The channels in question aren't accused of containing false/misleading videos, they're accused of containing disallowed facts. Noone disputes that modafinil promotes wakefulness or that magnesium makes many sleepy.
Websites have always been allowed to decide which facts to allow on their site. Right now, if I visited an anti-vaxxer forum, and posted "vaccines don't cause autism" in the comments, I'm sure it would be removed. So why is youtube any different?
Because youtube has a de-facto monopoly on online video viewing.
"Cronin’s YouTube channel was up to about 22,000 subscribers when he received a notice from YouTube about one of his videos, “Relax and Improve Your Sleep with Natural Calm Magnesium.” The notice said the video had been removed for violating YouTube’s community guidelines, but didn’t specify further." Magnesium isn't even a nootropic. That is, while it may have some ability to boost cognition, it isn't a substance pr…
Problem is medical claims are highly regulated in the West. So there is a likely legal liability for youtube in the US and in the UK. In fact, they might have already had pressure from regulators.
Did you know that Pepsi is made from dead babies? I didn't, before YouTube [1]. It turns out you can say almost anything you want on video without it being a legal issue. I don't think regulators care about this small-time stuff.
"Cronin’s YouTube channel was up to about 22,000 subscribers when he received a notice from YouTube about one of his videos, “Relax and Improve Your Sleep with Natural Calm Magnesium.” The notice said the video had been removed for violating YouTube’s community guidelines, but didn’t specify further." Magnesium isn't even a nootropic. That is, while it may have some ability to boost cognition, it isn't a substance pr…
YouTube isn't going after 'crazy idea[s] in need of being censored.' They're going after anything they can to shut down as many small channels as they can. Their end goal is a situation akin to traditional TV networks. Far less variety, very much walled off from participation, and much more centralized. This will enable Eric Schmidt and his colleagues to exercise much more control over human culture. He explained that Google has a responsibility to manipulate human culture in his book "The New Digital Age." They are rich, and as such, better. As far as he is concerned, protecting the masses from themselves is his duty and responsibility.
The channels in question aren't accused of containing false/misleading videos, they're accused of containing disallowed facts. Noone disputes that modafinil promotes wakefulness or that magnesium makes many sleepy.
Websites have always been allowed to decide which facts to allow on their site. Right now, if I visited an anti-vaxxer forum, and posted "vaccines don't cause autism" in the comments, I'm sure it would be removed. So why is youtube any different?
"Works just like an antivax website" is not a glowing endorsement of either youtube or the rules under which it is working.
Youtube is a private company and can do whatever they want with their own website. Nobody's stopping makers of these videos from hosting the videos themselves. This is not censorship in the way we have traditionally understood. It only feels like it because Youtube is where the biggest audience is. It's the same whenever Facebook penalizes a post in the timeline, or whenever Google hides content from the search resul…
The "my preferred definition of censorship specifies that it can only be done by governments, and [company] is not a government" rhetoric that always appears with these sort of stories is truly tiring and pedantic. Nobody here thinks that youtube is a government. The problem isn't people thinking that youtube is a government; the problem is people thinking that censorship is something only a government can do, or thi…
It's an important distinction though. One is legally sanctioned censorship by proxy of a defecto monopoly. The other is government enforced.
One has a penalty of shutting you up, the other of shutting you up, fining you, and or jailing you.
They shouldn't be conflated as the same type of censorship.
Youtube is a private company and can do whatever they want with their own website. Nobody's stopping makers of these videos from hosting the videos themselves. This is not censorship in the way we have traditionally understood. It only feels like it because Youtube is where the biggest audience is. It's the same whenever Facebook penalizes a post in the timeline, or whenever Google hides content from the search resul…
The "my preferred definition of censorship specifies that it can only be done by governments, and [company] is not a government" rhetoric that always appears with these sort of stories is truly tiring and pedantic. Nobody here thinks that youtube is a government. The problem isn't people thinking that youtube is a government; the problem is people thinking that censorship is something only a government can do, or thi…
YouTube could not survive on its own. YouTube only exists so that Google can guarantee they see no competition in the video space. It loses money by the mountain-load. It is propped up by Google Search and the titanic amounts of money AdSense brings in. If you wanted to build a competitor to YouTube, you would need investors willing to spend hundreds of millions of dollars to build the infrastructure - and willing to accept tremendous losses for potentially decades. Google will continue to prop up YouTube in order to guarantee competent competition will never exist.
> Youtube is a private company and can do whatever they want with their own website. A big chunk of our culture is hosted by that company. Not sure if that makes a difference, but imho, it should.
It totally does. Why is such a big chunk of our culture is hosted by a private company?
You answered your own question
> Instead, you all wanted to make money. (Understandable)
There isn't as much margin in self hosting and dumb pipes
The "my preferred definition of censorship specifies that it can only be done by governments, and [company] is not a government" rhetoric that always appears with these sort of stories is truly tiring and pedantic. Nobody here thinks that youtube is a government. The problem isn't people thinking that youtube is a government; the problem is people thinking that censorship is something only a government can do, or thi…
It's an important distinction though. One is legally sanctioned censorship by proxy of a defecto monopoly. The other is government enforced. One has a penalty of shutting you up, the other of shutting you up, fining you, and or jailing you. They shouldn't be conflated as the same type of censorship.
Nobody here is under the impression that youtube is threatening people with imprisonment. So pointing out the distinction is tiring and pedantic.
A TV station has limited bandwidth. They have a constant ongoing algorithm to choose what to fit in there. YouTube could keep all videos forever. There can be no commercial reason to 'cancel' a YouTube video. So we know that this decision is almost completely unrelated to the TV Station reasons.
1. Hosting videos costs Youtube money. It's probably a tiny amount per video. But that doesn't mean they can host every video forever. 2. They have a commercial reason to cancel these videos. Maybe they think the use of these drugs is risky, and gives their website an unsavory reputation. That hurts their brand (and potentially their bottom line). This is not unlike a TV show canceling a successful show when it's sta…
Number 1 is pretty much yes, they can. It's a diminishing cost, and the price of storage is very likely diminishing faster than the rate of video production is rising.
Number 2, agreed, we in fact know it can only be censorship (and not competing viewership) that drives the decision. That's my whole point.