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YouTube the app (or web site) is not great for kids, however, there is an immense amount of content on YouTube that is wonderful for kids. I curate content for

YouTube the app (or web site) is not great for kids, however, there is an immense amount of content on YouTube that is wonderful for kids. I curate content for my five year old daughter, and she can easily browse it, without descending into the rabbit hole that is YouTube-at-large. It's easy for me to do, but only because my main project (https://pianop.ly/ https://pianop.ly/) involves embedding YouTube videos into web pages, and I have a ton of tools that make it easy (for me, not necessarily for anyone). I don't understand why there isn't more of this. I wish there was a large community of parents that wanted to curate content -- educational, musical, etc -- that kids could enjoy without parents having to worry so much they'll either stumble into truly awful stuff, or more likely, just spend their time looking at completely inane timewasters. (opening eggs to reveal toys, etc) A side benefit is that if a video is embedded into a web page, the only ads YouTube ever shows is a banner. (although, I pay $10 a month to have YouTube without ads, so that isn't an issue for me. We don't have Netflix or cable or broadcast TV, by the way) Incidentally, my daughter and I have friends (another dad and daughter) that are YouTubers, and while this girl is only 8, their content is good (in my opinion) and is a creative outlet for them and they have a lot of fun with it. The dad is an excellent videographer/editor, and the daughter is an excellent skateboarder, and they combine those things and share it with the world. (we met via YouTube and the four of us meet up at skateparks...my daughter is also really good) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wzrrgcqyvF4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wzrrgcqyvF4 I just don't see the problem with this.

Spellman 7y ago
The first issue that pops into my mind is "community of parents curating content" doesn't scale. Or at least is hard to protect from bad actors injecting into the stream. The best way a group could maintain control would be to build a site with embedded YT videos, but YT would rather folks watch on their site with comments, engagements, and the ability to serve up Recommended links (plus easier tracking of user accounts and watching habits). And don't forget the Watch Next stuff popping up that will redirect them out of your curated garden back into the YT wildlands. And if it's only banner ads, those are much lower value for YT and advertisers. So you're fighting YT, and they intentionally don't give you the tools to build such a project to successful scale. And you can bet once one becomes semi-successful, others will quickly swoop in to exploit that market diluting the impact. In theory custom TY Playlists is how YT supports this curation on their site, but it's plagued with spammed algorithmic playlists associated with any semi-popular video trying to direct traffic towards their own content. YT's goals aren't to let groups curate a custom set of videos to then redistribute to others. It's to have users engage in an endless stream of content and maintain those sweet sweet watch times to get ad revenue. Yeah, YouTube has lots of great content, and can be a great creative outlet for many. It's the weird black holes of predatory folks that try to capture children's eyes for monetization that cause issues.
rihegher 7y ago
Parent of two kids here, i'm curating videos for them as well. Maybe we could create a tool for group curating videos?
- TeMPOraL 7y ago
  Parent of one. Sign me in.
- robbrown451 7y ago
  Awesome let's do it. I've got a ton of pieces in place. rjbrown at gmail
  - kashprime 7y ago
    Me too, will email you. I've been collecting as well.
- tokyokawasemi 7y ago
  Same here. I've started a small thing here: https://fugu.tv https://fugu.tv (piggy backing off this neat little repo https://github.com/iRaul/podcasts-repo https://github.com/iRaul/podcasts-repo )
  - rihegher 7y ago
    Thanks for this, did you start this alone?
    - tokyokawasemi 7y ago
      Yeah. I live in Tokyo and so my kid needs some English inputs. This is one effort to try to put that together.
derefr 7y ago
I think I've seen a few people mention using youtube-dl to put content onto a file share with a Plex server watching it; and then sitting the kids in front of a TV with a streaming box attached that only has the Plex client installed (or giving them a tablet with the "locked into a single app" mode enabled, locked into the Plex client.)
- TeMPOraL 7y ago
  This is precisely what I'm planning to do, +/- Plex (I'd prefer a FLOSS alternative; I'd prefer to avoid routing through third-party servers, and I have a good enough uplink with static IP and Wireguard to back it up).

Spellman 7y ago

The first issue that pops into my mind is "community of parents curating content" doesn't scale. Or at least is hard to protect from bad actors injecting into the stream. The best way a group could maintain control would be to build a site with embedded YT videos, but YT would rather folks watch on their site with comments, engagements, and the ability to serve up Recommended links (plus easier tracking of user accounts and watching habits). And don't forget the Watch Next stuff popping up that will redirect them out of your curated garden back into the YT wildlands. And if it's only banner ads, those are much lower value for YT and advertisers. So you're fighting YT, and they intentionally don't give you the tools to build such a project to successful scale. And you can bet once one becomes semi-successful, others will quickly swoop in to exploit that market diluting the impact. In theory custom TY Playlists is how YT supports this curation on their site, but it's plagued with spammed algorithmic playlists associated with any semi-popular video trying to direct traffic towards their own content. YT's goals aren't to let groups curate a custom set of videos to then redistribute to others. It's to have users engage in an endless stream of content and maintain those sweet sweet watch times to get ad revenue. Yeah, YouTube has lots of great content, and can be a great creative outlet for many. It's the weird black holes of predatory folks that try to capture children's eyes for monetization that cause issues.

rihegher 7y ago

Parent of two kids here, i'm curating videos for them as well. Maybe we could create a tool for group curating videos?

TeMPOraL 7y ago
Parent of one. Sign me in.
robbrown451 7y ago
Awesome let's do it. I've got a ton of pieces in place. rjbrown at gmail
- kashprime 7y ago
  Me too, will email you. I've been collecting as well.
tokyokawasemi 7y ago
Same here. I've started a small thing here: https://fugu.tv https://fugu.tv (piggy backing off this neat little repo https://github.com/iRaul/podcasts-repo https://github.com/iRaul/podcasts-repo )
- rihegher 7y ago
  Thanks for this, did you start this alone?
  - tokyokawasemi 7y ago
    Yeah. I live in Tokyo and so my kid needs some English inputs. This is one effort to try to put that together.

derefr 7y ago

I think I've seen a few people mention using youtube-dl to put content onto a file share with a Plex server watching it; and then sitting the kids in front of a TV with a streaming box attached that only has the Plex client installed (or giving them a tablet with the "locked into a single app" mode enabled, locked into the Plex client.)

TeMPOraL 7y ago
This is precisely what I'm planning to do, +/- Plex (I'd prefer a FLOSS alternative; I'd prefer to avoid routing through third-party servers, and I have a good enough uplink with static IP and Wireguard to back it up).