Suspect in YouTube Shooting Angry That Her Videos Had Been 'De-Monetized' • Hacker News Board

Re: Suspect in YouTube Shooting Angry That Her Videos Had Been 'De-Monetized'

#141

Post by dec0dedab0de » Wed, Apr 04, 2018, 2:16 PM UTC

jacquesm wrote: post #82

'De-Monetized' suggests that someone who produces a video has an automatic right to income. That's bonkers, it's already quite a service that Youtube allows you to upload your videos to reach an audience that you'd be hard pressed to serve from your own server. They do this for free. In the previous iteration of such platforms all the ad income would go to the owner of the website, not to the rights owners of the vid…

'De-Monetized' suggests that someone who produces a video has an automatic right to income. That's bonkers, it's already quite a service that Youtube allows you to upload your videos to reach an audience that you'd be hard pressed to serve from your own server. They do this for free. In the previous iteration of such platforms all the ad income would go to the owner of the website, not to the rights owners of the videos.

I tend to agree with you, especially since they could put ads directly in the videos. However, they changed their policy fairly recently. If it was money producers were relying on to live, then they are definitely going to be upset.

It's like when Apple pulls something from the AppStore because they want to release something similar. They shouldn't have tried to build a business on someone else's platform, but it's still shitty.

On another note: I hate fanatics, no matter of what plumage.

100% agree, no "however"

Re: Suspect in YouTube Shooting Angry That Her Videos Had Been 'De-Monetized'

#142

Post by rpiguy » Wed, Apr 04, 2018, 2:16 PM UTC

danso wrote: post #97

deftnerd wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While they're not directly responsible, the problem was entirely of their making. They created a whole new profession (even my 8-year-old son wants to grow up to be a "professional youtubber") and then arbitrarily destroy careers. The created an environment where people could work hard to create their own destiny while giving themselves the ability to destroy those destinies without cause or recourse. It was only a m…

So basically every company who has ever laid off or fired an employee should expect at some point to fall victim to a mass shooting?

Homicide has long been the number 2 cause of death in the workplace in the U.S. You can find statistics going back as far as 1992. Layoffs are indeed often a motivation.

Hence the term, "going postal."

Re: Suspect in YouTube Shooting Angry That Her Videos Had Been 'De-Monetized'

#143

Post by arkades » Wed, Apr 04, 2018, 2:17 PM UTC

morley wrote: post #94

I'm really surprised at how many of these HN comments are so sympathetic to this murderer's cause. To me, this illustrates how dangerous this type of reporting is, this media obsession with the perpetrators of mass shooting. This is the problem that I feel utterly powerless against. You can make more mental health programs, pass more gun control legislation, pay more for security, but what can you do when the culture…

I largely agree with you.

But, about 1% of me, can't help but note that... well, I think there's a reason for people's tendency to give the perpetrator some sympathy. The thing is, we abstract this away into things like "it's not censorship if a private organization declines to monetize the content you freely publish with them," but... let's be clear about what happens here, at the granular ground level:

1) Company creates a space for people to do work that pays their bills. This is for company's benefit as much as theirs. 2) People do that work, pay their bills. Mutual joy. 3) Company suddenly, and apparently arbitrarily, and without adequate communication, yanks people's ability to pay their bills away from them

Most people that suddenly and apparently arbitrarily go from "paying my bills" to "holy fuck not paying my bills" flip the hell out. It's like a lay-off, but even more inscrutable and un-appealable.

Whatever abstraction is laid upon this at the 10k-foot view, I think people are sympathetic to the fact that YT basically did a really shitty thing to a lot of people (or maybe did a totally not shitty thing in a really shitty way). And, if you do something really shitty to a large number of people, yeah, you run the risk of having done something really shitty to a nutjob. The nutjob isn't a black swan, though: they're an extreme version of the response that a lot of people are having.

So, yes, "organization that did really shitty thing to a lot of people accidentally included violent nutjob on list of shit-receivers," doesn't really merit any lionization of the nutjob, but it's hard to ignore the "really shitty thing" aspect of it. Because it's not a black swan - it's just a (much more) extreme version of the same feelings we'd have if we were in their shoes.

Re: Suspect in YouTube Shooting Angry That Her Videos Had Been 'De-Monetized'

#144

Post by bilbo0s » Wed, Apr 04, 2018, 2:17 PM UTC

banned1 wrote: post #118

bilbo0s wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a little humorous, as it really does indicate that the people who are complaining that their free speech is being attacked, are themselves, attacking free speech. I'm not sure any of the people arguing points and counterpoints in our society's current free speech debate really value free speech? I think it'd be a bit more accurate to say that these people value THEIR speech and freedom, not really the speech and…

Bingo! Think Antifa or the students protesting someone at school and not letting them speak.

Your comment does illustrate my point.

YOU value the free speech of whoever is speaking, but not that of the counter protesters. Who themselves value THEIR free speech, but not that of whoever is speaking.

It's an intractable problem really.

Re: Suspect in YouTube Shooting Angry That Her Videos Had Been 'De-Monetized'

#145

Post by emodendroket » Wed, Apr 04, 2018, 2:17 PM UTC

jacquesm wrote: post #82

'De-Monetized' suggests that someone who produces a video has an automatic right to income. That's bonkers, it's already quite a service that Youtube allows you to upload your videos to reach an audience that you'd be hard pressed to serve from your own server. They do this for free. In the previous iteration of such platforms all the ad income would go to the owner of the website, not to the rights owners of the vid…

I'm not going to defend shooting anyone, obviously. But YouTube has captured the entire market, practically, for streaming video, and encouraged people to look at it as a way of making money (even a full-time time job, for many). Why would you be surprised that someone would be upset about a capricious decision, which cannot be appealed, suddenly taking away the money?

