Banned From Making Money, These YouTubers Share Their Stories • Hacker News Board

Re: Banned From Making Money, These YouTubers Share Their Stories

#11

Post by tehwebguy » Mon, Dec 03, 2012, 4:38 PM UTC

thesis wrote: post #5

chimi wrote: post #3

These stories are getting tired. Google is too big to investigate every single exception to their machine rules. We know. We get it. When you have 100 accounts, you can devote time to every exception. When you have 100,000,000 accounts you can't. You have to automate it and with 100,000,000 accounts there are going to be a lot of exceptions to the rules. Even a failure rate of 0.0001% would be enough to fill that che…

The real problem is that there are little if any ways to get your account reinstated. Sure, they have to rely on automation... but if people are banned automagically then people need to be able to appeal it and have an actual human being look into it.

Absolutely, there should be a full blown appeal process. There are a few items in place but in the cases of several YouTubers I have tried to help through this process they often don't result in any additional clarity or reversal.

Re: Banned From Making Money, These YouTubers Share Their Stories

#12

Post by chimi » Mon, Dec 03, 2012, 4:39 PM UTC

SoftwareMaven wrote: post #7

chimi wrote: post #3

These stories are getting tired. Google is too big to investigate every single exception to their machine rules. We know. We get it. When you have 100 accounts, you can devote time to every exception. When you have 100,000,000 accounts you can't. You have to automate it and with 100,000,000 accounts there are going to be a lot of exceptions to the rules. Even a failure rate of 0.0001% would be enough to fill that che…

But it is seriously damaging to their company and there are other things they could do: If they notice apparent click-fraud, they should suspend payments and notify the account holders. If the fraud continues (either this one issue or if it repeats regularly)[1], shut them down. Like it or not, Google (and others like eBay) have put themselves in the position of supplying people's livelihood. There needs to be more r…

I would say a 99.9999% success rate is a reasonable algorithm.

Re: Banned From Making Money, These YouTubers Share Their Stories

#13

Post by Karunamon » Mon, Dec 03, 2012, 4:40 PM UTC

stephengillie wrote: post #10

This seems like a great way to seriously injure a competitor's ability to conduct business. In a sense, it could be used for a denial of service attack.

Indeed. Mass click fraud (and you don't even need to enlist the services of a botnet; there are Asian companies that will do this for you at a flat rate), YouTube shenanigans such as mass flagging or fake DMCAs (resulting in videos being pulled for significant lengths of time).

That's one of Google's primary problems and it will only get worse with popularity - they need better CS.

Re: Banned From Making Money, These YouTubers Share Their Stories

#14

Post by jonknee » Mon, Dec 03, 2012, 4:46 PM UTC

chimi wrote: post #3

These stories are getting tired. Google is too big to investigate every single exception to their machine rules. We know. We get it. When you have 100 accounts, you can devote time to every exception. When you have 100,000,000 accounts you can't. You have to automate it and with 100,000,000 accounts there are going to be a lot of exceptions to the rules. Even a failure rate of 0.0001% would be enough to fill that che…

These aren't people who are using a free email service, they are people who are directly generating your company revenue. In many cases a meaningful amount of revenue (Google keeps ~30% so if someone is generating just $1,000 a month that's $3,600 a year directly for Google).

If there is ever a case worthy of using company resources, it's for activities that directly affect its bottom line. Google seems to have bad support for both AdSense and AdWords and it's not because they don't have the resources, it's because they so far have not had to. Competition is what will solve Google's people problem.

I have generated Google a lot of revenue through AdSense over the years and I still live in fear of being cut off and not having any recourse. Yes, I have other revenue streams, but it would be a huge loss that's hard to fill. With any other company I would be confident that they would want the [significant] revenue and would at least work with me, but not Google.

Re: Banned From Making Money, These YouTubers Share Their Stories

#15

Post by knowaveragejoe » Mon, Dec 03, 2012, 4:48 PM UTC

chimi wrote: post #3

These stories are getting tired. Google is too big to investigate every single exception to their machine rules. We know. We get it. When you have 100 accounts, you can devote time to every exception. When you have 100,000,000 accounts you can't. You have to automate it and with 100,000,000 accounts there are going to be a lot of exceptions to the rules. Even a failure rate of 0.0001% would be enough to fill that che…

Surely a company of their size and resources could implement just an appeal system that is just a tad more useful.

