1 00:00:04,240 --> 00:00:07,240 Speaker 1: Welcome to Tech Stuff, a production of I Heart Radios, 2 00:00:07,320 --> 00:00:14,120 Speaker 1: How Stuff Works. Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff. 3 00:00:14,160 --> 00:00:17,560 Speaker 1: I'm your host, Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer with 4 00:00:17,640 --> 00:00:19,480 Speaker 1: How Stuff Works and I heart Radio and I love 5 00:00:19,560 --> 00:00:24,000 Speaker 1: all things tech. And one thing I do a lot 6 00:00:24,040 --> 00:00:27,760 Speaker 1: of these days but actually planned to reduce in the 7 00:00:27,840 --> 00:00:31,479 Speaker 1: future is that I watch a lot of online web series, 8 00:00:31,680 --> 00:00:37,000 Speaker 1: particularly on YouTube. I watched series about video games, pop culture, 9 00:00:37,159 --> 00:00:41,600 Speaker 1: film criticism, and vlogs a s MR Videos. I watch 10 00:00:41,640 --> 00:00:44,080 Speaker 1: a lot of stuff on YouTube, and one thing I've 11 00:00:44,080 --> 00:00:48,400 Speaker 1: seen a few times is how YouTube's monetization policies can 12 00:00:48,440 --> 00:00:51,400 Speaker 1: have a really big impact on the channels that I watch. 13 00:00:51,800 --> 00:00:54,440 Speaker 1: So today I want to talk a bit about the 14 00:00:54,480 --> 00:00:59,040 Speaker 1: business side of YouTube and how things have changed for creators, 15 00:00:59,080 --> 00:01:03,240 Speaker 1: particularly fairly recently. Now to understand what's been going on, 16 00:01:03,760 --> 00:01:07,240 Speaker 1: it's good to think of the story involving three major 17 00:01:07,440 --> 00:01:12,440 Speaker 1: groups or factions. First, you've got YouTube itself. This is 18 00:01:12,480 --> 00:01:16,160 Speaker 1: the publishing platform that enables users to share their videos 19 00:01:16,319 --> 00:01:19,760 Speaker 1: and have those videos paired with advertisers. YouTube takes a 20 00:01:19,840 --> 00:01:24,400 Speaker 1: percentage of the ad fees generated by videos, and generally speaking, 21 00:01:24,840 --> 00:01:27,440 Speaker 1: at percentage is pretty high. You know. You might have 22 00:01:27,520 --> 00:01:31,160 Speaker 1: heard that Apple in the iTunes store takes something like 23 00:01:31,319 --> 00:01:36,280 Speaker 1: thirty of all apps sales that goes to Apple itself. 24 00:01:36,640 --> 00:01:40,559 Speaker 1: YouTube does better than that for them, they do forty, 25 00:01:41,880 --> 00:01:44,560 Speaker 1: so nearly half of all the money generated by a 26 00:01:44,640 --> 00:01:49,360 Speaker 1: video goes to YouTube. More in that later. Then you've 27 00:01:49,400 --> 00:01:53,440 Speaker 1: got the creators. These are the people actually making the videos. 28 00:01:53,720 --> 00:01:56,440 Speaker 1: They run the range of no budget creators who rely 29 00:01:56,560 --> 00:01:59,680 Speaker 1: heavily on their own appeal to attract viewers, or upon 30 00:01:59,720 --> 00:02:02,800 Speaker 1: acular strategy for the type of content that they provide, 31 00:02:03,320 --> 00:02:05,440 Speaker 1: and it goes all the way up to highly produced 32 00:02:05,600 --> 00:02:10,080 Speaker 1: videos from established studios. If the creator meets a certain threshold, 33 00:02:10,240 --> 00:02:13,359 Speaker 1: they can choose an option to monetize their videos, which 34 00:02:13,360 --> 00:02:16,600 Speaker 1: allows YouTube to pair those videos with ads. A change 35 00:02:16,600 --> 00:02:21,440 Speaker 1: in monetization policy can have a dramatic impact on a creator. 36 00:02:21,840 --> 00:02:26,119 Speaker 1: And the third group or faction would be the advertisers themselves. Typically, 37 00:02:26,160 --> 00:02:29,560 Speaker 1: these are ad companies with many clients that offer up 38 00:02:29,960 --> 00:02:33,760 Speaker 1: different goods and services, so you'll have a dozen or 39 00:02:33,800 --> 00:02:39,240 Speaker 1: so ad companies that represent hundreds of different brands. Rarely 40 00:02:39,280 --> 00:02:43,000 Speaker 1: will such a company like McDonald's or Levi's interact directly 41 00:02:43,080 --> 00:02:46,320 Speaker 1: with a platform like YouTube, but it can happen more frequently, 42 00:02:46,360 --> 00:02:49,400 Speaker 1: they will rely upon a third party advertising firm to 43 00:02:49,480 --> 00:02:52,800 Speaker 1: hash all this out, And so the business of YouTube 44 00:02:52,840 --> 00:02:57,000 Speaker 1: depends upon these three prongs working together. The more views 45 00:02:57,120 --> 00:03:01,040 Speaker 1: a monetized video gets, the more it earns. Longer videos 46 00:03:01,040 --> 00:03:04,000 Speaker 1: can also have mid role ads, which creates a revenue 47 00:03:04,000 --> 00:03:07,920 Speaker 1: generating stream for creators and for YouTube itself. For that reason, 48 00:03:08,280 --> 00:03:11,480 Speaker 1: the platform began to encourage YouTube creators to make longer 49 00:03:11,560 --> 00:03:14,519 Speaker 1: videos a few years back. This was in stark contrast 50 00:03:14,520 --> 00:03:16,840 Speaker 1: with the early days of YouTube and which most videos 51 00:03:16,880 --> 00:03:20,280 Speaker 1: had a hard ten minute limit for running time. You 52 00:03:20,280 --> 00:03:23,920 Speaker 1: couldn't go beyond that. These days, YouTube would rather have 53 00:03:24,040 --> 00:03:27,600 Speaker 1: longer videos that encourage more activity on the platform, meaning 54 00:03:27,639 --> 00:03:32,400 Speaker 1: that after someone watches one video, they're likely to watch another. Now, 55 00:03:33,280 --> 00:03:36,440 Speaker 1: I didn't include viewers in those three prongs because we 56 00:03:36,480 --> 00:03:39,720 Speaker 1: don't have quite as much to do with the business 57 00:03:39,720 --> 00:03:42,200 Speaker 1: side of it. We generate the views that pull the 58 00:03:42,280 --> 00:03:45,680 Speaker 1: levers on those advertising dollars, but other than that, we 59 00:03:45,760 --> 00:03:48,960 Speaker 1: don't really have much involvement in the business. That stuff 60 00:03:49,000 --> 00:03:52,440 Speaker 1: lies more with the platform and the creators. Now, let 61 00:03:52,480 --> 00:03:55,360 Speaker 1: me give you a quick rundown on the history of 62 00:03:55,480 --> 00:03:58,840 Speaker 1: monetization on YouTube. So we can kind of understand where 63 00:03:58,840 --> 00:04:01,160 Speaker 1: we came from and where we are now. When YouTube 64 00:04:01,280 --> 00:04:04,680 Speaker 1: launched in two thousand five as an independent service before 65 00:04:04,680 --> 00:04:07,280 Speaker 1: it was part of Google, there was no monetization on 66 00:04:07,320 --> 00:04:10,920 Speaker 1: the platform. Now that changed in August two thousand six, 67 00:04:11,200 --> 00:04:15,960 Speaker 1: when YouTube launched its first ad concept, called participatory video ads, 68 00:04:16,000 --> 00:04:20,440 Speaker 1: along with brand channels. Brand channels are exactly what they 69 00:04:20,480 --> 00:04:23,440 Speaker 1: sound like, channels that are owned by specific companies and 70 00:04:23,520 --> 00:04:26,400 Speaker 1: meant to act as a type of marketing towards customers. 71 00:04:26,440 --> 00:04:30,880 Speaker 1: So you could have Nike having a Nike channel, for example. 72 00:04:31,360 --> 00:04:34,680 Speaker 1: The participatory video ads would appear in the upper right 73 00:04:34,720 --> 00:04:39,400 Speaker 1: corner of the screen among video choices, so you could 74 00:04:39,440 --> 00:04:42,520 Speaker 1: think of the right rail having a list of videos, 75 00:04:42,560 --> 00:04:46,520 Speaker 1: and the top one would be an AD, but there 76 00:04:46,440 --> 00:04:49,760 Speaker 1: are others would just be other YouTube videos. So YouTube 77 00:04:49,800 --> 00:04:53,200 Speaker 1: had yet to introduce a method for content creators who 78 00:04:53,240 --> 00:04:57,279 Speaker 1: weren't representing brands to monetize content. The only money that 79 00:04:57,360 --> 00:05:00,240 Speaker 1: was really going anywhere was going to YouTube. Google Goal 80 00:05:00,400 --> 00:05:04,080 Speaker 1: purchased YouTube for more than one point five billion dollars 81 00:05:04,200 --> 00:05:06,919 Speaker 1: in October two thou six, just a couple of months 82 00:05:06,960 --> 00:05:11,280 Speaker 1: after the rollout of this initial ad strategy. A year later, 83 00:05:11,720 --> 00:05:15,440 Speaker 1: YouTube launched in video ads. This would be August two 84 00:05:15,440 --> 00:05:19,400 Speaker 1: thousand seven. Instead of a commercial running before or during 85 00:05:19,440 --> 00:05:23,800 Speaker 1: a show, these were overlay ads that were flash based 86 00:05:23,839 --> 00:05:26,880 Speaker 1: and appeared on top of the video, so the lower 87 00:05:27,000 --> 00:05:30,320 Speaker 1: twenty percent part of a video could have an ad 88 00:05:30,320 --> 00:05:33,080 Speaker 1: appear after fifteen seconds of the video had already played. 