Why Is YouTube Demonetizing LGBTQ Videos? | Hacker News Reader

Why Is YouTube Demonetizing LGBTQ Videos?

autostraddle.com

58 pointslkrubner63 comments

YouTube has been demonetizing everything across the board, from gaming videos to non-political sketch comedies, and without much explanation.

This is all part of the "Adpocalypse" that YouTube content creators have been complaining about this past year.

Content creators are left guessing why many of their videos are being demonetized. Even fairly bland material gets demonetized by "the algorithm". Some speculate just having a somewhat risqué hashtag or image in the poster image is enough to get demonetized.

Realistically, this is the natural consequence of our current political climate. When you offend [group X] and they go after your advertisers, it's effective.

Advertisers naturally say "I don't want to be associated with anything/anyone controversial, so let's exclude those!"

The problem is that most things are "controversial" to some group.. therefore, large swaths of content are no longer "advertiser appropriate" and all creators suffer.

That has nothing to do with the current political climate. Advertisers were reluctant to advertise against anything not perfectly anodyne 20 years ago. This was a perennial problem for us at early community site bianca.com.

The specific things that people complain about has changed, sure. At the time the US right was much better at the game, insisting that everything be "family friendly". And at the time, anything GLBTQ related was seen as "not family friendly".

That has changed, though. For example, support for gay marriage has flipped, going from a minority position to a majority one:

http://news.gallup.com/poll/210566/support-gay-marriage-edge...

That's what makes YouTube's behavior here particularly notable. If, say, relationship advice is monetizable but GLBTQ relationship advice isn't, then that feels like going back to the dark ages.

This is a positive development if it forces content creators to look for platforms that are not ad-funded, and thus precipitates the death of the publisher business model that is beholden to advertisers.

Hopefully in 20 years we can look back and say that Facebook was the last major corporation to be built on ad revenue.

Why, why hasn't Pornhub or anyone else capitalized on this yet?

I mention Pornhub specifically because people seem to use them as a goto for posting uncensored not-necessarily pornographic content, but clearly Google's policies are creating an opportunity for a competitor to take in all of the content they no longer want.

I know there are a ton of streaming sites out there but no one seems to be positioning themselves (as far as I can tell) as, specifically, an adult (but not necessarily adult) alternative to Youtube?

The number one YouTube channel in size by subscribers, PewDiePie, said the N word live on stream and his fan base essentially attacked people who came out as offended.

I love the part of YouTube that gives you an incredibly personal insight on intelligent people, but I think there is a huge problem with how much leeway the content creators have and are still able to make money. And the fact that this harms the smaller channels like videogamedunkey that doesn't say racist things is extremely disheartening.

I don't have an opinion here other than it sucks that you can't just give people money based on how many people watch their videos.

I think it should be made clear that he didn't just say "nigger"; he actually called someone that.

Well, listen to a few rap tracks and you'll hear many, many people being called that, loudly, clearly, repeatedly.

You're being downvoted because you're completely deaf to context.

I thought it was just as simple as the fact that the big companies don't want to advertise their products on "controversial" videos... which are defined very loosely based on key words. For example if you make something like a rape surviver support video and include 'rape' in the description.

I can see why advertisers would not want to risk hurting their brand by playing before a video that is anyway offensive to anyone. If you give that power to them then they will use it. Which can be a problem if you are trying to have an open free speech platform where ideas are shared. I think that is not Google's motivation though. They want to make money. Which again is understandable but not necessarily what the world needs.

It was less of a problem a few years ago, before groups started claiming that Google & advertisers were explicitly supporting / promoting controversial content. With the PR fear in full swing, there is very little upside to either party allowing advertising.

For example, groups were actively hitting the top commercial websites and then visiting Breitbart so they could screenshot retargeting ads to use in shaming the company on social media.

My bet:

1. Advertisers don't want to be featured on an ISIS recruitment video, or something like that.

2. Google implements a filter. It is fuzzy and based on machine learning, because Google are strong believers of machine learning.

