4 ms·

YouTube is deleting comments with two phrases that insult the CCP

86 points by bobbydroptables 6y ago

4cao 6y ago
Previous discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23305149 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23305149
dmix 6y ago
This one was 1224 comments https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23223219 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23223219
qwerty123457 6y ago
Clickbait/fake news. Proper title is "Youtube auto-deletes lots of phrases that are commonly used by spammers, including phrases critical of the Chinese government"
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- manuelabeledo 6y ago
  This seems to be likely. Google has an awful track of things like this.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
vuln 6y ago
Looks like no response on the support ticket. Upvotes keep growing... https://support.google.com/youtube/thread/19190975?hl=en https://support.google.com/youtube/thread/19190975?hl=en
antoncohen 6y ago
The key thing here is that Ars Technica got YouTube to respond: > "This appears to be an error in our enforcement systems and we are investigating," YouTube said.
- vuln 6y ago
  Why wouldn’t they update the support ticket? Their statement seems very boiler plate. “It’s a glitch, we’re looking into it”. Weird it took all this attention for that little statement.
- calibas 6y ago
  Too bad this post has already been removed from the front page of HN. It barely survived 30 minutes.
  - Yetanfou 6y ago
    That is one of the reasons to stop using the front page of sites like HN (and lobste.rs and other similar 'popularity-driven' sites) and access the site through the RSS feed. This way you get to see all posts, popularity be damned. On news sites it sometimes gives an interesting insight in the editing process where they first rush out with articles with descriptive titles only to change the title (and, often, the article) to something less descriptive but more 'correct'.
Vysero 6y ago
I would be interested in seeing a list of all the banned phrases for some perspective. It's hard for me to understand why they would ban these phrases in particular. From the outside looking it it would certainly seem that Google is taking it's cues from the Chinese government directly on this matter.
- Udik 6y ago
  Yes, I suspect (as another commenter said) that these might be phrases that have been used in some 'political spamming' campaign flooding youtube with hundreds of thousands of OT comments on random videos. So they might have been treated as garbage and deleted. I can understand that if every youtube video starts to be spammed with "Trump sucks" comments, Youtube might decide to auto-delete them. It doesn't have to be pro-Trump censorship.

4cao 6y ago

Previous discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23305149 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23305149

dmix 6y ago

This one was 1224 comments https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23223219 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23223219

qwerty123457 6y ago

Clickbait/fake news. Proper title is "Youtube auto-deletes lots of phrases that are commonly used by spammers, including phrases critical of the Chinese government"

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
manuelabeledo 6y ago
This seems to be likely. Google has an awful track of things like this.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

vuln 6y ago

Looks like no response on the support ticket. Upvotes keep growing... https://support.google.com/youtube/thread/19190975?hl=en https://support.google.com/youtube/thread/19190975?hl=en

antoncohen 6y ago

The key thing here is that Ars Technica got YouTube to respond: > "This appears to be an error in our enforcement systems and we are investigating," YouTube said.

vuln 6y ago
Why wouldn’t they update the support ticket? Their statement seems very boiler plate. “It’s a glitch, we’re looking into it”. Weird it took all this attention for that little statement.
calibas 6y ago
Too bad this post has already been removed from the front page of HN. It barely survived 30 minutes.
- Yetanfou 6y ago
  That is one of the reasons to stop using the front page of sites like HN (and lobste.rs and other similar 'popularity-driven' sites) and access the site through the RSS feed. This way you get to see all posts, popularity be damned. On news sites it sometimes gives an interesting insight in the editing process where they first rush out with articles with descriptive titles only to change the title (and, often, the article) to something less descriptive but more 'correct'.

Vysero 6y ago

I would be interested in seeing a list of all the banned phrases for some perspective. It's hard for me to understand why they would ban these phrases in particular. From the outside looking it it would certainly seem that Google is taking it's cues from the Chinese government directly on this matter.

Udik 6y ago
Yes, I suspect (as another commenter said) that these might be phrases that have been used in some 'political spamming' campaign flooding youtube with hundreds of thousands of OT comments on random videos. So they might have been treated as garbage and deleted. I can understand that if every youtube video starts to be spammed with "Trump sucks" comments, Youtube might decide to auto-delete them. It doesn't have to be pro-Trump censorship.