89 00:05:33,480 --> 00:05:36,919 Speaker 1: The goal was to make the overlay transparent and to 90 00:05:36,960 --> 00:05:39,680 Speaker 1: have them run for only around ten seconds, so you'd 91 00:05:39,680 --> 00:05:43,440 Speaker 1: have a little message upp here on that bottom that 92 00:05:43,520 --> 00:05:47,600 Speaker 1: would somewhat obscure that portion of the video and would 93 00:05:47,600 --> 00:05:51,120 Speaker 1: be an ad for something. Again, YouTube restricted these ads 94 00:05:51,120 --> 00:05:53,800 Speaker 1: to run on content from a select group of partners, 95 00:05:54,200 --> 00:05:59,000 Speaker 1: and individual content creators were generally not eligible for this. So, 96 00:05:59,240 --> 00:06:02,560 Speaker 1: in other words, if you were Joe Schmo and you 97 00:06:02,600 --> 00:06:05,839 Speaker 1: were creating your own vlog and it was getting a 98 00:06:05,920 --> 00:06:10,200 Speaker 1: good following, you still weren't eligible to uh to have 99 00:06:10,360 --> 00:06:13,360 Speaker 1: ads run on your your videos. In December of two 100 00:06:13,360 --> 00:06:17,000 Speaker 1: thousand seven, YouTube launched the Partner program, in which individual 101 00:06:17,000 --> 00:06:20,720 Speaker 1: creators could apply to become partners, which would enable advertising 102 00:06:20,839 --> 00:06:23,680 Speaker 1: on their videos. It did require that they meet certain criteria. 103 00:06:23,720 --> 00:06:27,040 Speaker 1: We'll talk more about that a little bit later. By 104 00:06:27,040 --> 00:06:30,359 Speaker 1: November two thousand eight, YouTube would launch pre roll ads, 105 00:06:30,640 --> 00:06:33,680 Speaker 1: making videos more like television programs. Pre roll ad is 106 00:06:33,720 --> 00:06:36,080 Speaker 1: just what it sounds like, you have an ad that 107 00:06:36,200 --> 00:06:40,000 Speaker 1: runs before the video that you've selected to watch. But 108 00:06:40,080 --> 00:06:43,600 Speaker 1: YouTube ads work a little differently from television ads. See 109 00:06:43,600 --> 00:06:47,280 Speaker 1: on TV, and advertiser pays for a specific time slot. 110 00:06:47,800 --> 00:06:50,360 Speaker 1: Advertisers might say I want to run an ad during 111 00:06:50,400 --> 00:06:55,320 Speaker 1: this sporting event or during this show. On YouTube, Google 112 00:06:55,360 --> 00:06:58,279 Speaker 1: can target ads to people who appear to have interests 113 00:06:58,360 --> 00:07:02,680 Speaker 1: that align with particular brand. By analyzing user behavior, Google 114 00:07:02,760 --> 00:07:05,880 Speaker 1: can predict which brands will resonate the most and match 115 00:07:06,000 --> 00:07:09,080 Speaker 1: those up to a viewers experience. So, rather than Coca 116 00:07:09,120 --> 00:07:12,040 Speaker 1: Cola saying I really like those let's play videos, put 117 00:07:12,120 --> 00:07:16,040 Speaker 1: us on those, it's Coca Cola saying, show us to 118 00:07:16,560 --> 00:07:19,320 Speaker 1: people who really like soft drinks. And this would end 119 00:07:19,400 --> 00:07:22,160 Speaker 1: up being part of the problem because there's a whole 120 00:07:22,240 --> 00:07:24,840 Speaker 1: lot of folks out there who likes stuff like soft 121 00:07:24,920 --> 00:07:27,920 Speaker 1: drinks who also like to watch some pretty questionable content, 122 00:07:28,480 --> 00:07:31,120 Speaker 1: and thus Coca Cola's ads would show up against stuff 123 00:07:31,160 --> 00:07:34,760 Speaker 1: that maybe Coca Cola wasn't so crazy about. Now, at 124 00:07:34,760 --> 00:07:38,160 Speaker 1: this point, it became possible to actually make a living 125 00:07:38,320 --> 00:07:41,240 Speaker 1: off of YouTube if you were just a regular person, 126 00:07:41,440 --> 00:07:44,880 Speaker 1: if you were a creator with an engaged, large following, 127 00:07:45,280 --> 00:07:48,119 Speaker 1: you could conceivably have enough views to earn decent money, 128 00:07:48,280 --> 00:07:51,240 Speaker 1: and eventually this would grow beyond decent money to a 129 00:07:51,320 --> 00:07:54,080 Speaker 1: metric crap ton of money if you were one of 130 00:07:54,080 --> 00:07:57,760 Speaker 1: a few mega popular creators. As still sort of the 131 00:07:57,760 --> 00:08:01,280 Speaker 1: wild West at this point. You two grew largely as 132 00:08:01,280 --> 00:08:05,679 Speaker 1: an alternative to classic television services, and in the earliest days, 133 00:08:06,080 --> 00:08:09,240 Speaker 1: people were uploading a lot of copyrighted work that would 134 00:08:09,320 --> 00:08:12,640 Speaker 1: land YouTube in hot water with various publishing companies, particularly 135 00:08:12,960 --> 00:08:16,600 Speaker 1: music labels and movie and television studios, But that gradually 136 00:08:16,600 --> 00:08:19,280 Speaker 1: gave way to more user generated stuff, which is what 137 00:08:19,360 --> 00:08:23,160 Speaker 1: the platform was envisioned as. Now. It's interesting to point 138 00:08:23,160 --> 00:08:25,320 Speaker 1: out that in the early days of YouTube, a lot 139 00:08:25,360 --> 00:08:31,000 Speaker 1: of the popular videos were unauthorized uploads of more traditional media, 140 00:08:31,520 --> 00:08:34,079 Speaker 1: because if you go to YouTube today, you're going to 141 00:08:34,160 --> 00:08:38,079 Speaker 1: see a lot of authorized uploads of that same sort 142 00:08:38,120 --> 00:08:42,280 Speaker 1: of traditional media up on YouTube. So everything comes full 143 00:08:42,320 --> 00:08:45,320 Speaker 1: circle eventually, and here's where we run into the first 144 00:08:45,360 --> 00:08:50,040 Speaker 1: points of friction. YouTube is primarily a publishing platform. The 145 00:08:50,080 --> 00:08:53,840 Speaker 1: company does produce some of its own content, but it's 146 00:08:53,920 --> 00:08:57,760 Speaker 1: mostly known as being the place where creators can publish 147 00:08:57,880 --> 00:09:00,880 Speaker 1: their works, so YouTube is the video store, not the 148 00:09:00,920 --> 00:09:06,600 Speaker 1: studio producing the videos. Generally speaking, the video producers developed 149 00:09:06,640 --> 00:09:09,600 Speaker 1: their own voice, their own style, their type of content. 150 00:09:10,040 --> 00:09:12,800 Speaker 1: They find what works and they build an audience on that. 151 00:09:13,200 --> 00:09:17,520 Speaker 1: Some content creators do music, some tutorials, some do let's 152 00:09:17,520 --> 00:09:21,839 Speaker 1: play videos, some do scripted works like sketches, and some 153 00:09:21,920 --> 00:09:26,680 Speaker 1: incorporate pretty edgy material in their videos. Or sometimes they 154 00:09:26,760 --> 00:09:31,360 Speaker 1: might include intentionally offensive material knowing that controversy will result 155 00:09:31,400 --> 00:09:35,000 Speaker 1: in more views and that results in more money. Now, 156 00:09:35,040 --> 00:09:39,839 Speaker 1: initially that benefits YouTube because YouTube only makes money as 157 00:09:39,920 --> 00:09:43,440 Speaker 1: videos earned views, So as those videos rack up the views, 158 00:09:43,520 --> 00:09:46,959 Speaker 1: advertisers fork over more cash and YouTube takes that healthy 159 00:09:48,240 --> 00:09:53,280 Speaker 1: slice of all those revenues. Now. One example YouTubers pointed 160 00:09:53,320 --> 00:09:58,360 Speaker 1: to as a problem of this kind of philosophy, this 161 00:09:58,440 --> 00:10:02,920 Speaker 1: idea of YouTube being totally cool with controversial material as 162 00:10:02,920 --> 00:10:05,120 Speaker 1: long as it was bringing money in was a channel 163 00:10:05,120 --> 00:10:08,160 Speaker 1: that was run by Mike and Heather Martin. The couple 164 00:10:08,280 --> 00:10:10,560 Speaker 1: created a series of videos in which they would pull 165 00:10:10,559 --> 00:10:14,720 Speaker 1: what they called pranks on their young kids, but others 166 00:10:15,040 --> 00:10:19,360 Speaker 1: saw these pranks as borderline or sometimes beyond borderline abuse. 167 00:10:20,080 --> 00:10:23,440 Speaker 1: And it was this that the parents were profiting from. 168 00:10:23,440 --> 00:10:26,200 Speaker 1: In other words, they were mistreating their children, at least 169 00:10:26,200 --> 00:10:29,440 Speaker 1: in the eyes of these critics, and they were using 170 00:10:29,480 --> 00:10:32,320 Speaker 1: that as a form of entertainment through which they were 171 00:10:32,360 --> 00:10:36,600 Speaker 1: making money. Um Rose Hill, who was the biological mother 172 00:10:36,679 --> 00:10:39,679 Speaker 1: of two of the children in the Martin household says 173 00:10:39,720 --> 00:10:42,440 Speaker 1: that she had been flagging videos as being in violation 174 00:10:42,440 --> 00:10:45,720 Speaker 1: of YouTube's standards as early as October two thousand sixteen, 175 00:10:46,320 --> 00:10:49,559 Speaker 1: and yet little appeared to be done about it. YouTube 176 00:10:49,559 --> 00:10:51,640 Speaker 1: did not seem to take any of the videos down 177 00:10:51,760 --> 00:10:54,440 Speaker 1: or demonetize them or anything. It was only after the 178 00:10:54,520 --> 00:10:57,840 Speaker 1: channel made the news and a massive negative backlash mounted 179 00:10:57,880 --> 00:11:00,360 Speaker 1: against the Martins that things seemed to be set in motion. 