3. The algorithm let a single ISIS recruitment video through. Advertisers form a coalition and yell "NO ISIS RECRUITMENT VIDEOS!"

4. This forces Google to implement either whitelists, or tune the algorithm for detecting bad content such that it produces a lot of false positives.

5. Most people are now demonetized, and since the system is based on machine learning, it is not possible for Google to tell you exactly why the neural network decided what it did.

It is clear that the current demonitization algorithm hits unfairly hard on content creators. It forces them to run a Patreon-model. I'm willing to bet that Youtube is now powerful enough that people are willing to pay for content and no ads for certain channels, so in the end this is not necessarily good for advertisers.

> It is fuzzy and based on machine learning, because Google are strong believers of machine learning.

It seems like YouTube must be backed into a corner where that's the only feasible way to do it, at least as a first pass. Video is uploaded at what, 5000x realtime? Or 100 years of video per week?

>400 hrs of content are uploaded every minute. You’re exactly correct that an algorithmic first pass is the only thing that’s feasible.

It’s important to mention that creators can appeal monitization decisions to a human reviewer for videos with at least a thousand views.

I'd love to see how many minutes of video-with-1000+-views gets uploaded per minute.

The real problem is the lack of explanation. If a film is refused certification, it will usually come with a list of reasons, making it possible to recut to an acceptable version. If it's demonetised by youtube you get no explanation.

Yes, that will result in people working exactly up to the line, but at least having a line is something that people can work with.

I'm not sure if there is a line. Here are two identical videos, and the one with "transgender" in the title was demonetized. https://twitter.com/GeekRemix/status/910942349928419328 (edited with larger sample)

That is extremely troubling. I wonder if it's because the algorithm is taking into account previous negative uses of the word in comments/commentary and flagging it as possible hate speech?

This is the point that various people such as Maciej Cegłowski have been making - if they had a policy which banned that word, we could argue about it; but if they have an algorithm that emits the same result but without explanation, it's much harder to make criticism stick. And unless people go to special effort, the algorithm will pick up the prejudices of the training data.

Maybe for most countries, but not America. The MPAA movie rating system here is a nightmare. The rating standards are private, and if they rate you NC17 or X or what have you, they'll refuse to give any reasons as to why, because that would imply they engage in censorship. The rating system is not government-run either, so it's partially controlled by clergy members, and treats gay films more harshly. "This Film Is Not Yet Rated" is a good documentary that covers the MPAA rating system.

iirc the rating standards are not actually private, but rather there are no ratings standards. It's just a few people (mostly friends) sitting in a room saying what they feel like it should be. There are some rough guidelines, but it's not particularly consistent.

YouTube is demonetizing any and all content that is politically charged or even just not interesting to the advertisers. If content by Brady Haran is not safe, no one is safe.

https://twitter.com/BradyHaran/status/901041339105673217 https://twitter.com/BradyHaran/status/901044151806021632 https://twitter.com/BradyHaran/status/906592700132196352

With all due respect for those who create these videos, is it not up to google to determine what they do and don't monetize? At the end of the day, it is their platform, and they will do whatever makes the most business sense. YouTube is not a government service, it is a private company, and as such it holds to right to make whatever decision it needs to make in order to maximize its business potential.

The essence of your argument here appears to be "we cannot complain about how people use power", which I think is bunk.

Yes, Google has the power to do whatever they please. But the people who work there aren't perfect; one can reasonably dispute that a given action is the best business choice.

Although their power over their platform is in some sense absolute, everybody else has power over their individual uses of that platform. It is entirely reasonable of them to tell Google, their business partner, how that platform is working for them.

Further, everybody, whether they're a creator, a viewer, or just a regular person has the right to freedom of speech and freedom of association. Google has dominion over their platform, but everybody else gets to choose whether to deal with Google and what they say about it.

It is up to Google to do that. And it's up to the people to complain, strike and whatnot about it and to leave the platform, if the problem becomes unbearable. This is a perfectly normal dynamic that exists any time anyone is being paid money to do a job.

Content providers think they want their videos to stay monetized, but I don't think they don't.