Re: Banned From Making Money, These YouTubers Share Their Stories

#16

Post by knowaveragejoe » Mon, Dec 03, 2012, 4:50 PM UTC

chimi wrote: post #12

SoftwareMaven wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But it is seriously damaging to their company and there are other things they could do: If they notice apparent click-fraud, they should suspend payments and notify the account holders. If the fraud continues (either this one issue or if it repeats regularly)[1], shut them down. Like it or not, Google (and others like eBay) have put themselves in the position of supplying people's livelihood. There needs to be more r…

I would say a 99.9999% success rate is a reasonable algorithm.

I would say that statistic is entirely flawed, since we're not only talking about Partner accounts which are far, far less in number than the 100,000,000 figure cited, but the likely minuscule percentage of them actually generating any substantial revenue.

Re: Banned From Making Money, These YouTubers Share Their Stories

#17

Post by pavel_lishin » Mon, Dec 03, 2012, 4:52 PM UTC

lambda wrote: post #9

mistercow wrote: post #2

I'm glad the word is getting out about this. Google's abuse of content creators on AdSense has been going on since before they acquired YouTube. As usual, the only way to make any headway with them is to get some media attention. For anyone considering anything resembling a professional relationship with Google (i.e. you are relying on them for income), make absolutely sure that you have real alternatives that you ca…

This applies to more than just Google. Your income should not solely depend on one party, unless you're in an employment relationship with them, which carries with it various sorts of legal and social obligations that are a lot harder to simply end on a whim. Does your revenue depend entirely on being in Apple's good graces, and being dropped from the App Store would end it? Does it depend solely on Google's advertis…

Isn't this basically an argument against ever creating any iPhone app?

Re: Banned From Making Money, These YouTubers Share Their Stories

#18

Post by moepstar » Mon, Dec 03, 2012, 4:53 PM UTC

lambda wrote: post #9

mistercow wrote: post #2

I'm glad the word is getting out about this. Google's abuse of content creators on AdSense has been going on since before they acquired YouTube. As usual, the only way to make any headway with them is to get some media attention. For anyone considering anything resembling a professional relationship with Google (i.e. you are relying on them for income), make absolutely sure that you have real alternatives that you ca…

This applies to more than just Google. Your income should not solely depend on one party, unless you're in an employment relationship with them, which carries with it various sorts of legal and social obligations that are a lot harder to simply end on a whim. Does your revenue depend entirely on being in Apple's good graces, and being dropped from the App Store would end it? Does it depend solely on Google's advertis…

While you're absolutely right, there's still one problem:

There aren't much, if any, advertising providers with ads as accepted and unintrusive as Googles AdSense...

Not to forget their huge portfolio of ads that will fit almost every context - so yes, AdSense is the go-to provider for most.

Re: Banned From Making Money, These YouTubers Share Their Stories

#19

Post by shocks » Mon, Dec 03, 2012, 4:54 PM UTC

I was banned from AdSense for a similar reason.

When I was 14 I made a flash games/funny videos website, and used AdSense as my only income. I learnt a lot about driving traffic and things just started to pick up - and then I was banned.

It later came to my attention that a few friends and (at the time) girlfriend had taken it upon themselves to 'help' me by clicking an ad once a day. Annoying, since I was making about $10 a day from ads. I didn't need help. $10 a day was great for a 14 year old.

That was nearly eight years ago. I recently contacted Google about it, and was completely ignored. I understand why, it makes sense for them to protect their business - but it's annoying none the less. I could think of good uses for AdSense right now.

Re: Banned From Making Money, These YouTubers Share Their Stories

#20

Post by Vivtek » Mon, Dec 03, 2012, 4:56 PM UTC

knowaveragejoe wrote: post #15

chimi wrote: post #3

These stories are getting tired. Google is too big to investigate every single exception to their machine rules. We know. We get it. When you have 100 accounts, you can devote time to every exception. When you have 100,000,000 accounts you can't. You have to automate it and with 100,000,000 accounts there are going to be a lot of exceptions to the rules. Even a failure rate of 0.0001% would be enough to fill that che…

Surely a company of their size and resources could implement just an appeal system that is just a tad more useful.

Or any appeal system at all.

The only way to get unbanned is to get noticed by a human at Google - through a non-Google channel, because Google channels are specifically designed never to bother humans.