180 00:11:00,840 --> 00:11:04,240 Speaker 1: It reinforced the perception that YouTube was loath to move 181 00:11:04,440 --> 00:11:07,320 Speaker 1: against a creator that's getting a lot of views because 182 00:11:07,400 --> 00:11:10,959 Speaker 1: those creators are a healthy source of revenue for the company. So, 183 00:11:11,520 --> 00:11:15,360 Speaker 1: at least initially, there's very little incentive for YouTube to 184 00:11:15,400 --> 00:11:20,120 Speaker 1: do anything about offensive or questionable content if it's driving views, 185 00:11:20,160 --> 00:11:23,560 Speaker 1: because that would hurt its revenue. But then we have 186 00:11:23,760 --> 00:11:26,319 Speaker 1: the third point of that triangle, and I'm going to 187 00:11:26,440 --> 00:11:28,719 Speaker 1: use a lot of different metaphors for things with three components. 188 00:11:29,160 --> 00:11:32,720 Speaker 1: Maybe at some point I'll use tricycle. The third part 189 00:11:33,200 --> 00:11:37,600 Speaker 1: is the advertisers. Now, advertisers are understandably sensitive about the 190 00:11:37,600 --> 00:11:41,400 Speaker 1: types of content they run ads against, the association of 191 00:11:41,400 --> 00:11:45,680 Speaker 1: the advertiser with questionable content could be harmful for the brand. 192 00:11:46,240 --> 00:11:49,160 Speaker 1: Protecting a brand is an important part of advertising. So 193 00:11:49,400 --> 00:11:52,360 Speaker 1: if a soft drink company executive suddenly finds out then 194 00:11:52,440 --> 00:11:55,400 Speaker 1: add for their company's flagship product is running against a 195 00:11:55,480 --> 00:11:59,560 Speaker 1: video that contains racial slurs or hate speech, calls for 196 00:11:59,640 --> 00:12:03,320 Speaker 1: violent or other objectionable material, there's a good chance someone's 197 00:12:03,320 --> 00:12:06,280 Speaker 1: about to get fired. So we've got YouTube and creators 198 00:12:06,679 --> 00:12:09,400 Speaker 1: pushing the envelope and driving lots of views to videos 199 00:12:09,400 --> 00:12:12,680 Speaker 1: of questionable content. This powder keg just needed a spark 200 00:12:12,760 --> 00:12:15,320 Speaker 1: to set it off. The spark first arrived in late 201 00:12:15,320 --> 00:12:18,679 Speaker 1: two thousand sixteen, and the powder keg blew in February 202 00:12:18,760 --> 00:12:22,320 Speaker 1: two thousand seventeen. That's when advertisers began to take note 203 00:12:22,320 --> 00:12:24,920 Speaker 1: that their ads were running against videos that had hate 204 00:12:24,960 --> 00:12:28,800 Speaker 1: speech and extremist content in them, particularly in the UK. 205 00:12:29,760 --> 00:12:32,560 Speaker 1: The advertisers, in an effort to protect their clients and 206 00:12:32,640 --> 00:12:36,360 Speaker 1: mitigate the fallout of such associations, began to pull ads 207 00:12:36,400 --> 00:12:39,679 Speaker 1: from YouTube. Their main objection was that they had no 208 00:12:39,760 --> 00:12:43,000 Speaker 1: control over what types of videos could run their ads, 209 00:12:43,040 --> 00:12:46,079 Speaker 1: and so they could end up being associated with ideologies 210 00:12:46,120 --> 00:12:48,960 Speaker 1: and messaging that was in conflict with their public image. 211 00:12:49,160 --> 00:12:51,599 Speaker 1: And that was just the beginning. I'll explain more in 212 00:12:51,679 --> 00:12:53,840 Speaker 1: just a second, but first let's take a quick break. 213 00:13:01,160 --> 00:13:04,360 Speaker 1: I mentioned before the break that advertisers were pulling their 214 00:13:04,400 --> 00:13:08,080 Speaker 1: spots from YouTube. They represented some really big clients, including 215 00:13:08,080 --> 00:13:12,920 Speaker 1: Coca Cola, The Guardian, Johnson and Johnson, and the Government 216 00:13:12,920 --> 00:13:16,320 Speaker 1: of the United Kingdom. Their move began to create sort 217 00:13:16,400 --> 00:13:20,319 Speaker 1: of a domino effect, and one domino to fall was 218 00:13:20,360 --> 00:13:26,080 Speaker 1: a reassessment of Google itself. Analyst Brian Weezer moved Google 219 00:13:26,160 --> 00:13:31,160 Speaker 1: stock from a buy recommendation to a hold recommendation based 220 00:13:31,160 --> 00:13:34,440 Speaker 1: off the February two, seventeen scandal. He pointed out that 221 00:13:34,480 --> 00:13:38,440 Speaker 1: Google had quote a serious issue in the UK with 222 00:13:38,559 --> 00:13:42,280 Speaker 1: brand safety issues end quote, and that they could end 223 00:13:42,360 --> 00:13:46,200 Speaker 1: up devaluing the company. Now. Suffice to say, this was 224 00:13:46,240 --> 00:13:49,920 Speaker 1: a lot of incentive for YouTube to do something about 225 00:13:49,960 --> 00:13:54,360 Speaker 1: all this. One high profile case where YouTube did act 226 00:13:54,800 --> 00:13:59,360 Speaker 1: involved Felix Kilberg, better known by his screen name as 227 00:13:59,400 --> 00:14:03,000 Speaker 1: Beauty Pie, Kilberg published a video that showed two men 228 00:14:03,040 --> 00:14:06,840 Speaker 1: holding up a reprehensible message written on a sign and 229 00:14:06,840 --> 00:14:10,160 Speaker 1: I'm not going to repeat it here. This prompted Disney 230 00:14:10,200 --> 00:14:13,520 Speaker 1: Maker Studios, which had been producing Pautie Pie shows, to 231 00:14:13,640 --> 00:14:17,360 Speaker 1: cut all ties with the creator. YouTube canceled a YouTube 232 00:14:17,400 --> 00:14:21,520 Speaker 1: red series called Scared Pauti Pie. YouTube Read is a 233 00:14:21,560 --> 00:14:25,120 Speaker 1: subscription service that, in return for a monthly fee unless 234 00:14:25,120 --> 00:14:28,240 Speaker 1: you watch videos without ads and view special content. Just 235 00:14:28,360 --> 00:14:31,840 Speaker 1: for those subscribers, Google removed kale Berg from the preferred 236 00:14:31,840 --> 00:14:34,960 Speaker 1: premium ad tier as well, which cut back how much 237 00:14:34,960 --> 00:14:38,000 Speaker 1: he could make on his videos. It was a pretty 238 00:14:38,320 --> 00:14:42,360 Speaker 1: pretty extreme punishment. UM, I don't know if it was 239 00:14:42,400 --> 00:14:46,440 Speaker 1: completely unwarranted. I have some pretty strong feelings about it 240 00:14:46,480 --> 00:14:49,480 Speaker 1: in general, but there were other YouTubers who felt like 241 00:14:49,600 --> 00:14:56,560 Speaker 1: that was a particularly harsh judgment against another creator, and 242 00:14:56,560 --> 00:14:58,760 Speaker 1: other people said no, he got exactly what he deserves. 243 00:14:58,760 --> 00:15:02,240 Speaker 1: So it kind of runs the gamut. Now. I've placed 244 00:15:02,240 --> 00:15:04,600 Speaker 1: a lot of the responsibility for how things have shaken 245 00:15:04,600 --> 00:15:07,480 Speaker 1: out at YouTube on the platform and the creators, but 246 00:15:07,520 --> 00:15:09,920 Speaker 1: I want to make it clear that advertisers were also 247 00:15:10,240 --> 00:15:13,640 Speaker 1: somewhat responsible, with some pretty bad choices of their own. 248 00:15:14,040 --> 00:15:18,360 Speaker 1: In April two thousand seventeen, PepsiCo had an ad featuring 249 00:15:18,440 --> 00:15:21,000 Speaker 1: Kindall Jenner handing over a can of Pepsi to a 250 00:15:21,000 --> 00:15:24,200 Speaker 1: police officer during a protest. This was at the height 251 00:15:24,280 --> 00:15:27,200 Speaker 1: of the initial protests in the Black Lives Matter movement, 252 00:15:27,640 --> 00:15:31,520 Speaker 1: and so PepsiCo was widely criticized for trying to exploit 253 00:15:31,640 --> 00:15:35,480 Speaker 1: a social movement for the purposes of advertising a soft drink. 254 00:15:35,920 --> 00:15:38,200 Speaker 1: Pepsi would pull the ad after just a few days, 255 00:15:38,520 --> 00:15:41,800 Speaker 1: including pulling it from YouTube. The move of a major 256 00:15:41,880 --> 00:15:45,760 Speaker 1: company pulling more advertising from YouTube fueled even more companies 257 00:15:45,760 --> 00:15:48,520 Speaker 1: to follow suit. Even without the public image issues that 258 00:15:48,520 --> 00:15:53,200 Speaker 1: Pepsi faced. The sudden departure of numerous big money advertisers 259 00:15:53,440 --> 00:15:57,360 Speaker 1: prompted YouTube executives to make some pretty hasty and broad decisions, 260 00:15:57,760 --> 00:16:01,520 Speaker 1: leading to what was called the ad PoCA lips. Now essentially, 261 00:16:02,000 --> 00:16:06,840 Speaker 1: YouTube effectively demonetized any channels that were not considered to 262 00:16:06,880 --> 00:16:11,160 Speaker 1: be family friendly, but the definition of family friendly was 263 00:16:11,280 --> 00:16:14,640 Speaker 1: left rather vague, and YouTube began to rely heavily on 264 00:16:14,680 --> 00:16:19,200 Speaker 1: algorithms to determine whether or not a channel's content qualified 265 00:16:19,520 --> 00:16:22,760 Speaker 1: for the tag family friendly or not. Now, to be 266 00:16:22,800 --> 00:16:25,880 Speaker 1: fair to YouTube, the company had little other choice than 267 00:16:25,920 --> 00:16:29,440 Speaker 1: the hand things over to an automated protocol. Today, around 268 00:16:29,480 --> 00:16:33,040 Speaker 1: four hundred fifty hours of video are uploaded to the 269 00:16:33,040 --> 00:16:37,480 Speaker 1: platform every single minute. The site racks up a billion 270 00:16:37,560 --> 00:16:41,200 Speaker 1: hours of you time every day. With that much content 271 00:16:41,320 --> 00:16:45,120 Speaker 1: being added every minute, it's impossible to put human beings 272 00:16:45,120 --> 00:16:47,160 Speaker 1: in charge of vetting all of it and making sure 273 00:16:47,240 --> 00:16:50,600 Speaker 1: none of it contains material that violates YouTube's policies or 274 00:16:50,640 --> 00:16:54,720 Speaker 1: will upset advertisers. For that reason, the company has developed 275 00:16:54,760 --> 00:16:59,320 Speaker 1: programs that try to do that automatically. Part of this 276 00:16:59,440 --> 00:17:03,480 Speaker 1: depends upon the metadata that's connected to the videos in question. 