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>Reddit, youtube, etc became extremely popular precisely because they weren't censored. But once they got huge, corporate and political interests took over and
by rtpg 8y ago
>Reddit, youtube, etc became extremely popular precisely because they weren't censored. But once they got huge, corporate and political interests took over and you got censorship.
I... kinda get this argument for reddit, though only a bit. But this is just not true for Youtube. There was never a point where "well I wanted to put my video on X but Youtubue will actually let me do it without censoring" was ever true.
There's the recent stuff about monetization, but all that was happening way later! Not to mention that Youtube was huge even before ad revenue sharing was a thing on the platform.
Meanwhile, there are very well documented cases where lack of moderation on social networks lead to the people who actually make content taking their ball and going home.
The revisionism of "the internet used to have no mods and corporate money has ruined it all" is so exhausting to read over and over again. Even 4chan has had mods and janitors! Turns out that just letting the worst actors on a network be loud is not fun.
- wmf 8y agoDidn't YouTube originally become popular because it was all pirated content? Then once they had an audience they forced out the pirates?
- yjftsjthsd-h 8y ago> Then once they had an audience they forced out the pirates? ... They did what now? I find it hard to believe that half the stuff on there is "properly" licensed.
- Danieru 8y agoEarly days of YouTube had pirate anime on the front page. The crack down was rather noticeable and I rmemebe thinking "what, does YouTube just want to be cat videos?". Yet they managed to carry through and now the majority of view hours are coming from made for YouTube content.
- dotancohen 8y agoInterestingly, in the beginning, Youtube was mostly airplane videos. When I first was introduced to the site, before it was a Google property I believe, a significant portion of the site was Boeing 747s landing and taking off. I had later read that the airplane videos were seeded by early employees.
- cbsmith 8y agoThe great thing about social media sites is that everyone who visits them has a different idea of what the primary content on the site is. ;-)
- Grue3 8y agoI remember it was not that long ago when I was able to watch the entirety of Panty & Stocking with Garterbelt on Youtube. Hard to imagine that kind of content on Youtube now, and not just because of copyright.
- syrrim 8y agoBelieve it. Go to almost any song, click "see more" in the description, and it will tell you who they licensed it from.
- asaph 8y ago> There was never a point where "well I wanted to put my video on X but Youtubue will actually let me do it without censoring" was ever true. I can't parse this. Can you please state your point more clearly.
- saagarjha 8y agoI think it says "there was never at time where I could put my content on YouTube without them censoring it".
- Dylan16807 8y agoIt's more "there was never a time where the draw of youtube was that it wouldn't censor". The draw was simply that it hosted videos.
- rtpg 8y agoSorry, I might not have been clear. My point was more that there was never a point in YT's where Youtube's moderation policy was part of a decision for an uploader to go there instead of some other platform (excluding some edge cases like gov't dissidents in certain countries) The implication of the original post was that YT's growth was in part thanks to some moderation policy that made it more attractive than alternatives. But to my understanding this was never the case, and YT's growth was from a bunch of other things. Including it basically being the only reliable option for a good part of its early life (how I remember things)