Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

YouTube blocks Russell Brand from making money through its platform

nytimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

951–960 of 1001 posts

Re: YouTube blocks Russell Brand from making money through its platform

#951

Post by judge2020 »

brigandish wrote: post #792
judge2020 wrote: post #532

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> continuing to stream his content without paying for it is despicable and immoral. But he can private the videos at anytime. Even unlisting it would remove all ads while allowing people to find the videos (via links).

It seems to me that you are suggesting that Brand harm himself further, rather than we focus on Youtube's continuing to benefit? Cutting off one's nose to spite one's face doesn't seem to be a canny strategy here (or anywhere?)

The ability to upload to YT is at YouTube's own discretion and thus their terms are imposed on that content. YouTube doesn't have to host his stuff if they don't want to, nor do they have to give them any money. Brand has the legal right to switch to a competing video platform.

Re: YouTube blocks Russell Brand from making money through its platform

#952

Post by jimnotgym »

Manuel_D wrote: post #929
jimnotgym wrote: post #875

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If only...I have never watched his videos or read about him. I don't read tabloid news. I don't watch TV news. I only listen to 'serious' radio news stations. Yet somehow I know all about this story

Because you aren't adherering to the above comment: you are reading stories about him, in fact you're also posting in the comment sections in said stories.

I didn't read the story though. I have categorically not read any stories about him ever. Yet still 'celebs' infect our lives

Re: YouTube blocks Russell Brand from making money through its platform

#953

Post by leptons »

agentgumshoe wrote: post #649
leptons wrote: post #427

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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 l…

>What happens if YouTube shuts down tomorrow? A, would society accept it and B, would they be bailed out?

I see no reason to "bail out" youtube if they close shop due to insolvency.

>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.

"important things"? You mean all the troll comments and misinformation being spread there? Or the very few videos that are actually interesting or useful? If the content creators don't still have those videos backed up somewhere other than youtube, then that's their failure. If they want those videos streamed on another platform, they are free to upload their content anywhere they want to, or even host it themselves.

Re: YouTube blocks Russell Brand from making money through its platform

#954

Post by ulizzle »

pixl97 wrote: post #921
ulizzle wrote: post #828

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you are accused, you don't lose your job; proof must be there first. Otherwise, you can sue for wrongful termination, and there will be hell to pay in dollars. HR's job is to protect the company first, so unless they catch someone in the act, they won't know or want to know unless it comes from you or the cops. But this is different because it's politics and a public person. It's different rules for them. Johnny D…

>you can sue for wrongful termination, and there will be hell to pay in dollars. Maybe in your state, or maybe in your country, but in "right to work" states, the best you'll get is unemployment.

I’m a Texan so I am, for some people, in a fanatical place for “right to work”. Even here, If you get a DUI, only way you get fired is if they find out, which they shouldn’t.

In that case you could sue and why it doesn’t happen is because of the legal consequences.

Maybe they will, maybe you ran over some kids and their puppies and you come out in the news. But otherwise no one has the right or power to find out because all citizens have a right to privacy: innocent until proven guilty and due process.

What we have here is a double standard in that public figures apparently don’t have that right, unless you toe the party line like Howard Stern or belong to the secular left priesthood like bill Clinton.

Most people are perfectly ok with that because most people are driven by ideology. I’m sure that soon no one will have any right to privacy unless they have a good credit score and vote for whoever happens to be in power at the time

Re: YouTube blocks Russell Brand from making money through its platform

#955

Post by kwere »

withinboredom wrote: post #601
djbusby wrote: post #501

Earlier 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…

>I imagine not every company uses it as sparingly but it’s a much needed clause to deplatform certain kinds of charismatic people who are harmful to humanity.

if companies really cared about humanity, most of them would close shop. Corporate activism is truly scary, as they game the system to acquire virtue to be immune to criticism and even get kickbacks from "aligned" politicians. Fascism 2.0 is really weird