277 00:17:03,880 --> 00:17:07,920 Speaker 1: A metadata is data about data, so YouTubers build out 278 00:17:08,000 --> 00:17:12,439 Speaker 1: metadata like tags and descriptions so that their videos will 279 00:17:12,480 --> 00:17:14,760 Speaker 1: show up in search results. That way, when you pop 280 00:17:14,800 --> 00:17:17,960 Speaker 1: into YouTube search and you're searching for a specific thing, 281 00:17:18,040 --> 00:17:21,520 Speaker 1: like the other day, I search for Gauntlet to play 282 00:17:21,560 --> 00:17:25,359 Speaker 1: through because I was feeling nostalgic, then it gives you 283 00:17:25,400 --> 00:17:29,080 Speaker 1: the results that are relevant. It helps boost the video's 284 00:17:29,200 --> 00:17:32,359 Speaker 1: visibility and makes it more likely that people will find 285 00:17:32,520 --> 00:17:36,119 Speaker 1: the video. And since you only make money if a 286 00:17:36,119 --> 00:17:39,199 Speaker 1: lot of people are viewing your stuff, it's important to 287 00:17:39,280 --> 00:17:42,920 Speaker 1: include the information and your metadata. If you don't your 288 00:17:43,000 --> 00:17:44,920 Speaker 1: video is not likely to be seen by very many 289 00:17:44,960 --> 00:17:48,119 Speaker 1: people at all, so the algorithms look for the tags 290 00:17:48,160 --> 00:17:51,960 Speaker 1: that could indicate whether or not a video contains objectionable material, 291 00:17:52,400 --> 00:17:56,640 Speaker 1: and again, the term objectionable isn't terribly well defined here. 292 00:17:57,640 --> 00:18:01,399 Speaker 1: YouTube did create a checklist for advertisers in an effort 293 00:18:01,480 --> 00:18:05,359 Speaker 1: to win them back, and the checklist would allow companies 294 00:18:05,440 --> 00:18:08,359 Speaker 1: to select the types of material they did not want 295 00:18:08,400 --> 00:18:12,480 Speaker 1: their ads to support. Categories include stuff like profanity and 296 00:18:12,560 --> 00:18:17,040 Speaker 1: rough language or sexually suggestive content, which is stuff similar 297 00:18:17,080 --> 00:18:18,760 Speaker 1: to what you would see in a film's m p 298 00:18:18,960 --> 00:18:22,639 Speaker 1: A A rating description. But there were other categories as well, 299 00:18:22,720 --> 00:18:27,520 Speaker 1: such as tragedy and conflict or sensational and shocking that 300 00:18:27,640 --> 00:18:31,440 Speaker 1: raised questions and it could mean that people doing valuable 301 00:18:31,440 --> 00:18:35,280 Speaker 1: work in fields that need coverage would find themselves without 302 00:18:35,280 --> 00:18:38,280 Speaker 1: a means of earning enough money to pay for production costs. 303 00:18:39,080 --> 00:18:42,200 Speaker 1: And you do painted with a pretty broad brush. People 304 00:18:42,240 --> 00:18:46,320 Speaker 1: who had never had an issue with demonetization found themselves 305 00:18:46,400 --> 00:18:49,960 Speaker 1: hit hard by it. YouTube pointed out that the company 306 00:18:50,040 --> 00:18:53,720 Speaker 1: had an appeals process that creators could follow if they 307 00:18:53,800 --> 00:18:57,040 Speaker 1: felt that their work had been unfairly targeted, and there 308 00:18:57,040 --> 00:18:59,760 Speaker 1: were a lot of people who definitely felt that way. 309 00:19:00,240 --> 00:19:03,720 Speaker 1: For example, people advocating for human rights for people in 310 00:19:03,760 --> 00:19:09,080 Speaker 1: the LGBTQ community saw some of their videos demonetized, and 311 00:19:09,160 --> 00:19:11,639 Speaker 1: the message seemed to be that their goal, that of 312 00:19:11,840 --> 00:19:15,600 Speaker 1: extending human rights to a vulnerable population of people, was 313 00:19:15,680 --> 00:19:19,560 Speaker 1: somehow not add friendly or it was taboo, which is 314 00:19:19,600 --> 00:19:23,040 Speaker 1: a pretty crappy message to get. It reinforces the idea 315 00:19:23,080 --> 00:19:26,480 Speaker 1: that the world is against you when your video series 316 00:19:26,560 --> 00:19:30,520 Speaker 1: that's all about trying to extend human rights to people 317 00:19:31,359 --> 00:19:36,280 Speaker 1: is demonetized because the people in question somehow fall into 318 00:19:36,320 --> 00:19:42,920 Speaker 1: a category that isn't advertiser friendly. Uh. It's dehumanizing, really, 319 00:19:43,480 --> 00:19:46,680 Speaker 1: And that's just one example of the types of videos 320 00:19:46,720 --> 00:19:50,320 Speaker 1: that were targeted. YouTube was seen as being overly cautious 321 00:19:50,480 --> 00:19:53,000 Speaker 1: in order to appease the advertisers that were pulling out 322 00:19:53,040 --> 00:19:56,760 Speaker 1: of the platform, and the appeals process wasn't exactly a 323 00:19:56,880 --> 00:20:00,320 Speaker 1: smooth one. Creators who had a flagged video would get 324 00:20:00,320 --> 00:20:02,560 Speaker 1: a notification that their video was in a sort of 325 00:20:02,760 --> 00:20:06,040 Speaker 1: limbo in which it was not currently counting towards monetization, 326 00:20:06,840 --> 00:20:11,320 Speaker 1: but an appeal could, in theory, overturn that, and the 327 00:20:11,400 --> 00:20:14,920 Speaker 1: flagging process was based on machine learning, which also meant 328 00:20:14,960 --> 00:20:17,960 Speaker 1: that the appeals process was effectively part of the training 329 00:20:18,080 --> 00:20:21,760 Speaker 1: model for the system. You have a computer system that 330 00:20:22,280 --> 00:20:25,479 Speaker 1: identifies what it believes to be a video that has 331 00:20:25,520 --> 00:20:29,960 Speaker 1: objectionable material, It flags the video. The videos immediately demonetized, 332 00:20:30,520 --> 00:20:33,639 Speaker 1: and then by appealing the decision and having a human 333 00:20:34,440 --> 00:20:38,399 Speaker 1: go over the result and either uphold it or overturn it, 334 00:20:38,880 --> 00:20:43,560 Speaker 1: you train the machine learning model. That's great if you're 335 00:20:43,600 --> 00:20:45,760 Speaker 1: doing it in a lab, but when you're doing it 336 00:20:45,880 --> 00:20:49,000 Speaker 1: out in the real world, where it's actually affecting people's 337 00:20:49,000 --> 00:20:52,719 Speaker 1: ability to earn money, it's less great. So the content 338 00:20:52,800 --> 00:20:56,840 Speaker 1: creator was meant to send an appeal request, and in theory, 339 00:20:56,920 --> 00:20:59,280 Speaker 1: that would push the video to a human staffer at 340 00:20:59,320 --> 00:21:01,920 Speaker 1: YouTube whose of it was to manually review the video 341 00:21:01,960 --> 00:21:06,320 Speaker 1: to see if in fact the demonetization was justified. That 342 00:21:06,520 --> 00:21:10,040 Speaker 1: was the theory. However, that could not really work in 343 00:21:10,160 --> 00:21:14,960 Speaker 1: practice because the number of videos being uploaded each day 344 00:21:15,359 --> 00:21:17,879 Speaker 1: and the number getting flagged would have made that almost 345 00:21:17,960 --> 00:21:20,399 Speaker 1: as impossible as having humans view all the videos in 346 00:21:20,440 --> 00:21:24,040 Speaker 1: the first place, and so YouTube put in some additional rules. 347 00:21:24,640 --> 00:21:28,520 Speaker 1: Appealed videos would only go to human reviewers if those 348 00:21:28,600 --> 00:21:31,080 Speaker 1: videos had more than one thousand views in the most 349 00:21:31,280 --> 00:21:34,840 Speaker 1: recent seven days, or if you had a subscriber base 350 00:21:34,960 --> 00:21:37,920 Speaker 1: of at least ten thousand people, then a human would 351 00:21:37,960 --> 00:21:40,800 Speaker 1: review a flag video even if it hadn't yet met 352 00:21:40,840 --> 00:21:44,400 Speaker 1: the metric of one thousand views in seven days. Besides 353 00:21:44,440 --> 00:21:46,359 Speaker 1: the fact that YouTube was having to deal with an 354 00:21:46,520 --> 00:21:49,959 Speaker 1: enormous number of appeals, the company also wanted to make 355 00:21:50,000 --> 00:21:53,639 Speaker 1: sure it was addressing the concerns of the big earners first, 356 00:21:54,080 --> 00:21:58,080 Speaker 1: the most popular channels on YouTube. Many videos performed best 357 00:21:58,560 --> 00:22:01,240 Speaker 1: in the short term after uploading to the site, no 358 00:22:01,359 --> 00:22:04,280 Speaker 1: big surprise there. Right a new video goes up, people 359 00:22:04,640 --> 00:22:08,159 Speaker 1: flocked to it. There are fan bases who eagerly anticipate 360 00:22:08,240 --> 00:22:10,840 Speaker 1: the next video or episode, and so you see the 361 00:22:10,920 --> 00:22:15,360 Speaker 1: vast majority of activity hit those videos right away. YouTube 362 00:22:15,400 --> 00:22:18,320 Speaker 1: wanted to prioritize those videos over ones that might get 363 00:22:18,400 --> 00:22:21,480 Speaker 1: a lot of views over a very long span