There's several instances in which creators deliberately uploaded videos unmonetized under the understanding that this would comply with some kind of noncommerc

There's several instances in which creators deliberately uploaded videos unmonetized under the understanding that this would comply with some kind of noncommercial licensing requirement[0] (e.g. NCommander's video on the MSWord 1.0 source). Such uploads are now retroactively illegal unless you're already partnered, since YouTube now only allows partners to disable monetization. To be slightly fair to YouTube, they never added NC clauses to their Creative Commons declaration support, but I doubt that was evidence of a 10-year plan to demand monetization. But on the other hand, they also made a huge stink about keeping Partner status out of the hands of people who shouldn't have it. That move now retroactively looks like YouTube trying to front-run smaller creators on ad revenue, especially if something they make goes 'viral' before they can make partner. [0] For the purpose of this comment let's pretend that 'not monetized' satisfies whatever flimsy 'noncommercial' license declaration exists