With regard to monetizing videos, am I totally wrong to assume that this is entirely based on what advertisers are willing to sponsor? So if company A decides, for whatever reason, they don't want to pay for ads on videos that talk about some subject that they don't agree with, I think we can all agree that they should have the right to do that. And if that causes a community backlash against that advertiser, then that's a good. Boycotts are better than laws.

If some video has content, regardless of whether we agree or disagree with it, and youtube is seeing advertisers shy away from such content, then why would youtube continue to force that advertisers ads to show up on that video. They would lose the advertiser. No advertiser. No money. So leaving it monetized only to lose advertisers and thus money isn't exactly what the content creators want either.

I think what you're saying explains the situation quite concisely.

It seems that it would be somewhat difficult to argue that advertisers truly care where their ads are placed in terms of moral values. There's no shortage of western companies setup and advertising in places like Saudi Arabia/Belarus/etc. If there was any money to be made in North Korea and they were allowed, there's every reason to believe that there'd be McDonalds and Starbucks on every corner.

However, the whole point of advertising is to positively influence the population regarding your product's brand. If an advertiser's ads are shown on something that's domestically controversial and the face a social backlash, well that's a complete waste of money. And even if an advertiser chooses to pull their advertising from something some group found controversial not only does it rarely appease the offended group, but it's increasingly likely in today's society that another group will counterprotest - again resulting in brand damage and a complete waste of money.

The only completely economically safe path is to restrict your ads to the most neutral, neutered, and completely inoffensive content possible. Well, at least unless the target is large enough - in which case the brand image gained from that viewership will likely dwarf any sort of brand damage from people protesting against it. And this seems to be, in a nutshell, the solution that YouTube and advertisers are choosing. For that matter it could even go some way to explaining the increasing sterilization of things like mass entertainment.

We did this to ourselves. We, as a culture, are simultaneously becoming increasingly intolerant and turning politics into a team sport - quick to finger "allies" and "enemies" alike. People, and companies, who choose to choose no side are left walking on egg shells for fear of being damned or claimed by one side or the other. Read, for instance, the entry on 'gun controversy' relating to Starbucks [1]. This is the no-win situation we're putting companies in today. It sucks.

[1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starbucks#Gun_controversy

It's one thing if a government regulates a market, yet another if a company regulates it.

But at the same time they're trying to avoid responsiblity by pointing to an algorithm. I mean they put a rainbow flag on their site and then also pull monetization from videos! I guess it's their legal right but they can't duck accountability.

'But it's the algorithm' has become the new 'but I am a comedian, what kind of a fool are you to take my political propaganda serious' defense.

He says, trying to make a humorous analogy to further his political ideals.

I remember that from some Jon Stewart vs Bill O'Reilly discussion, where Stewards basic argument was: 'But I am running a joke show, haha'.

> but they can't duck accountability

for what? they have no obligation to do anything besides follow the letter of the law. Anything else is your morals vs. theirs.

Ok? I haven't seen anyone asking for law enforcement to get involved. This is between Google and its customers and users.

What frustrates me with the adpocalypse is that YouTube and advertisers are treating it like the television industry when it's not. Real life isn't a perfect, cuss-free, conflict-free utopia like television shows are, and content created by normal people shouldn't expected to be that way.

Instead of demonetizing everything, I think YouTube should emphasize to its advertisers that while both television and YouTube are media companies, that doesn't mean they have the same market share, and thus shouldn't be advertised on in the same way that television does. At the same time, I think YouTube should make it known that advertisement on a video shouldn't equate to endorsement by that advertiser.

I believe YouTube's algorithm takes into account comments in shuch a way that some motivated group of activists could demonetize the videos of a channel by posting hate-speech.

The adpocalypse had an obvious chilling effect on youtube, lots of channels closed as a result of this. And while you can repeal the demonetization, this takes time and even if its successful will remove 90%+ of the income from a video anyways (since most ad revenue is generated in the first day[1]). The arbitrary nature of YouTube's decisions have always made doing YouTube as a full time job really risky. A large number of gaming related video creators have already transitioned to twitch.