of time, 364 00:22:21,600 --> 00:22:23,600 Speaker 1: you know, the sort of stuff that tends to do 365 00:22:23,720 --> 00:22:26,720 Speaker 1: well on search. It might be more evergreen, so the 366 00:22:26,800 --> 00:22:29,879 Speaker 1: earnings month to month may be low but consistent. So 367 00:22:29,960 --> 00:22:32,080 Speaker 1: if I did a video that was sort of a 368 00:22:32,160 --> 00:22:35,840 Speaker 1: how to guide on something that would remain relevant for years, 369 00:22:36,520 --> 00:22:39,159 Speaker 1: I might not have a ton of traffic to that 370 00:22:39,359 --> 00:22:42,320 Speaker 1: video on any given month, but I would have consistent 371 00:22:42,440 --> 00:22:47,480 Speaker 1: traffic throughout the whole run of the lifetime of the video. Meanwhile, 372 00:22:47,560 --> 00:22:50,719 Speaker 1: someone else who's posting a new episode of a web series, 373 00:22:51,119 --> 00:22:53,960 Speaker 1: they're going to see the vast majority of activity on 374 00:22:54,119 --> 00:22:58,240 Speaker 1: their video in the in the near immediate fall health 375 00:22:58,320 --> 00:23:02,760 Speaker 1: of uploading it. So those first few days are critical 376 00:23:03,160 --> 00:23:06,000 Speaker 1: for those kind of series. And worse, there was a 377 00:23:06,080 --> 00:23:09,520 Speaker 1: growing concern among creators that this would mean a really 378 00:23:09,600 --> 00:23:12,920 Speaker 1: big drop in revenue, since the time they need monetization 379 00:23:13,160 --> 00:23:16,640 Speaker 1: would be shortly after the video goes live. So if 380 00:23:16,840 --> 00:23:21,239 Speaker 1: you upload a video, algorithm decides its objection it's got 381 00:23:21,280 --> 00:23:24,600 Speaker 1: objectionable material in it, flags it, and then you're not 382 00:23:25,040 --> 00:23:28,800 Speaker 1: You're demonetized and your video is just now live. It 383 00:23:28,920 --> 00:23:32,520 Speaker 1: could be the sweetest spot to earn money, and you 384 00:23:32,680 --> 00:23:36,040 Speaker 1: can't earn anything because you've been demonetized. The longer you 385 00:23:36,280 --> 00:23:39,120 Speaker 1: your video spins in limbo, the more money the creators 386 00:23:39,240 --> 00:23:42,760 Speaker 1: would lose. And as for older videos, there was a 387 00:23:42,800 --> 00:23:45,560 Speaker 1: concern that creators wouldn't even see that those had been 388 00:23:45,640 --> 00:23:48,480 Speaker 1: demonetized because all the focus would be directed towards the 389 00:23:48,560 --> 00:23:53,000 Speaker 1: latest videos that they're posting, So older videos typically don't 390 00:23:53,119 --> 00:23:56,920 Speaker 1: earn a ton individually, but collectively they can still act 391 00:23:56,960 --> 00:23:59,280 Speaker 1: as a pretty healthy source of revenue. So if you're 392 00:23:59,320 --> 00:24:01,840 Speaker 1: a creator who has been active for several years and 393 00:24:01,960 --> 00:24:04,919 Speaker 1: you have a big back catalog of videos, you might 394 00:24:05,000 --> 00:24:07,600 Speaker 1: have a decent amount of money coming in from views 395 00:24:07,800 --> 00:24:11,240 Speaker 1: on those videos, And if an older video suddenly becomes 396 00:24:11,320 --> 00:24:14,520 Speaker 1: relevant again for some reason, you could stand to benefit 397 00:24:14,600 --> 00:24:17,760 Speaker 1: from that. But if it's been demonetized, you never see 398 00:24:17,800 --> 00:24:19,800 Speaker 1: that money, and there's a good chance you wouldn't even 399 00:24:19,840 --> 00:24:22,760 Speaker 1: know about the demonetization because your focus is on what's 400 00:24:22,760 --> 00:24:25,920 Speaker 1: going up next instead of what you uploaded years ago. 401 00:24:26,640 --> 00:24:30,240 Speaker 1: This pushed many creators to consider leaving the platform altogether. 402 00:24:30,720 --> 00:24:33,840 Speaker 1: Some looked at alternatives like Twitch, where they can live 403 00:24:33,960 --> 00:24:37,280 Speaker 1: stream and use in platform features as a means of 404 00:24:37,359 --> 00:24:41,160 Speaker 1: earning money. Others moved to Patreon, in which users could 405 00:24:41,200 --> 00:24:44,040 Speaker 1: pledge a recurring amount of money to the creator, either 406 00:24:44,119 --> 00:24:47,040 Speaker 1: on a scheduled basis such as a monthly payment, or 407 00:24:47,119 --> 00:24:50,080 Speaker 1: on a per upload basis. But these methods meant the 408 00:24:50,119 --> 00:24:52,800 Speaker 1: creators had to rely upon fans who were able and 409 00:24:52,960 --> 00:24:57,439 Speaker 1: willing to pay for something actively. They were only passively 410 00:24:57,560 --> 00:25:01,040 Speaker 1: paying for earlier asked in the fact that they were 411 00:25:01,080 --> 00:25:04,200 Speaker 1: watching ads as opposed to actually handing over money to 412 00:25:04,359 --> 00:25:07,720 Speaker 1: view videos. Now, if we are to believe some of 413 00:25:07,760 --> 00:25:11,480 Speaker 1: the top creators on the platform, the initial fallout was 414 00:25:11,600 --> 00:25:15,560 Speaker 1: pretty dramatic. Phil DeFranco said add earnings on his channel 415 00:25:15,600 --> 00:25:19,560 Speaker 1: fell by eight percent following the flight of advertisers, though 416 00:25:19,640 --> 00:25:22,240 Speaker 1: by mid April those earnings had leveled out to a 417 00:25:22,359 --> 00:25:26,320 Speaker 1: thirty percent drop from the average. It's still not great, obviously, 418 00:25:26,480 --> 00:25:31,120 Speaker 1: but better than others stated less extreme drops in revenue, 419 00:25:31,520 --> 00:25:33,280 Speaker 1: but a lot of people said, yeah, it took a hit. 420 00:25:33,920 --> 00:25:36,960 Speaker 1: Making things worse was an overall feeling that YouTube wasn't 421 00:25:37,040 --> 00:25:40,119 Speaker 1: very good at communicating out the changes to creators or 422 00:25:40,160 --> 00:25:42,720 Speaker 1: explaining how their work was falling into one of these 423 00:25:43,520 --> 00:25:47,320 Speaker 1: categories that advertisers were opting out of, or presenting a 424 00:25:47,440 --> 00:25:50,240 Speaker 1: sort of best practices approach so that they could make 425 00:25:50,359 --> 00:25:53,600 Speaker 1: certain their work wasn't being demonetized. There seemed to be 426 00:25:53,680 --> 00:25:56,320 Speaker 1: a lack of communication on YouTube's part, which made the 427 00:25:56,359 --> 00:26:02,360 Speaker 1: creators feel truly abandoned. Then things got really crazy. I'll 428 00:26:02,359 --> 00:26:13,480 Speaker 1: explain more after the break. In late two thousand and seventeen, 429 00:26:13,800 --> 00:26:17,800 Speaker 1: yet another YouTube controversy made headlines. This time it was 430 00:26:17,920 --> 00:26:22,320 Speaker 1: all about how several channels creating videos ostensibly for children 431 00:26:22,680 --> 00:26:28,359 Speaker 1: had bizarre, disturbing, and sometimes blatantly inappropriate material in those videos. 432 00:26:29,119 --> 00:26:33,920 Speaker 1: They inhabited YouTube Kids, which is a standalone app and 433 00:26:34,000 --> 00:26:37,720 Speaker 1: it's marketed as a safe space for kids entertainment. The 434 00:26:37,880 --> 00:26:40,960 Speaker 1: idea was that you, as a parent or caregiver, could 435 00:26:41,000 --> 00:26:44,000 Speaker 1: download the app on a mobile device, hand that mobile 436 00:26:44,000 --> 00:26:46,440 Speaker 1: device over to a kid, and feel safe in the 437 00:26:46,520 --> 00:26:48,800 Speaker 1: knowledge that the child was only going to see family 438 00:26:48,920 --> 00:26:52,879 Speaker 1: friendly content through that app. The general belief was that 439 00:26:53,000 --> 00:26:55,480 Speaker 1: YouTube would have a system in place to block any 440 00:26:55,600 --> 00:27:00,960 Speaker 1: material that didn't meet the app's family friendly standards, but 441 00:27:01,840 --> 00:27:06,919 Speaker 1: that's not what happened. Some people made really disturbing videos 442 00:27:07,400 --> 00:27:12,800 Speaker 1: using popular characters to lure kids into watching popular trademarked characters, 443 00:27:12,840 --> 00:27:15,879 Speaker 1: a lot of them Disney characters, and tricking kids to 444 00:27:15,960 --> 00:27:19,880 Speaker 1: watching them, and these videos were trending. They were popular 445 00:27:20,000 --> 00:27:22,320 Speaker 1: enough so that they were showing up on related videos 446 00:27:22,640 --> 00:27:26,040 Speaker 1: or recommended videos when kids were watching other stuff, and 447 00:27:26,200 --> 00:27:29,040 Speaker 1: kids tend to watch a lot of stuff, and they 448 00:27:29,080 --> 00:27:32,120 Speaker 1: will often watched the same thing many times, so these 449 00:27:32,200 --> 00:27:35,399 Speaker 1: videos were racking up views, which meant more ad dollars 450 00:27:35,480 --> 00:27:39,359 Speaker 1: for YouTube. Now the videos were getting flagged. There wasn't 451 00:27:39,560 --> 00:27:43,080 Speaker 1: much activity to show for it, not much response from YouTube, 452 00:27:43,119 --> 00:27:46,080 Speaker 1: at least in the early days. But then these stories 453 00:27:46,160 --> 00:27:50,280 Speaker 1: broke about these videos and YouTube had another pr disaster 454 00:27:50,520 --> 00:27:54,080 Speaker 1: to deal with. This is