Re: YouTube blocks Russell Brand from making money through its platform

#956

Post by tptacek »

rayiner wrote: post #476
karaterobot wrote: post #243

> “If a creator’s off-platform behavior harms our users, employees or ecosystem, we take action to protect the community,” the spokeswoman said. Putting aside the validity of the accusations—let's say he did everything he's accused of, for the sake of argument—is Youtube alleging that he assaulted Youtube employees, app developers who use the Youtube ecosystem, or Youtube users? I assume the latter. But the thing is,…

I’m 100% in favor of cleaning house with that generation of musicians and performers that openly preyed on women. But is that what YouTube is doing? When is Aerosmith getting demonetized? https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-features/steven-tyl... How has it taken YouTube this long, anyway? Hasn’t much of this stuff been openly known for a decade or more? Is YouTube literally just reacting to the media cycle and…

Soon, hopefully. But I don't understand how you think Aerosmith is significant, or somehow countervails Brand. The people who care about Brand's sex pestery tend not to give a shit about Aerosmith. There are always going to be victimizers who haven't been called out, or who haven't yet been dealt with, in every field of endeavor; Robert Kelly is a good example.

It's not as if people who care about sexual assault are somehow lined up in Steven Tyler's corner. Quite the opposite.

Re: YouTube blocks Russell Brand from making money through its platform

#957

Post by kypro »

harshitaneja wrote: post #884
kypro wrote: post #256

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or alternatively companies have to provide clear and explicit rules about what is permissible on their platform and if you feel you're wrongly censored or removed from the platform you should be able to take legal action. I'm fine with YouTube not wanting to provide a platform for people who they feel are harmful, but they need to define that in an explicit way so that these decisions are not made arbitrarily. I beli…

Define "clear and explicit rules". Does the constitution of say United States qualify as examples of clear and explicit rules? If yes, then even after roughly a quarter millennium, there are still hundreds of thousands of cases filed each year.

I don't need to define it. It would be open to reasonable interpretation.

If an online platform creates an unclear or vague rule and use that rule to remove a user, then that user could pursue legal actions. If a court agrees that the rule (or rules) used to remove the user from the platform is unclear or too vague from the perspective of a reasonable person then the platform would need to pay out for their mistake.

Therefore it would be in their interest to ensure they have clear and explicit rules.

I don't think this is hard and we shouldn't pretend it is. It's just regulators in the West rather force Apple adopt USB-C and destroy E2E than than protect us from arbitrary corporate censorship.

Re: YouTube blocks Russell Brand from making money through its platform

#958

Post by kwere »

anigbrowl wrote: post #162
mikece wrote: post #67

No clue whether Brand is innocent or guilty before the law, but if he's exonerated would he have grounds to sue YouTube/Google or do the terms of service allow YouTube to demonetize people based on accusations even if they turn out to be false at a later time?

Unlikely, since uploaders don't really have a contractual relationship with YouTube. Platform operators can just arbitrarily kick people off with no recourse or accountability or even a clear explanation. There's no workaround for this except through regulation, aka government overreach into the free market destroying jobs and freedoms (as objections are usually phrased).

youtube is a de facto utility (like most of other Google products) and should be regulated accordingly

Re: YouTube blocks Russell Brand from making money through its platform

#959

Post by weeblewobble »

benj111 wrote: post #853
surfingdino wrote: post #308

Earlier quoted context omitted.

YouTube doesn't want to be demonetized by advertisers, so they are demonetizing Brand. It's basic reputation management / income stream protection. Brand is free to go elsewhere or set up his own streaming / video publishing service.

[flagged]

Rumble is doing well and Brand already has a deal with them. Twitter supports long form video now and the owner is a big supporter. Plenty of other places

Re: YouTube blocks Russell Brand from making money through its platform

#960

Post by stainablesteel »

Supply5411 wrote: post #487
stainablesteel wrote: post #472

Earlier quoted context omitted.

why are they never nervous when they outright betray the demographics they should be pandering to? latest examples would be the bud light and target fiascos

You answered your own question: the advertising that they produce is what they're comfortable with.

sounds like they should fire that marketing team, that's a money making role not a comfort zone
Post reply on HN