Live data from Hacker News

YouTube Advertiser Meltdown: An Opportunity for Startups

righteousruminations.blogspot.com

21–30 of 140 posts

Re: YouTube Advertiser Meltdown: An Opportunity for Startups

#21
post #10

Strictly speaking it isn't censorship when Youtube removes a channel for being politically too extreme. Not to distract from the larger point, but this isn't true. The definition of censorship says nothing about the government being the one suppressing the content.

I look forward to your principled commitment to opening your home to everyone with a bullhorn and an opinion to share with you.

Re: YouTube Advertiser Meltdown: An Opportunity for Startups

#22
It's a weird thing because this seems to be the culmination of YouTube, as a platform, becoming a worse place consistently for content creators. This ad-hysteria seems to have just accelerated the process to its (yet unknown) logical conclusion. I think a lot of content creators didn't look for alternatives to YT as a platform because they've been a pretty alright place for free speech (most of the time -- even during this debacle!), but it's been having some pretty severe issues over the years (a lot of which are caused by YouTube's absolute refusal to deal with people personally).

It's also a weird situation, because free video sharing on the Internet is not really a profitable line of business when it exists in a way as liberal as YouTube is (Vimeo, for example is limited for free users, etc.) so there are not as many long term, similarly equipped alternatives to it, at least as of now.

Re: YouTube Advertiser Meltdown: An Opportunity for Startups

#23
post #10

Strictly speaking it isn't censorship when Youtube removes a channel for being politically too extreme. Not to distract from the larger point, but this isn't true. The definition of censorship says nothing about the government being the one suppressing the content.

No, but they aren't doing anything to suppress the video, they are just refusing to host it. If you expand the definition of censorship to anyone who refuses to host a specific piece of content, then it basically loses all meaning. The New York Times is censoring me by not publishing my article. This science journal is censoring me by not publishing my paper.

Re: YouTube Advertiser Meltdown: An Opportunity for Startups

#24
post #20
post #10

Strictly speaking it isn't censorship when Youtube removes a channel for being politically too extreme. Not to distract from the larger point, but this isn't true. The definition of censorship says nothing about the government being the one suppressing the content.

It sounds like you're making the implication that, in order to not be classified as censoring, YouTube is required to host anyone's content, regardless of how it is perceived by their stakeholders. That seems fishy. Revoking a service is not the same as censoring, I would argue.

There's some difference between removing individuals for specific behavior and in going after identifiable groups of people. As well as whether a service is some sort of public accommodation or not.

So it's one thing to ban someone from some public accommodation for specific behavior and another thing entirely if you don't serve that kind of people or if you play games with the rules and enact a grandfather clause that somehow only applies to 'that' sort, but avoids spelling it out.

Re: YouTube Advertiser Meltdown: An Opportunity for Startups

#25
post #19
post #10

Strictly speaking it isn't censorship when Youtube removes a channel for being politically too extreme. Not to distract from the larger point, but this isn't true. The definition of censorship says nothing about the government being the one suppressing the content.

Discussion is terribly confused when 'censorship' is interpreted in this general sense. Censorship enforced by the state is something distinctly different from editorial control exercised by private entities. When the single word can represent either concept (and other related concepts) ambiguity and confusion isn't far behind. I used to argue that 'censorship' should be interpreted as something done by governments a…

Your point was valid 20-30 years ago, but not anymore. Not when our bubbles are so largely defined by what we see online.

These companies with all the eyeballs are now able to exert an influence on people's lives in a way that companies rarely have been able to do in the past (barring media, which the censorship claim was a bit deal).

So it is that nowadays censorship on something like youtube has become a big deal.

Re: YouTube Advertiser Meltdown: An Opportunity for Startups

#26
post #10

Strictly speaking it isn't censorship when Youtube removes a channel for being politically too extreme. Not to distract from the larger point, but this isn't true. The definition of censorship says nothing about the government being the one suppressing the content.

No, but they aren't doing anything to suppress the video, they are just refusing to host it. If you expand the definition of censorship to anyone who refuses to host a specific piece of content, then it basically loses all meaning. The New York Times is censoring me by not publishing my article. This science journal is censoring me by not publishing my paper.

Except that Youtube's position is that they will host anything, of any quality, unless it crosses one of their red lines.

Whereas NYT will only publish stuff of high quality.

Re: YouTube Advertiser Meltdown: An Opportunity for Startups

#27

It's a weird thing because this seems to be the culmination of YouTube, as a platform, becoming a worse place consistently for content creators. This ad-hysteria seems to have just accelerated the process to its (yet unknown) logical conclusion. I think a lot of content creators didn't look for alternatives to YT as a platform because they've been a pretty alright place for free speech (most of the time -- even durin…

Let's not forget that presence on YouTube likely increases viewer retention. Being part of a channel eco-system where viewers subscribe to multiple channels gives higher retention for all channels.

Note. YT did cultivate an entire market of independent media published as subscribe-able channels of videos. It's no surprise moving is hard.

Re: YouTube Advertiser Meltdown: An Opportunity for Startups

#30
It's more growing pains. Advertisers are starting to better understand the digital space so will hopefully concentrate their efforts and dollars on those creating premium video (like Kurzgesagt). Youtube could help the case by adjusting their recommendation algorithms ... watch one weird video and your recs are ruined.
Post reply on HN