the same year when the 455 00:27:54,160 --> 00:27:57,760 Speaker 1: apocalypse thing had started, so creators throughout their hands and 456 00:27:57,880 --> 00:28:01,480 Speaker 1: essentially said they're preventing us for making money while you're 457 00:28:01,560 --> 00:28:04,320 Speaker 1: also allowing this kind of stuff to go on on 458 00:28:04,480 --> 00:28:08,800 Speaker 1: your kids app. It wasn't a good look. It made 459 00:28:08,840 --> 00:28:13,159 Speaker 1: YouTube look like hypocrites. Now. Adding to that scandal was 460 00:28:13,280 --> 00:28:16,760 Speaker 1: one in December two thousand and seventeen when Logan Paul, 461 00:28:17,040 --> 00:28:21,440 Speaker 1: who was is an extremely popular YouTuber. He had really 462 00:28:21,520 --> 00:28:25,359 Speaker 1: made his fame on Vine and then when Vine closed down. Uh, 463 00:28:25,880 --> 00:28:27,840 Speaker 1: he had already done some stuff on YouTube, but he 464 00:28:28,119 --> 00:28:31,280 Speaker 1: managed to kind of leverage his popularity over to YouTube's 465 00:28:31,320 --> 00:28:35,520 Speaker 1: platform anyway. In December two thousand seventeen, he posted a 466 00:28:35,640 --> 00:28:40,440 Speaker 1: video that showed a hanging corpse in it. Uh. Logan 467 00:28:40,480 --> 00:28:43,000 Speaker 1: Paul was walking through an area in Japan known as 468 00:28:43,120 --> 00:28:48,960 Speaker 1: the Suicide Forest and encountered this corpse and caught it 469 00:28:49,040 --> 00:28:53,440 Speaker 1: on video and uploaded it. The video received millions of views. 470 00:28:53,600 --> 00:28:56,360 Speaker 1: It ended up trending on YouTube. It became the focal 471 00:28:56,440 --> 00:29:01,120 Speaker 1: point for a huge blowback from the YouTube community. Here 472 00:29:01,280 --> 00:29:06,680 Speaker 1: was a video that clearly violated YouTube's policies. Numerous people 473 00:29:06,760 --> 00:29:11,520 Speaker 1: had flagged it for review. YouTube didn't remove the video. 474 00:29:12,240 --> 00:29:15,600 Speaker 1: Logan Paul or someone on his staff removed the video, 475 00:29:15,960 --> 00:29:20,440 Speaker 1: but YouTube, the platform, seemed to do nothing, and that really, 476 00:29:20,800 --> 00:29:25,520 Speaker 1: in many people's minds, cemented the idea that YouTube's rules 477 00:29:25,760 --> 00:29:28,120 Speaker 1: didn't apply to people if they were at a certain 478 00:29:28,240 --> 00:29:32,320 Speaker 1: level of success and were seen as the future of YouTube. Moreover, 479 00:29:33,040 --> 00:29:37,320 Speaker 1: advertisers didn't pull their spots from Logan Paul's videos, which 480 00:29:37,360 --> 00:29:40,080 Speaker 1: seemed to suggest that it was the financial aspect of 481 00:29:40,120 --> 00:29:43,720 Speaker 1: the platform's rules that matter, not the ethical ones. So 482 00:29:44,120 --> 00:29:47,400 Speaker 1: there's a lot of blame to go around here. Advertisers have. 483 00:29:48,000 --> 00:29:49,680 Speaker 1: They have some of the blame, a lot of the 484 00:29:49,720 --> 00:29:54,600 Speaker 1: blame because while they reacted strongly to Beauty Pie, they 485 00:29:54,680 --> 00:29:59,080 Speaker 1: did not react strongly to Logan Paul, and so YouTube 486 00:29:59,200 --> 00:30:02,280 Speaker 1: was given a very strong incentive to react to the 487 00:30:02,360 --> 00:30:06,840 Speaker 1: Pauti Pie scandal by punishing Pauti Pie. But because the 488 00:30:06,880 --> 00:30:10,280 Speaker 1: advertisers didn't freak out, YouTube didn't have a whole lot 489 00:30:10,360 --> 00:30:16,040 Speaker 1: of incentive to uh, punish logan Paul because they were 490 00:30:16,120 --> 00:30:19,240 Speaker 1: making money. No One, no one on the let me 491 00:30:19,400 --> 00:30:22,200 Speaker 1: give you a check side of the equation was complaining. 492 00:30:23,080 --> 00:30:27,600 Speaker 1: Video viewers and other content creators were complaining. But since 493 00:30:27,640 --> 00:30:30,680 Speaker 1: they're not the ones handing checks over to YouTube at least, 494 00:30:30,680 --> 00:30:33,760 Speaker 1: as is the way the argument goes, YouTube just didn't care. 495 00:30:34,560 --> 00:30:37,640 Speaker 1: One thing YouTube did do, though, was to restrict its 496 00:30:37,720 --> 00:30:42,040 Speaker 1: Partner program, which allows content creators to opt into monetization 497 00:30:42,080 --> 00:30:44,640 Speaker 1: in the first place. This is the criteria you have 498 00:30:44,840 --> 00:30:49,160 Speaker 1: to meet in order to be considered in a part 499 00:30:49,200 --> 00:30:52,239 Speaker 1: of the partner program. So you have to meet these uh, 500 00:30:52,440 --> 00:30:57,400 Speaker 1: these requirements first before you can actually join. Before the 501 00:30:57,480 --> 00:31:00,120 Speaker 1: new restrictions were put in place, the general rule was 502 00:31:00,160 --> 00:31:03,440 Speaker 1: that a channel had to hit ten thousand views to 503 00:31:03,560 --> 00:31:07,640 Speaker 1: qualify as a YouTube partner across the channel. So if 504 00:31:07,720 --> 00:31:12,040 Speaker 1: you had a thousand videos and they each had ten 505 00:31:12,160 --> 00:31:16,560 Speaker 1: views each, you hit ten thousand views, that's It may 506 00:31:16,600 --> 00:31:19,880 Speaker 1: be that you only have ten people watching, but you 507 00:31:19,960 --> 00:31:22,640 Speaker 1: still have ten thousand views across your entire channel. That 508 00:31:22,680 --> 00:31:24,640 Speaker 1: would be enough for you to qualify as YouTube partner 509 00:31:24,760 --> 00:31:28,560 Speaker 1: under the previous rules, but the update changed that. They 510 00:31:28,680 --> 00:31:32,960 Speaker 1: changed it to four thousand hours of watch time over 511 00:31:33,040 --> 00:31:37,480 Speaker 1: the previous twelve months, which clearly favored longer videos over 512 00:31:37,600 --> 00:31:41,200 Speaker 1: shorter ones, since you could create very short videos and 513 00:31:41,360 --> 00:31:44,720 Speaker 1: rack up ten thousand views relatively quickly. But if you 514 00:31:44,840 --> 00:31:49,040 Speaker 1: have short videos, accumulating four thousand hours of view material 515 00:31:49,280 --> 00:31:52,160 Speaker 1: would take a lot longer. If your average video is, 516 00:31:52,560 --> 00:31:57,000 Speaker 1: you know, two minutes long, just getting an hour makes 517 00:31:57,080 --> 00:31:58,320 Speaker 1: mean that you have to get a whole lot of 518 00:31:58,400 --> 00:32:01,360 Speaker 1: views on that one video. But if your average video 519 00:32:01,480 --> 00:32:04,240 Speaker 1: is an hour and a half long, then it doesn't 520 00:32:04,320 --> 00:32:07,240 Speaker 1: take as many full views to hit that four thousand 521 00:32:07,320 --> 00:32:11,280 Speaker 1: hour water mark. Now, in addition, a channel would need 522 00:32:11,320 --> 00:32:14,840 Speaker 1: to have at least a thousand subscribers before it could 523 00:32:14,840 --> 00:32:18,320 Speaker 1: be considered for the Partner program. Existing channels that had 524 00:32:18,400 --> 00:32:21,800 Speaker 1: previously qualified for the Partner Program under the ten thousand 525 00:32:21,960 --> 00:32:25,960 Speaker 1: views rule but had not yet hit the four thousand 526 00:32:26,040 --> 00:32:31,360 Speaker 1: hours one thousand subscriber benchmark would end up being demonetized. 527 00:32:31,760 --> 00:32:36,320 Speaker 1: So there were people who had been qualified under the 528 00:32:36,360 --> 00:32:39,760 Speaker 1: Partner program previously, they did not get grandfathered in when 529 00:32:39,760 --> 00:32:43,760 Speaker 1: these changes were made, they were affected to Now YouTube 530 00:32:43,960 --> 00:32:47,760 Speaker 1: claimed that of those affected by these changes them were 531 00:32:47,760 --> 00:32:50,440 Speaker 1: making less than a hundred bucks a year on videos 532 00:32:50,840 --> 00:32:53,600 Speaker 1: that it was a very small amount of money that 533 00:32:53,840 --> 00:32:56,800 Speaker 1: wasn't being paid out and therefore was not having a 534 00:32:57,000 --> 00:33:03,640 Speaker 1: meaningful impact on people. Fast forward to February two thousand nineteen. 