YouTube is 100% opaque, nobody knows why and when they are doing anything. Including things that cause a huge damage for people that make their livelihood on their platform. They clearly don't really know what they are doing, I hope there is going to be a viable alternative to this terrible company in the future.

[1] source: https://youtu.be/ULtjwGN2olM?t=373

According to Google, the "machine is learning every day": https://twitter.com/TeamYouTube/status/911340451696971776

I wonder how long it'll take!

Why should Google be monetizing anybody's propaganda?

Why do you think someone talking about their wedding is propaganda?

One of the mentioned videos was a sex-ed video. Honest question wouldn't sex-related content violate TOS even if its for educational purposes?

If it violated the TOS they would just take the video down. Talking about sex, even with very explicit language, isn't against YouTube's rules. Heck they'll sell you softcore porn! NSFW https://www.youtube.com/results?q=red+shoe+diaries&sp=EgIQBF...

Is there a specific marker that marks a video as "demonetized" vs no advertiser wants to put an ad on it?

Yes

Any more info?

Yes, see the pictures here https://twitter.com/GeekRemix/status/910942349928419328

I wonder if this violates various local ordinances against LGBT discrimination?

whose ordinance do we appease? how do internet companies not cross a line in some area of the world one way or another. the simple matter is, let them post but don't facilitate the message one way or another.

it is going to give these sites all sorts of ways to make revenue without having to share it

FWIW, youtube has been demonetizing videos that promote conservative POVs.

(Edit: Gee, I didn't think this would upset people enough to attract so many downvotes. Looks like I was wrong.)

I am willing to wager that more action will be seen with regards to LGBTQ channels being demonetized than conservative channels. Google never really tried to hide their left leaning biases.

I follow liberals and conservatives on Twitter - this is the first I've heard of them "demonetizing" anything associated with liberalism - everything I've been seeing is them "demonetizing" content by conservatives.

Anecdata, a lot of the popular conservative user-generated content on YouTube I've come across tends to trend negatively towards "black people are causing all this crime and police drama", "I don't hate LGBT people, I just think their sexual preferences should be criminal again", etc.

I don't think YouTube is purposefully demonitizing videos on conservative fiscal theories.

Thefore I like this post and development very much.

When free speech on the converative side is under attack, the argument of the now seems to be 'nazis must be silenced'.

The more YouTube's ideological punishment practices come in the open, the better!

It does mention this near the end of the article.

This isn't really a political issue despite the linked articles stance or your response. What both say is true, but politics isn't the motivation. It's general gentrification and pushing away the potentially controversial in order to bring in more ad money.

I personally noticed it first when all the machining channels that discussed homemade firearms were demonitized.

The difference in this case is that the claims made by op's article are legally actionable under protected class laws.

More importantly some countries are reverting back to demonizing LGBTQ people and behavior. Go after them first before we return to the Dark Ages.

Pure whataboutery. The fact that a significantly worse harm happens in other countries doesn't mean this isn't something people are allowed to discuss.

Sexuality is an adult topic. so there's that.

No, sexuality is not an adult topic.

Seeing two straight people getting married or discussing their romantic relationship isn't an adult topic, but seeing two gay people doing the same is treated as one.

Nobody is talking about adult or mature-rated LGBT content, they are talking about the disparity in treatment between non-adult content containing LGBT themes vs. non-adult content that doesn't contain LGBT themes.

Is it "controversial" and "offensive" to some people? Then yes.

This is why I was so taken back when the left demanded censorship for "offensive" and "hateful" content. Don't the LGBT, atheists, etc understand that much of the country and even more of the world view them as hateful and offensive?

The greatest boon for the LGBT, atheist, etc movements was free speech. Free speech is want advanced their cause. Why attack it?

Does anyone know why this article would disappear from the front page of Hacker News? Right now, some of the articles on the front page:

this one:

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There are several articles with less points and less comments and which are either the same age are older, yet they are on the front page. Does anyone understand the algorithm?

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