Huge opportunity for X to continue to become the safe haven for "cancelled" content. Tucker Carlson, etc.
Or even an exclusive, paid platform - like Rogan on Spotify.
One I’d be doubly happy to continue not paying for.
YouTube blocks Russell Brand from making money through its platform
641–650 of 1001 posts
Re: YouTube blocks Russell Brand from making money through its platform
#642Earlier quoted context omitted.
Well so much for the "we censor because of the advertisers demands" excuse for their censorship then.
There's a bit more nuance to that. Some advertisers can choose to put ads on videos that are labelled undesirable. But because there's less advertiser demand for ads on such videos, they're generally very cheap.
Yeah that's not so bad then. They are probably losing money hosting it.
Re: YouTube blocks Russell Brand from making money through its platform
#643Earlier quoted context omitted.
Before reflexively expressing disagreement through a downvote, I invite and encourage a thoughtful discourse on the matter. It's disheartening to observe dissent without accompanying dialogue, as meaningful engagement fosters mutual understanding and growth.
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I find that intellectual engagement often makes for the most memorable soirées. Perhaps you'd like an invite next time?
Re: YouTube blocks Russell Brand from making money through its platform
#644Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's generally the premise behind "innocent until proven guilty in a court of law", as opposed to "guilty whenever the histrionic internet mob and its tech enablers deem it so".
Except, and I know you must have read this somewhere else by now, that Youtube is not the State. Your employer (should you have one) doesn't need to wait until a court of law proves you guilty of a stealing paperclips before they fire you, and a restaurant doesn't have to wait until a court proves that you are being a public disturbance before they kick you out. A private corporation has the right to do whatever they…
Who made YouTube judge and jury?
Let's say, for the sake of argument, YouTube demonitized all Irish because they unilaterally decided they're all plonkers and they're a private company and they can do what they want. Because that's the level of absurdity here.
Nor do your examples hold water. This isn't a situation of "you were caught stealing paperclips on video". Rather, it's more a case of Sally the tart from accounting has accused you of fingering her in a pub toilet ten years ago when you were both drunk and now ten years later she decides she's upset so let's engage the digital lynch mob and proceed with ruining your life because we all know women never lie.
Re: YouTube blocks Russell Brand from making money through its platform
#645Earlier quoted context omitted.
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Glad to see you deleted your other reply that was just rude. I'd agree with the other person (and even if I agreed with you, I'd still point out that your language and attitude are quite against the HN guidelines, which are worth reading: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html ) I'd personally be surprised if Russel Brand had more than $1M/yr in sponsorship deals relating to his YouTube content, which would…
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Re: YouTube blocks Russell Brand from making money through its platform
#646Earlier quoted context omitted.
At some point the private platform becomes so influential over the information environment and politics that it can no longer be considered merely a private platform. It is now also a public square. It’s not unreasonable at that point to require it to adhere higher standards of evidence, law, and reason. In this case, I’m no fan of Brand, but I’m even less a fan of YouTube’s apparent policy of “guilty till proven inn…
I am also very much a free speech absolutist. But demonetization is different. Anyone who wants to see the video still can, so Russel Brand has not had his freedom of speech restricted in any way. This is not a policy of guilty until proven innocent. It's a policy of "advertisers don't want to be associated with rapists." And while there is a good argument for allowing access to YouTube as a public square, there is n…
Alleged rapists.
Is that even true? Are there no convicted rapists with monetized youtube channels? Youtube does background checks? Or they merely take action when someone's crime(s) make it into the news? That seems rather arbitrary and short-sighted. Some journalist or cabal of journalists can write a viral article about someone, about something that happened a decade or more ago, and a corporation will unilaterally decide to end the economic aspect of their relationship with the person?
Re: YouTube blocks Russell Brand from making money through its platform
#647Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not just social media. Stripe and Square have similar wiggle-room and it's a demonization felt pretty directly. Amazon, Etsy and others - their policies give room to pick and choose winners - and change policy on a whim - and apply it inconsistently. Corporate Overlords don't have to engage on Rights - it's all in the Privilege realm.