535 00:33:04,280 --> 00:33:08,040 Speaker 1: That's when Matt Watson, a former YouTuber, posted a video 536 00:33:08,160 --> 00:33:11,000 Speaker 1: showing that there was a disturbing trend on the platform 537 00:33:11,560 --> 00:33:17,400 Speaker 1: in which Skivie people were uploading videos showing kids doing 538 00:33:17,840 --> 00:33:22,800 Speaker 1: just stuff like nothing bad, just kids being kids. But 539 00:33:22,960 --> 00:33:27,400 Speaker 1: in the comments section, people were posting time stamps of 540 00:33:27,520 --> 00:33:32,200 Speaker 1: specific moments of the video that, out of context, would 541 00:33:32,240 --> 00:33:38,000 Speaker 1: sexualize the content, and that was where the huge issue was. 542 00:33:38,400 --> 00:33:43,000 Speaker 1: Watson demonstrated that YouTube's recommendation algorithm could quickly pull up 543 00:33:43,080 --> 00:33:46,760 Speaker 1: one of these videos, and he started with a bikini 544 00:33:46,920 --> 00:33:49,480 Speaker 1: hall video in which a woman was showing off bathing 545 00:33:49,520 --> 00:33:53,080 Speaker 1: suits she had purchased, and using only the recommended videos 546 00:33:53,160 --> 00:33:57,840 Speaker 1: that appear alongside the one you're watching, Watson quickly navigated 547 00:33:57,880 --> 00:34:00,800 Speaker 1: to a seemingly unrelated video of a young girl playing 548 00:34:01,280 --> 00:34:04,480 Speaker 1: in two clicks, and the comments were full of disturbing, 549 00:34:04,840 --> 00:34:12,240 Speaker 1: awful content that was enabling some truly hideous behavior. Watson's 550 00:34:12,280 --> 00:34:17,000 Speaker 1: point was that YouTube's algorithm was actually facilitating this sort 551 00:34:17,040 --> 00:34:20,480 Speaker 1: of behavior, making it easier for predators to seek out 552 00:34:20,600 --> 00:34:24,600 Speaker 1: each other and the content they wanted. The Verge ran 553 00:34:24,760 --> 00:34:29,239 Speaker 1: their own test after seeing Watson's video post, and they 554 00:34:29,520 --> 00:34:32,000 Speaker 1: used his methods, and they found that it took at 555 00:34:32,160 --> 00:34:35,560 Speaker 1: most six clicks to get to one of those videos 556 00:34:35,640 --> 00:34:39,520 Speaker 1: from the recommendation page, so they would start with a video, 557 00:34:40,120 --> 00:34:43,440 Speaker 1: and it found that if they just followed enough times 558 00:34:44,320 --> 00:34:47,480 Speaker 1: that being at most six, they would hit on one 559 00:34:47,520 --> 00:34:50,520 Speaker 1: of these. While Watson was adamant that he didn't want 560 00:34:50,560 --> 00:34:53,920 Speaker 1: another apocalypse and that he still had many friends who 561 00:34:53,920 --> 00:34:56,600 Speaker 1: were dependent upon YouTube for their living, he did want 562 00:34:56,719 --> 00:35:00,640 Speaker 1: something done about this problem, and he urged people to 563 00:35:00,800 --> 00:35:04,440 Speaker 1: reach out to the advertisers whose ads were being displayed 564 00:35:04,600 --> 00:35:08,360 Speaker 1: against this sort of content to have that content or 565 00:35:08,440 --> 00:35:10,960 Speaker 1: to have those ads pulled, because he was concerned that 566 00:35:11,000 --> 00:35:14,640 Speaker 1: YouTube wasn't going to do anything. So essentially he was saying, hey, 567 00:35:14,960 --> 00:35:18,360 Speaker 1: did you know that the ad for your product is 568 00:35:18,520 --> 00:35:24,399 Speaker 1: showing up on videos that are sexualizing children and don't 569 00:35:24,440 --> 00:35:26,440 Speaker 1: you think that's a bad thing? Then you want to 570 00:35:26,520 --> 00:35:30,040 Speaker 1: have your your ads pulled. And since YouTube had developed 571 00:35:30,040 --> 00:35:33,360 Speaker 1: a bit of a reputation for not responding to issues 572 00:35:33,440 --> 00:35:37,040 Speaker 1: like this in a timely or consistent manner, Watson decided 573 00:35:37,040 --> 00:35:40,440 Speaker 1: he'd go public with this discovery to create that pressure. Now, 574 00:35:40,560 --> 00:35:44,120 Speaker 1: some YouTubers disagreed with that strategy. Many said that Watson 575 00:35:44,200 --> 00:35:47,880 Speaker 1: simply should report incidents rather than try to get views 576 00:35:48,040 --> 00:35:51,080 Speaker 1: out of the issue. Some feared that the publicity would 577 00:35:51,120 --> 00:35:54,640 Speaker 1: prompt AD companies to pull out of YouTube altogether, creating 578 00:35:54,680 --> 00:35:59,239 Speaker 1: another round of the apocalypse. Personally, I find it hard 579 00:35:59,320 --> 00:36:02,120 Speaker 1: to figure out where I stand on this particular issue. 580 00:36:02,360 --> 00:36:06,239 Speaker 1: I do think reporting the incidents is important. Posting a 581 00:36:06,360 --> 00:36:08,680 Speaker 1: video about it could very well be in the best 582 00:36:08,760 --> 00:36:12,880 Speaker 1: interests of the people using YouTube, particularly if the YouTuber 583 00:36:13,040 --> 00:36:15,520 Speaker 1: chose not to monetize the video. So, in other words, 584 00:36:15,960 --> 00:36:19,080 Speaker 1: if Onston comes forward and says there's this terrible practice 585 00:36:19,120 --> 00:36:22,920 Speaker 1: that's going on and his video is not being monetized, 586 00:36:23,400 --> 00:36:27,640 Speaker 1: then at least you remove the criticism of, hey, you're 587 00:36:27,719 --> 00:36:29,880 Speaker 1: just trying to profit from this because you know it's 588 00:36:29,920 --> 00:36:31,799 Speaker 1: going to be a big controversy. It's going to drive 589 00:36:31,800 --> 00:36:33,800 Speaker 1: a lot of views, and therefore you can make money 590 00:36:34,440 --> 00:36:37,960 Speaker 1: off of it, and it removes that criticism. But if 591 00:36:38,000 --> 00:36:40,640 Speaker 1: the video pointing out the problem itself is monetized, then 592 00:36:41,400 --> 00:36:43,160 Speaker 1: you're like, well, you're now you're just trying to stir 593 00:36:43,280 --> 00:36:45,920 Speaker 1: up a hornet's nest for your own personal benefit. Even 594 00:36:46,000 --> 00:36:48,440 Speaker 1: if that's not the case, it's enough to create the 595 00:36:48,560 --> 00:36:52,399 Speaker 1: seed of doubt. On the other hand, YouTube definitely has 596 00:36:52,440 --> 00:36:55,360 Speaker 1: a history of turning a blind eye to problematic behaviors 597 00:36:55,520 --> 00:36:59,360 Speaker 1: on the platform, typically taking action only when the pressure 598 00:36:59,440 --> 00:37:02,520 Speaker 1: is too gray to ignore, and so I can sympathize 599 00:37:02,560 --> 00:37:04,880 Speaker 1: with Watson's point that this was something that needed to 600 00:37:04,920 --> 00:37:07,480 Speaker 1: be brought to light to create that pressure necessary to 601 00:37:07,600 --> 00:37:11,840 Speaker 1: enact change. At the same time, I also sympathize with 602 00:37:11,880 --> 00:37:14,480 Speaker 1: all the creators out there who are depending heavily on 603 00:37:14,600 --> 00:37:19,520 Speaker 1: YouTube for their living. They've spent countless hours shooting, editing, 604 00:37:19,640 --> 00:37:23,520 Speaker 1: and uploading videos for their audiences. They face challenges like 605 00:37:23,840 --> 00:37:27,560 Speaker 1: sweeping changes to monetization policies, which is sort of like 606 00:37:27,680 --> 00:37:30,160 Speaker 1: coming into work and learning that your paycheck has been 607 00:37:30,200 --> 00:37:33,799 Speaker 1: cut by and they can't tell you why or how 608 00:37:34,080 --> 00:37:37,200 Speaker 1: you can fix it. That's how people who depend upon 609 00:37:37,280 --> 00:37:40,360 Speaker 1: YouTube feel, and they face burnout as they try to 610 00:37:40,400 --> 00:37:43,000 Speaker 1: create more videos to meet demand and to earn money. 611 00:37:43,360 --> 00:37:46,239 Speaker 1: You know, knowing that each new video that comes out 612 00:37:46,560 --> 00:37:50,919 Speaker 1: earns most of its money on its initial release means 613 00:37:51,000 --> 00:37:52,680 Speaker 1: that for you to keep making money, you have to 614 00:37:52,800 --> 00:37:56,439 Speaker 1: keep producing videos, and that takes its toll. As someone 615 00:37:56,520 --> 00:38:00,080 Speaker 1: who makes his living creating content week to week, I 616 00:38:00,160 --> 00:38:02,760 Speaker 1: can tell you it's not always easy. Sometimes it requires 617 00:38:02,800 --> 00:38:04,640 Speaker 1: a lot of work to scrape up the motivation and 618 00:38:04,800 --> 00:38:08,320 Speaker 1: energy to do the job. You can ask Tari sometimes 619 00:38:08,480 --> 00:38:11,440 Speaker 1: pitch a fit before I come into the studio, and 620 00:38:11,520 --> 00:38:14,560 Speaker 1: by sometimes I mean pretty much every time. Having a 621 00:38:14,640 --> 00:38:19,120 Speaker 1: capricious platform doesn't make it any easier now. It also 622 00:38:19,200 --> 00:38:22,879 Speaker 1: reminds me of what Bernie Burns of Rooster Teeth would 623 00:38:22,960 --> 00:38:26,280 Speaker 1: point out pretty frequently. I've heard him say this in person, 624 00:38:26,640 --> 00:38:29,560 Speaker 1: I've heard him say it on podcasts and videos, and 625 00:38:29,719 --> 00:38:34,000 Speaker 1: I think it's a really important point. When you rely 626 00:38:34,160 --> 00:38:38,120 Speaker 1: on someone else's platform, you are creating a recipe for 627 00:38:38,280 --> 00:38:42,120 Speaker 1: things to go wrong sooner or later. So in other words, 628 00:38:42,280 --> 00:38:45,640 Speaker 1: it's the old adage don't put all your eggs in 629 00:38:45,840 --> 00:38:50,359 Speaker 1: one basket, because when that platform changes, you may find 630 00:38:50,440 --> 00:38:56,040 Speaker 1: yourself a disadvantage with no recourse, no solution. It's much 631 00:38:56,160 --> 00:38:59,960 Speaker 1: better to spread that risk around. Having your own platform 632 00:39:00,440 --> 00:39:02,719 Speaker 1: is helpful too, if you can do it, because you 633 00:39:02,800 --> 00:39:05,640 Speaker 1: have ultimate control over your own platform. So, for example, 634 00:39:05,680 --> 00:39:07,840 Speaker 1: with the Rooster teeth. They have their own website and 635 00:39:07,880 --> 00:39:10,560 Speaker 1: they host all their videos on their website. They also 636 00:39:10,760 --> 00:39:13,800 Speaker 1: host them on YouTube because that's where the audience is. 637 00:39:14,600 --> 00:39:16,880 Speaker 1: Then that's the flip