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Google's Video Nasties

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Re: Google's Video Nasties

#21

Post by Neliquat »

nl wrote: post #14
Someone1234 wrote: post #2

The ironic thing is that this creates the very problem it seeks to solve... If advertisers have no control over which content their ads appear near then they can legitimately claim, when criticised, that they are unable to pick and choose. By giving advertisers control, when criticised, the critics can use that same control in order to pressure advertisers to limit ads to inoffensive content only (which, frankly, is…

But with the direction "being offended" has taken (i.e. someone on twitter will take offense to anything, and they feel they have a legitimate right to never feel offended) it won't be long before most content is inaccessible. I dunno. I find Nazis, cat torture videos and pro-ISIS propaganda offensive. But you are right, clearly free speech must be protected at all costs and even made profitable, and clearly it being…

Its okay, we only torture facist nazi cats. /s

Re: Google's Video Nasties

#22

Post by SmellyGeekBoy »

nl wrote: post #14
Someone1234 wrote: post #2

The ironic thing is that this creates the very problem it seeks to solve... If advertisers have no control over which content their ads appear near then they can legitimately claim, when criticised, that they are unable to pick and choose. By giving advertisers control, when criticised, the critics can use that same control in order to pressure advertisers to limit ads to inoffensive content only (which, frankly, is…

But with the direction "being offended" has taken (i.e. someone on twitter will take offense to anything, and they feel they have a legitimate right to never feel offended) it won't be long before most content is inaccessible. I dunno. I find Nazis, cat torture videos and pro-ISIS propaganda offensive. But you are right, clearly free speech must be protected at all costs and even made profitable, and clearly it being…

I'm not sure why you were downvoted, hyperbole maybe. But you raise a very valid point. People are using a "slippery slope" argument to justify supermarkets indirectly funding terrorist groups by way of sponsored propaganda videos. Advertisers should absolutely have some choice over how and where their adverts are shown.

Re: Google's Video Nasties

#23

Post by skywhopper »

fareesh wrote: post #12

I get the argument that corporations ought to take responsibility for where their money goes, but I feel like this is a bit similar to if I buy a cookie and the cookie baker buys a house and the former owner of the house buys a gun and kills some people - is it reasonable to hold me partly responsible for contributing to it? Should we want that level of control in our lives? What's the average degrees of Kevin Bacon…

I think there's two factors at work here. Number one, the ad buyers have a brand image they wish to control, and therefore they have an interest in ensuring that their brand is not associated with content they think would tarnish their image. Even if every ad-viewer consciously knew that the ads did not imply endorsement of the content, there are subconscious factors to consider (factors which form the basic premise of a huge percentage of corporate advertising--eg that positive subconscious associations with brand imagery is one of the purposes of advertising).

Second, this is a (needed) power play on the part of ad buyers. Google has growing control over huge swaths of online and mobile advertising. Ad buyers need to push back, questioning the value of this sort of advertising and demanding more control over where their ads are displayed. Why should they trust Google to do the job of deciding where their ads belong for them? Google has proven time and again that they trust their own AI and machine learning tools far more than they should. And the longer they wait, the worse it's going to get.

Re: Google's Video Nasties

#24

Post by arprocter »

Someone1234 wrote: post #2

The ironic thing is that this creates the very problem it seeks to solve... If advertisers have no control over which content their ads appear near then they can legitimately claim, when criticised, that they are unable to pick and choose. By giving advertisers control, when criticised, the critics can use that same control in order to pressure advertisers to limit ads to inoffensive content only (which, frankly, is…

I said the same thing when reddit changed it's mind about "free speech" - once you announce you're banning 'the bad stuff' it implies that what remains is good

Re: Google's Video Nasties

#25

Post by TACIXAT »

In the finance category, so many posts are robo written now. If you Google just about any ticker symbol you get a very unnatural reading post about its recent movement. Just meaningless analysis that say nothing and recites some ratios. I spend about 2 seconds on those pages when researching a company.

Re: Google's Video Nasties

#26

Post by praxulus »

arebop wrote: post #7
chickenfries wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Advertisers have always wanted to control the content that their ads appear next to because it determines the efficacy of the ad. If your wholesome, family brand starts showing up on porn or ISIS sites, it doesn't matter that you can say "oh that's out of our control," your brand has already been damaged. Also, if you cost structure is CPM, you probably didn't want to waste an impression on that page. > (i.e. someone…

> the efficacy of the ad That part of it is easy to mitigate by the auction process. I.e., the mean efficacy of ad placement is reflected in the price of the winning bid due to the usual market forces. The less quantifiable part of it, "my brand must never appear alongside X," cannot be dealt with in the auction because the recall has to be perfect and it's not feasible to guess how the advertiser would decide all th…

The auction process only solves that problem if advertisers know what the adjacent content is and use that information to bid less or not bid on it. At that point, we're back to the status quo of advertisers policing content.

While you might be able to automate the process somewhat with ads that aim for direct conversions, it's still extremely difficult to automatically measure the effectiveness of brand advertising.

Re: Google's Video Nasties

#27

Post by alphonsegaston »

YouTube also just had a big pushback from the LGBTQ+ community because they quietly instituted a feature that (unevenly) blocked videos having anything to do with being LGBTQ+ as "objectionable."

http://teneightymagazine.com/2017/03/19/youtubes-restricted-...

They've walked it back with "our algorithm went overboard," but I wonder when people are gonna stop buying this excuse. If the automated system you put in place serves extremist ads or deems a whole class of people as objectionable, that's on you.

Re: Google's Video Nasties

#28

Post by randyrand »

It's google's platform and they can do what they want, and I have little issue blocking actual racists. But, banning hate speech (correctly) stopped any ad revenue from going to Tommy Sotomayor, a black man who grew up in the poor south and who talks about black issues. The problem: He's very critical of black people/culture, issues he personally faced growing up.

The algorithm works in this instance. His speech is hate speech by most definitions of the word. But that's the main problem. Hate speech includes reasonable hate!

If I had it my way, reasonable discussion about a culture should never be blocked. Even if it's hateful. Hate should not be banned, otherwise people will vent their hate in worse ways.

Here's his channel if you're curious: https://www.youtube.com/user/sotomayortv2

Example video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ycYDUCGi7no1

Re: Google's Video Nasties

#29

Post by gpawl »

randyrand wrote: post #28

It's google's platform and they can do what they want, and I have little issue blocking actual racists. But, banning hate speech (correctly) stopped any ad revenue from going to Tommy Sotomayor, a black man who grew up in the poor south and who talks about black issues. The problem: He's very critical of black people/culture, issues he personally faced growing up. The algorithm works in this instance. His speech is h…

How can you say "He's very critical of black people" in tht wording with a straight face, after acknowledging that he is black too? The point is that there's a difference between saying "I hate this person and the thousands like her who behaving this way" and "I hate black people because they behave this way".

Re: Google's Video Nasties

#30

Post by Sunset »

jff wrote: post #16
maxerickson wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think your implication that any number of offended people will be acted on is a stretch. Advertisers will respond to the masses, not the most outraged hecklers.

> Advertisers will respond to the masses, not the most outraged hecklers. Twitter seems to be proving that wrong these days.

It's because the people doing the responding share the ideological leanings of the people doing the complaining.

When the same social circles are both in PR/HR and the offended class they will consider the same things valid criticism and may go as far as flying in the face of 90% of the quiet consumers of the product's interests.

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