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On June 5th, YouTube announced in a post on its official blog that it is going to be:
Removing more hateful and supremacist content from YouTube
by specifically prohibiting videos alleging that a group is superior in order to justify discrimination, segregation or exclusion based on qualities like age, gender, race, caste, religion, sexual orientation or veteran status.
Finally, we will remove content denying that well-documented violent events, like the Holocaust or the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary, took place.
Reducing borderline content and raising up authoritative voices
In January, we piloted an update of our systems in the U.S. to limit recommendations of borderline content and harmful misinformation
We're looking to bring this updated system to more countries by the end of 2019. Thanks to this change, the number of views this type of content gets from recommendations has dropped by over 50% in the U.S. Our systems are also getting smarter about what types of videos should get this treatment, and we'll be able to apply it to even more borderline videos moving forward. As we do this, we'll also start raising up more authoritative content in recommendations
Continuing to reward trusted creators and enforce our monetization policies
we are strengthening enforcement of our existing YouTube Partner Program policies. Channels that repeatedly brush up against our hate speech policies will be suspended from the YouTube Partner program, meaning they can't run ads on their channel or use other monetization features like Super Chat.
In an article discussing this, Silicon Valley reporter Casey Newton of The Verge notes that this "is expected to result in the removal of thousands of channels across YouTube."
The crackdown goes into effect today and will "ramp up" over the next few days.
Aristarchus adds from Time:
The video streaming company says it has already made it more difficult to find and promote such videos, but it's now removing them outright. YouTube will also prohibit videos that deny certain proven events have taken place, such as the Holocaust.
The changes come as YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and other online services face mounting concern that the services allow, and in some cases foster , extremism.
YouTube's new policies will take effect immediately. Specifically, the service is banning videos "alleging that a group is superior in order to justify discrimination, segregation or exclusion." The ban applies to a range of characteristics, including race, sexual orientation and veteran status.
[...] The companies have said they are walking the balance between creating safe spaces while also protecting freedom of expression. With little government oversight on online material, internet companies have become the arbiters for what is and isn't allowed.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Mer on Monday June 10 2019, @07:33PM (1 child)
The stinker is that despite cranking the vice again and again they each time take down pundits that have unpopular opinions but are by no mean fascists and the nazi problem doesn't really shrink. It's true you've got the scum of the earth using the platforms, actual nazis, pedophiles, terrorists... They're not lying on that front.
But whether you think it's incompetence or they keep them so they always have a justification for the latest change targetting wrongthink alphabet's actions have done very little to fight against it.
Shut up!, he explained.
(Score: 1) by RandomFactor on Saturday June 29 2019, @03:16PM
Those folks are there in negligible quantities of course, but that's not what it is about, regardless of putting on appearances.
The vast majority of what is putatively being cracking down on migrated elsewhere years ago. The individuals being caught in these crackdowns are not generally Nazis, pedos, or terrorists. They are Trump supporters, libertarians, devout individuals, large or small government conservatives, classical liberals, gun enthusiasts, conspiracy theorists, global warming skeptics, anti-vaxxers, free speech proponents, pro life individuals, and lately people that would be considered 'moderate' or even 'liberal' that foolishly try to keep their party from drifting further towards the far ends of left wing ideology.
A number of the above I truly would rather faded into obscurity organically, however if you take all of the above together (and probably a bunch I'm leaving out) and tally them up, I suspect you are far past 50% of the population. I can't see this as being a winning play for these companies in the long term, although leveraging an effective oligopoly controlling the public square to disrupt the speech of those with different or opposing views may gain some advantage in the short term.
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