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YouTube creators fear a catastrophic drop in advertising revenue following the new controversy surrounding YouTube's inability to mitigate predatory behavior on content featuring young children.
"I do not tell the story because it negatively affects the entire YouTube community," Daniel "Keemstar" Keem, the host of the popular Drama Alert, tweeted. "We do not need another apocalypse announcement. What I did behind the scenes, however, is to my YouTube contacts to show them the video and my team shows them the content to delete. This is not right for me. This concerns all my friends big and small creators. I do not report anything that will affect their livelihood.
"Instead, I'll be working privately behind the scenes with YouTube to have this content removed."
The controversy erupted again after a video, published Feb. 18 by Matt Watson, exposes how bad actors and pedophiles download or find videos of young children and use the comments section to talk about children's bodies or timestamp some parts of the video. badualises them. The video made headlines for Reddit for hours and Watson asked viewers to contact companies whose ads appear on videos, such as Grammarly, L'Oreal and Maybelline. YouTube responded to the video, claiming that while these videos represent a fraction of a percentage of videos violating YouTube's guidelines, this is a problem that society takes seriously.
Companies are already drawing ads in response. Fortnite The developer Epic Games removed all pre-roll ads from YouTube in light of the fact that some of his videos had been discovered by Watson. Other companies, such as Peloton and Grammarly, have asked YouTube to investigate the situation and are working with independent third parties as part of their own investigation into what happened. They could also broadcast their own ads. Although YouTube has been trying to make advertisers more aware of the location of their ads, it's clear that big companies are worried and frustrated with the location of their ads and the possibility of an even bigger scandal.
If enough companies do it, this could have serious consequences for ordinary YouTube creators. The result is something that the creative community calls ad-junkie – a term that originated in the creative community in 2016. Roberto Blake, popular YouTube creator and commentator, tweeted that the current crusade Watson – including several live feeds and calls to people boycotting YouTube – is just creating more problems.
"He's deliberately trying to inaugurate another Adpocalypse," Blake tweeted. "YouTube has problems, fixing them does not mean you're going to tell people to call advertisers. It's not a heroic crusade, it's a vendetta. "
The first adpocalypse began in late 2016, when YouTube decided to focus on promoting family-friendly content as a result of adverse reactions from critics. Designers like Philip DeFranco were hit hard enough and drew attention to the fact that they could no longer monetize their channels as frequently and as reliably as before.
The situation has only got worse in February 2017, after the announcement of terrorism and hateful content broadcast on the platform and activated by advertising. Shortly after, PewDiePie, the biggest creator of YouTube, became involved in a controversy over a video containing anti-Semitic images. Advertisers have threatened to leave YouTube. YouTube has therefore tightened its restrictions.
This "adpocalypse" has changed the way some creators have approached YouTube. It arrived again in late 2017, after the discovery of children's content on YouTube, and again in 2018, after Logan Paul's video on the forest-suicide. The creators have found alternative monetization solutions, including live shows and spin-offs, but the fear of another adpocalpyse on the horizon never disappears.
After Watson's videos, the creators are worried again. Watson has clearly expressed his intentions: he wants creators and users to boycott YouTube until the company is able to completely eliminate the predatory content of its platform. Although Watson followed his boycott call with sympathy for the creators who live on the platform, other YouTubers have since expressed concern over his call to action. Watson, for example, badociating business numbers in his descriptions and encouraging viewers to call and complain about ads on certain video pages, is a tactic used by creators like Eion, including the YouTube channel, Nerd City. , comment on the YouTube culture. critical.
"Why does he suppose that the solution to a problem is to create a disaster," said Eion. "That's what he does absolutely."
YouTube gives advertisers more control over the type of videos their ads show on, as well as some types of videos they do not want their ads to show, but there's still no way to effectively prevent it from displaying. disturbing videos. For example, advertisers can tell YouTube that they want to run ads on music and sports videos, but not video games, and YouTube will show them on channels in those categories. In theory, if a channel featuring young children performing gymnastics or performing choreography meets YouTube's AdSense requirements, an advertisement for a Google Chromebook might appear on a video that has also attracted predators in the comments section.
YouTube creators like Eion understand the dangers too well. The way advertising works on YouTube is something that creators have learned to follow after previous adpocalypses.
"Whenever any of these things happen, it helps to misunderstand the way advertising works," Eion said. "Targeted advertising is completely different from sponsored advertising or broadcast ads on television. Coca-Cola was not addressing ISIS channels and was not saying, "Hey, I like what you're doing, we'd love to run ads on your channel." Coke targeted people who might drink Coca-Cola. And it's a huge basket of people. "
YouTube Executive Director Susan Wojcicki spoke of the concern of advertisers and creators about harmful video ads, and tightened on designer measures in December.
"We plan to apply more stringent criteria, more manual remediation, while significantly strengthening our ad reviewer team to ensure that ads are only shown where they should." Wojcicki wrote in a blog published on December 4. help approved creators to better stabilize their incomes. This is important for advertisers and creators, and over the next few weeks we will be discussing with both to refine this approach. "
YouTube is clearly trying to address the concerns of creators and advertisers. In an effort to keep the website user-friendly for advertisers, YouTube has increased creator obligations to generate AdSense revenue on their channels. In turn, YouTube has begun to roll out other monetization models, including helping creators sell their products. Nevertheless, YouTube is aware of the problem and tries to react as quickly as possible.
"All content – including comments – putting minors at risk is obnoxious and we have clear rules banning this on YouTube," said a spokeswoman for YouTube. The edge. "We acted immediately by removing accounts and channels, reporting any illegal activity to the authorities and disabling violent comments. Much remains to be done and we continue to work to improve and catch the abuse faster. "
YouTube creators have been getting to know one another and worry that as more businesses become aware of what is happening and YouTube is responding, the more likely it is that another adpocalypse will arrive. One of the problems that creators face with Watson's approach to its current streaming is that calling advertisers and asking people to boycott YouTube is not a solution to the current problem.
"If advertisers leave YouTube, it's not going to stop the pedos in the comments section," Keem said in his latest episode of Drama Alert. "It's just going to hurt the livelihoods of young and old YouTubers … YouTube is doing a great job and removing those videos."
The creators are aware that a storm is brewing. The attention to Watson's video worries advertisers and creators are trying all their power not to get into another wave of announcements. Eion said The edge all the creators can hope for at this point is that YouTube offers "the right solution".
"YouTube is very important to us all. Turning a problem into an existential threat to YouTube will make me want to defend YouTube, "said Eion.
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