Re: Suspect in YouTube Shooting Angry That Her Videos Had Been 'De-Monetized'

#146

Post by bmarquez » Wed, Apr 04, 2018, 2:18 PM UTC

guelo wrote: post #23

Simulacra wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a very good analysis. You could apply that to just about anything in the news these days. What would you say are the worst organizations at manufacturing news?

Breitbart, Infowars, The Blaze, Fox News, Drudge.

Drudge is simply an aggregator that links to sites like CNN, Bloomberg, CNBC, Fox, AP, etc. Better to name the individual sites directly.

Re: Suspect in YouTube Shooting Angry That Her Videos Had Been 'De-Monetized'

#147

Post by bsenftner » Wed, Apr 04, 2018, 2:18 PM UTC

colechristensen wrote: post #63

SlowRobotAhead wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> For whatever reason Anyone that’s been paying attention knows the reason. If you can’t attack free speech, make that speech too expensive. All of the recent controversial issues have one side scrambling to publicly list advertisers - see the March Against Guns tweets about who has deals with NRA or advertises on Fox News. It’s a horrible tactic that’s very much mob censorship.

The Internet was supposed to be about the free exchange of information. People treat Facebook, Google, etc. etc. etc. as if they themselves are "The Internet" when they are publishers. "You" are not publishing content on YouTube, YouTube is publishing your content. Just because they do almost nothing to curate what they publish, doesn't mean the little they do is some civil rights violation. We're learning with the R…

"The Internet was supposed to be about the free exchange of information."

Actually, no, not at all. The Internet was for defense contractors to share information, and when made available to the public it was for corporations to sell services to the public. All that "free information" propaganda was just propaganda to get the public comfortable with allowing large scale surveillance technologies into their homes and to be carried on their persons. "Social media" is a genius re-writing of surveillance technologies.

Re: Suspect in YouTube Shooting Angry That Her Videos Had Been 'De-Monetized'

#148

Post by analognoise » Wed, Apr 04, 2018, 2:18 PM UTC

simonsarris wrote: post #40

I can't help but think of of the Tunisian guy who was trying to eke out a living, faced his own Arbitrary Machine (the state in this case) and lost, getting de-monetized. Then set himself on fire, more or less starting the "Arab Spring." If you never read of the Tunisian man, from wiki: > Twenty-six-year-old Mohamed Bouazizi had been the sole income earner in his extended family of eight. He operated a vegetable or a…

I can't tell if you're serious.

One of those 'systems' is governmental corruption, the other is Youtube; the comparison makes absolutely no sense. Youtube is a private company, not a corrupt government. If you're living in the states and trying to "eek out a living" and Youtube steals your proverbial "apple cart", too bad, so sad, go get a different job - they don't exist as a platform to ensure people get paid, people getting paid is a side effect of them existing. If it doesn't work for you, find other work.

To compare them indicates a level of myopia and entitlement that is profoundly distressing.

Re: Suspect in YouTube Shooting Angry That Her Videos Had Been 'De-Monetized'

#149

Post by DanAndersen » Wed, Apr 04, 2018, 2:18 PM UTC

leshow wrote: post #104

Klathmon wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is absolutely a "no-win" situation in my mind. Everyone is acting in their best interests, and in many cases are acting benevolently, but the outcome is still awful. Obviously YouTube is going to cave to advertiser pressure and start to restrict what videos can have ads, their whole existence depends on it, and if I worked at YouTube i'd see demonetizing some videos as a welcome alternative to closing the whole…

> I don't blame the advertisers one bit from wanting to remove their ads from many videos. Once the media starts playing the game that "an ad on the video == the advertiser agrees with the message" I too would want to do everything I can to ensure that I'm not associated with bad things. Why do we do that on youtube when we don't do that on TV? Do we assume that if you're ad runs during you agree with the jokes in it…

>Why do we do that on youtube when we don't do that on TV?

Our society does do that on TV and radio. Consider the recent boycott attempts against Laura Ingraham: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boycott_in_support_of_David_Ho...

>Do we assume that if you're ad runs during you agree with the jokes in it?

I don't think most people actually assume that the advertiser literally agrees with all the content they are running ads on. Rather, I think that people have found that it's an effective ideological weapon.

Going after the advertisers to attack content is a tactic that works. The attackers don't have to literally think that the advertisers are morally signing on with the content, they just have to think that enough people out there think that, and that the advertisers are risk-averse to bend the knee, that it's a useful tactic.

Re: Suspect in YouTube Shooting Angry That Her Videos Had Been 'De-Monetized'

#150

Post by aeorgnoieang » Wed, Apr 04, 2018, 2:19 PM UTC

danso wrote: post #97

deftnerd wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While they're not directly responsible, the problem was entirely of their making. They created a whole new profession (even my 8-year-old son wants to grow up to be a "professional youtubber") and then arbitrarily destroy careers. The created an environment where people could work hard to create their own destiny while giving themselves the ability to destroy those destinies without cause or recourse. It was only a m…

So basically every company who has ever laid off or fired an employee should expect at some point to fall victim to a mass shooting?

Statistically, yes, i.e. every company that has ever laid off or fired an employee should expect the possibility at whatever the relevant probability is.