YouTube bans comments on all videos of children • Hacker News Board

Re: YouTube bans comments on all videos of children

#21

Post by twblalock » Thu, Feb 28, 2019, 8:14 PM UTC

deelowe wrote: post #18

_skel wrote: post #11

Social media scandals like this one are a reminder that there are larger numbers of closet pedophiles, racists, Nazi sympathizers, and conspiracy theorists in our societies than many people realized. Social media gives them a means to discover each other and collaborate, but they were always there. I agree with Youtube’s move here, but the root cause of the problem is that our societies are worse than we thought they…

Did you look into the scandal? It seemed pretty overblown to me.

I was speaking about social media scandals in general. This is one of many.

Re: YouTube bans comments on all videos of children

#22

Post by dragonwriter » Thu, Feb 28, 2019, 8:14 PM UTC

saagarjha wrote: post #4

minimaxir wrote: post #2

Official statement: https://youtube-creators.googleblog.com/2019/02/more-updates... It's not "all". > A small number of creators will be able to keep comments enabled on these types of videos. These channels will be required to actively moderate their comments, beyond just using our moderation tools, and demonstrate a low risk of predatory behavior. We will work with them directly and our goal is to grow this number…

Surely this group will always be a small fraction of channels creating content that is affected by this rule?

Over time it will probably become a large fraction, as YouTube stabilized rules, increases automation for monitoring the rules, and, frankly as channels that want integrated comments but still can't meet the rules leave YouTube for alternative platforms, or abandon creating the affected kind of content for some other pursuit.

Re: YouTube bans comments on all videos of children

#23

Post by ars » Thu, Feb 28, 2019, 8:14 PM UTC

_skel wrote: post #11

Social media scandals like this one are a reminder that there are larger numbers of closet pedophiles, racists, Nazi sympathizers, and conspiracy theorists in our societies than many people realized. Social media gives them a means to discover each other and collaborate, but they were always there. I agree with Youtube’s move here, but the root cause of the problem is that our societies are worse than we thought they…

It's not quite as bad as it looks, people say and do things online they would never do in real life.

Might want to consider requiring permanent irrevocable identities, linked with their real-world identity, for certain forums. By removing anonymity a lot of this type of behavior is suppressed.

Re: YouTube bans comments on all videos of children

#24

Post by saagarjha » Thu, Feb 28, 2019, 8:15 PM UTC

darepublic wrote: post #8

michaelmrose wrote: post #6

Man people are depressing. I'm guessing the scum bags will have to post scummy things on other forums and link to videos. At least the consumers on youtube wont be subjected to such. Incoming new challenges for reddit. Maybe its an opportunity to get rid of some more scummy communities.

More depressing that people like you would rather stifle expression so broadly in response to false panics like this one. Thanks.

I'd call this a personal attack; maybe it would be more productive if you rephrased your comment so that it wasn't so?

Re: YouTube bans comments on all videos of children

#25

Post by Sargos » Thu, Feb 28, 2019, 8:15 PM UTC

What a ham fisted reaction to the controversy. Now all content creators have to ensure that no kids are ever in their videos, which includes background footage and movie clips.

I think this is a major problem with our current centralized model of the internet where giant corporations make all the rules. Large corporations have no ability to rationally judge situations or inject nuance into discussions. They simply take the easiest and most expedient pathway to make the problem go away regardless of the long term consequences. This is not behavior we want from the few major building blocks of our modern life.

Re: YouTube bans comments on all videos of children

#26

Post by ceejayoz » Thu, Feb 28, 2019, 8:15 PM UTC

goshx wrote: post #16

To ban comments is an important step IMHO, but how about putting the people making the comments behind bars? They will keep watching these videos.

There's no law making creepy comments like these illegal, at least not in the US. (I can't speak for other countries, and US law is what's relevant here.)

Re: YouTube bans comments on all videos of children

#27

Post by dragonwriter » Thu, Feb 28, 2019, 8:16 PM UTC

goshx wrote: post #16

To ban comments is an important step IMHO, but how about putting the people making the comments behind bars? They will keep watching these videos.

> Ban comments is an important step IMHO, but how about putting the people making the comments behind bars?

That's...out of YouTube’s legal authority.

> They will keep watching these videos.

Watching the videos itself is neither illegal nor harmful to anyone, even if it may correlates with conduct that is either or both.

Re: YouTube bans comments on all videos of children

#28

Post by brootstrap » Thu, Feb 28, 2019, 8:17 PM UTC

ceejayoz wrote: post #15

zaroth wrote: post #12

The fact that Google is ceding the fight against toxic comments on YouTube is actually pretty shocking. In a company that knows more about you than you can possibly imagine, and more about automated sentiment analysis than anyone in the world, they couldn’t algorithmically determine who should be allowed to post on certain subsets of videos, or devise a system they thought was worth deploying to ensure comments meet…

I can't think of having ever seen a comment on YouTube that made the commenting feature seem worthwhile.

I extensively watch music videos and live music performances on youtube, comments are fun to read. Not sure they are completely necessary but i've learned some interesting things and been turned on to good bands from YT comments!

Re: YouTube bans comments on all videos of children

#29

Post by zapdrive » Thu, Feb 28, 2019, 8:17 PM UTC

I wonder how long before they totally disable all comments. I mean I mostly watch all my YouTube on my smart TV, and as far as I know, I can't read any comments on the TV. Additionally, I can't even read the description of the video, or the tags, or even the number of likes/dislikes. So I guess that is the direction YouTube is headed to.

Re: YouTube bans comments on all videos of children

#30

Post by thanatos_dem » Thu, Feb 28, 2019, 8:17 PM UTC

goshx wrote: post #16

To ban comments is an important step IMHO, but how about putting the people making the comments behind bars? They will keep watching these videos.

How do you find them? Are you going to start forcing everyone to log in to view videos? And forcing everyone with a google account to verify themselves as a genuine person, with personally identifiable information?

Anonymity brings out the worst of some people, sure, but the damage of taking away anonymity is substantially more dangerous IMO.

And really, yeah, these people are complete creeps... but how does that affect anyone?