types of content. So advertisers need to have confidence in Google's decisions that ad-enabled content is reasonably appropriate for them. Instead, advertisers will threaten to pull their ads from Google's platforms entirely if it doesn't self-police adequately in terms of deciding which content is allowed on the platform and ad-enabled. That was really the controversy with Logan Paul. He had top-tier status with YouTube (Google Preferred) meaning that YouTube positioned his channel as suitable for advertising from the biggest, most risk-averse brands, and those brands flipped out about the potential of appearing before his suicide forest video. See https://variety.com/2018/digital/news/youtube-changes-partner-program-google-preferred-advertisers-1202665815/ https://variety.com/2018/digital/news/youtube-changes-partne... > In addition, YouTube said all videos in Google Preferred — representing the top 5% most-viewed channels — will be reviewed by human moderators before they’re monetized. YouTube also is rolling out a three-tiered “suitability system” for advertisers to select their level of comfort with content they’re buying ads against. If advertisers were generally happy to have their content show up alongside any sort of videos, then YouTube might as well. There's another aspect of this which is YouTube kicking content off their platform that isn't even monetized at all, but that probably relates to the same problem again, where advertisers wouldn't want to monetize on a platform that's known for hosting objectionable content generally. (Porn sites don't tend to run a lot of mainstream ads, for example.) Note that this description is intended to be a positive analysis of Google's probable behavior, not a normative defense of it. From a free speech perspective it's unfortunate that so many content policies are ultimately advertising-driven, but advertisers are the ones paying for most of the platform (with the exception of subscribers like to YouTube Red which are probably a minority of users).

thinkingemote 9y ago
Worth saying that advertisers are working on the basis of their clients. I think it's the clients that are pushing this change. And I think it's a vocal group who are shouting at those companies saying that their group is unhappy. The companies respond by pulling their advertising. I'd argue therefore that the advertisers and the companies, the brands have less morality than you might think - they are just reacting to consumer pressure. Demonitization effectively stops any advertiser, and any brand from advertising on a particular space. I'd also argue that Google is reacting to consumer pressure, which is why there is plenty of objectively worse content on YT which is not restricted (because there is no pressure about these vile videos). One example would be the Stop Funding Hate pressure group who very loudly and aggressively by social media, campaigns to companies to stop advertising within The Daily Mail newspaper in the UK.
freedomben 9y ago
This is a great point (as far as it relates to demonetization). Ultimately the advertisers (and arguably the consumers those advertisers want to reach) are the ones with the power.

thinkingemote 9y ago

Worth saying that advertisers are working on the basis of their clients. I think it's the clients that are pushing this change. And I think it's a vocal group who are shouting at those companies saying that their group is unhappy. The companies respond by pulling their advertising. I'd argue therefore that the advertisers and the companies, the brands have less morality than you might think - they are just reacting to consumer pressure. Demonitization effectively stops any advertiser, and any brand from advertising on a particular space. I'd also argue that Google is reacting to consumer pressure, which is why there is plenty of objectively worse content on YT which is not restricted (because there is no pressure about these vile videos). One example would be the Stop Funding Hate pressure group who very loudly and aggressively by social media, campaigns to companies to stop advertising within The Daily Mail newspaper in the UK.

freedomben 9y ago

This is a great point (as far as it relates to demonetization). Ultimately the advertisers (and arguably the consumers those advertisers want to reach) are the ones with the power.