I worked at a (big) company when they changed their policy to include this vagueness. It was all over this guy spreading mass disinformation and conspiracy theories that were actively harmful. There was a lot of discussion about “yeah, I agree this is bad… but, this is a slippery slope,” and “how can you think we should let him use OUR platform to do this,” type arguments. We were a privately held company at the time…
Nature of the allogations aside, isn't this what possibly happened to Brand? He spoke things that many wished went unsaid. Eventually the "terms & conditions" were tweaked so to speak and now the critic is silenced, marginalized and humiliated.
Of all the targets to pick, why Brand? Why now?
Re: YouTube blocks Russell Brand from making money through its platform
#648Earlier quoted context omitted.
Andrew Tate has been indicted on charges of rape, human trafficking, and forming an organised crime group to sexually exploit women. He is by his own admission a violent misogynist and, in his own words, "probably 40% of the reason" he moved to Romania was the perceived ease of evading rape charges there: "I'm not a rapist, but I like the idea of just being able to do what I want. I like being free." That's the same…
This is one of the best viewpoints criticizing the “I’m being silenced” victim position of conspiracy theorists. Also, consider that the ones that are silenced we are not hearing about and from.
> Also, consider that the ones that are silenced we are not hearing about and from.
I agree, and find this heartbreaking. I remember reading the accusations against Bill Clinton which, like those against Brand, were independent of one another, made by credible victims who did not know each other, supported by witnesses, and -- like Brand -- included similar patterns of behaviour from attack to attack (Clinton, if I recall, had a predilection for biting the faces and lips of the women he assaulted).
And then those women watch as Hillary Clinton uses her platform to discredit them in the cruellest possible terms.[^1] I wish those weeping and tearing their clothes for Brand as he is "silenced" would consider what it must be like to truly be silenced. Not just "my $1m a year YouTube income stream is gone"-silenced, but silenced by the fear of people like OP reflexively treating them with disdain and pretending they're part of some establishment plot.
It's on the same continuum as going into a pizza restaurant with a gun because it's a Democrat pedophile hub. Lunatics.
[^1] Although on Clinton it's worth noting that when his VP Al Gore was asked at a press conference whether he (Gore) thought the accusations were credible, he gave a wishy-washy answer. The journalist replied "You could just have said you don't believe them," to which Gore – astonishingly – replied: "I didn't say that," before going on to enumerate how any crimes Clinton may have committed were balanced out by his record of public service?!
Re: YouTube blocks Russell Brand from making money through its platform
#649Wow so much focus in the comments on the individual instead of YouTube's ability to randomly remove whoever they dislike, reminding us of the problems with large corporate companies controlling essentially public services. Just imagine if Tencent decided to buy YouTube from Google, would get real interesting.
> controlling essentially public services. Youtube is not and never was a "public service". It's their platform and they are free to do with it as they want, with very little exception. It's not any different than a mom and pop store having a "No shirt, No shoes, No service" sign and enforcing that. It's their store, it's private property, it's their rules.
I get that, and I've been in the camp warning people of that many times, but I think it's an interesting situation where so much essentially public data is on a private platform. What happens if YouTube shuts down tomorrow? A, would society accept it and B, would they be bailed out? For the latter, what happens next?
Honestly, I would not be against one of these massive services failing spectacularly to 'teach us a lesson' about trusting all our important things to private corps.
Re: YouTube blocks Russell Brand from making money through its platform
#650Earlier quoted context omitted.
Government should offer email (and identity verification) as a utility. And if the populace wants video streaming as a utility, then that too, although I would rather the government simply provide high quality fiber internet connections as a utility since that is limiting factor in hosting your videos.
That further centralizes, makes matter worse. Government is also extremely inefficient. To build the service it'll cost them 10x more than private companies doing it. How much do you want to pay in taxes? There will come a point that even if the government actually is trying, that even if the entire GDP is converted the taxes that it'll still end up with a worse quality of life for the rest of us. Governments is easi…
I don’t think so. Email is low barrier to entry, and a constitutionally protected email account would protect people’s ability to communicate electronically, especially if the government is going to communicate via email with you.
USPS can handle it all. SMS 2FA should also be replaced with something that is legally protected no matter what, so it doesn’t matter if you get blocked by Google/Apple/ATT/Verizon/etc, you can still live your life.
Same for an electronic money account.