side. Getting people to come to 638 00:39:17,000 --> 00:39:20,560 Speaker 1: you remains a huge challenge. It's hard to get people 639 00:39:21,000 --> 00:39:24,680 Speaker 1: to come to your owned and operated site. People go 640 00:39:24,920 --> 00:39:27,600 Speaker 1: where the content is, and as YouTube gets hundreds of 641 00:39:27,680 --> 00:39:32,200 Speaker 1: hours of content each minute, it's definitely that destination. So 642 00:39:33,239 --> 00:39:35,800 Speaker 1: it's easy to say, don't put all your eggs in 643 00:39:35,840 --> 00:39:38,680 Speaker 1: one basket, but it's also hard to build your own 644 00:39:38,719 --> 00:39:41,040 Speaker 1: platform and then convince people to go to it, so 645 00:39:41,200 --> 00:39:45,120 Speaker 1: it's not like there's a one size fits all solution. However, 646 00:39:45,600 --> 00:39:50,759 Speaker 1: it does again reinforce the point that depending entirely on 647 00:39:50,880 --> 00:39:54,640 Speaker 1: YouTube means that whenever there's a change, you're gonna be 648 00:39:54,880 --> 00:39:57,080 Speaker 1: affected by it and there may not be much you 649 00:39:57,120 --> 00:39:59,680 Speaker 1: can do about it. The same thing is true as 650 00:39:59,719 --> 00:40:03,400 Speaker 1: certain and I've seen this in my actual professional career, 651 00:40:03,560 --> 00:40:08,200 Speaker 1: where you might have articles that do really well in 652 00:40:08,320 --> 00:40:11,160 Speaker 1: Google Search because of the algorithm, and then Google will 653 00:40:11,239 --> 00:40:13,640 Speaker 1: change the algorithm and now those articles don't do so 654 00:40:13,719 --> 00:40:16,360 Speaker 1: well in search anymore, and you'll notice as a result, 655 00:40:16,640 --> 00:40:21,640 Speaker 1: traffic to your website drops dramatically. That impacts revenue and 656 00:40:21,680 --> 00:40:25,840 Speaker 1: impacts how much money you make from advertising. And again 657 00:40:25,920 --> 00:40:28,960 Speaker 1: it shows that if you're beholden to a third party 658 00:40:29,600 --> 00:40:32,960 Speaker 1: for traffic to your stuff, for people to actually get 659 00:40:33,000 --> 00:40:37,680 Speaker 1: their eyeballs on it and to consume it and thus 660 00:40:37,760 --> 00:40:41,960 Speaker 1: to generate revenue for you, then you could be up 661 00:40:42,000 --> 00:40:45,560 Speaker 1: the creek. And as The Verge points out, YouTube's own 662 00:40:45,680 --> 00:40:50,280 Speaker 1: course doesn't seem to have original content creators in mind 663 00:40:50,600 --> 00:40:54,480 Speaker 1: at all. YouTube seems to have kind of moved away 664 00:40:54,640 --> 00:41:00,160 Speaker 1: from that d I Y you know, home video content 665 00:41:00,320 --> 00:41:04,920 Speaker 1: creator model. When YouTube presents pitches to advertisers, they're not 666 00:41:05,040 --> 00:41:10,359 Speaker 1: typically showing these individual content creators, even the really popular ones. 667 00:41:10,760 --> 00:41:12,960 Speaker 1: More and more of the sizzle reel that the company 668 00:41:13,000 --> 00:41:16,759 Speaker 1: shows off includes stuff like music videos and clips of 669 00:41:16,880 --> 00:41:21,279 Speaker 1: television shows and movies, clips of celebrities, uh, stuff from 670 00:41:21,320 --> 00:41:24,440 Speaker 1: popular late night TV shows. In other words, it's that 671 00:41:24,560 --> 00:41:26,560 Speaker 1: stuff I was talking about at the beginning when YouTube 672 00:41:26,560 --> 00:41:30,080 Speaker 1: first started and people were uploading pirated content and the 673 00:41:30,360 --> 00:41:34,080 Speaker 1: industry was freaking out. Now that's what YouTube is relying 674 00:41:34,160 --> 00:41:37,359 Speaker 1: on in their in their sizzle reels, because now they 675 00:41:37,520 --> 00:41:42,719 Speaker 1: have these working relationships with these these big production studios 676 00:41:43,120 --> 00:41:45,839 Speaker 1: it's no longer adversarial now it's you know, a sort 677 00:41:45,840 --> 00:41:50,239 Speaker 1: of a symbiotic relationship, and the content is always more 678 00:41:50,360 --> 00:41:54,080 Speaker 1: highly produced than what d I Y video content creators 679 00:41:54,120 --> 00:41:57,560 Speaker 1: can do, even though YouTube build its business around those 680 00:41:57,719 --> 00:42:01,880 Speaker 1: content creators. And so the feeling among a lot of 681 00:42:01,960 --> 00:42:04,800 Speaker 1: creators is that they've been completely left out in the cold, 682 00:42:05,280 --> 00:42:08,040 Speaker 1: that they've been abandoned by the platform they helped build. 683 00:42:08,640 --> 00:42:10,640 Speaker 1: And so that's where we are right now, with content 684 00:42:10,719 --> 00:42:13,759 Speaker 1: creators concerned about their livelihood and looking at possible ways 685 00:42:13,800 --> 00:42:17,680 Speaker 1: to offset their dependence upon YouTube. Meanwhile, YouTube continues to 686 00:42:17,840 --> 00:42:20,719 Speaker 1: court big names and entertainment and groups that can create 687 00:42:20,800 --> 00:42:23,760 Speaker 1: highly produced content, and there's still the worry that another 688 00:42:23,840 --> 00:42:28,520 Speaker 1: apocalypse could be coming. So it's, uh, it's kind of 689 00:42:28,560 --> 00:42:31,320 Speaker 1: a concerning time if you're a content creator. UM. I 690 00:42:31,400 --> 00:42:35,840 Speaker 1: know a lot of content creators who, even fairly recently, 691 00:42:36,160 --> 00:42:39,040 Speaker 1: have expressed a lot of concern about this, some of 692 00:42:39,080 --> 00:42:42,720 Speaker 1: whom have gotten out of the content creation business pretty 693 00:42:42,840 --> 00:42:45,560 Speaker 1: much entirely. And it's a shame because they made really 694 00:42:45,680 --> 00:42:50,240 Speaker 1: good stuff. But they were also affected by these moves. 695 00:42:50,560 --> 00:42:54,480 Speaker 1: Some of them had content that wasn't at all objectionable, 696 00:42:55,040 --> 00:42:57,320 Speaker 1: but for one reason or another it would get flagged 697 00:42:57,480 --> 00:42:59,760 Speaker 1: that way, they'd have to go through the whole appeals 698 00:42:59,760 --> 00:43:02,080 Speaker 1: pro sess and it would happen with all their videos. 699 00:43:02,120 --> 00:43:05,160 Speaker 1: And if you've created you know, more than a hundred videos, 700 00:43:05,600 --> 00:43:08,759 Speaker 1: going through that process again and again just to just 701 00:43:08,920 --> 00:43:13,040 Speaker 1: to have monetization turned back on, I think it's demoralizing. 702 00:43:13,760 --> 00:43:18,680 Speaker 1: So it's a pretty rough landscape out there for the independent, 703 00:43:19,320 --> 00:43:23,160 Speaker 1: you know, small creators. There's some some of the big 704 00:43:23,280 --> 00:43:26,759 Speaker 1: names who are still doing quite well. Um you know, 705 00:43:26,840 --> 00:43:29,880 Speaker 1: they're they're big enough where they can operate on a 706 00:43:30,080 --> 00:43:34,800 Speaker 1: level at least, you know, similar to the established studios. 707 00:43:35,120 --> 00:43:37,359 Speaker 1: But for a lot of others, they feel like they've 708 00:43:37,400 --> 00:43:40,759 Speaker 1: been completely abandoned and left out, so they're looking for alternatives. 709 00:43:41,400 --> 00:43:43,520 Speaker 1: A lot of folks have moved to Patreon or to 710 00:43:43,880 --> 00:43:46,919 Speaker 1: Twitch in the hopes that perhaps they can at least 711 00:43:47,200 --> 00:43:51,279 Speaker 1: convince their audience to follow along with them. It's tough, 712 00:43:51,600 --> 00:43:54,320 Speaker 1: and it's one of the reasons why I've never spent 713 00:43:54,600 --> 00:43:57,040 Speaker 1: a huge amount of time trying to develop my own 714 00:43:57,080 --> 00:44:01,480 Speaker 1: YouTube video series, because I know that at the challenges 715 00:44:01,760 --> 00:44:07,239 Speaker 1: would be beyond just your average production challenges. You know, 716 00:44:07,320 --> 00:44:10,640 Speaker 1: even after something has been produced and published, you still 717 00:44:10,800 --> 00:44:14,800 Speaker 1: have challenges making sure that it remains monetized and that 718 00:44:14,920 --> 00:44:18,960 Speaker 1: you recapture the costs of production. Anyway, that wraps up 719 00:44:19,040 --> 00:44:25,120 Speaker 1: this episode about the apocalypse and YouTube's demonetization practices, and 720 00:44:25,239 --> 00:44:28,600 Speaker 1: maybe they will change over the course of twenty nineteen. 721 00:44:28,640 --> 00:44:30,520 Speaker 1: We'll have to take a look again in the future. 722 00:44:30,880 --> 00:44:34,040 Speaker 1: If any of you have suggestions for future podcast topics, 723 00:44:34,200 --> 00:44:36,600 Speaker 1: you can reach out to me by email the addresses 724 00:44:36,719 --> 00:44:40,000 Speaker 1: tech stuff at how stuff works dot com, or you 725 00:44:40,040 --> 00:44:44,200 Speaker 1: can drop on by our website that's text stuff podcast 726 00:44:44,480 --> 00:44:46,719 Speaker 1: dot com. There you're gonna find an archive of all 727 00:44:46,800 --> 00:44:50,520 Speaker 1: of our shows, links to our social media, as well 728 00:44:50,520 --> 00:44:53,319 Speaker 1: as a link to our online store where you can 729 00:44:53,640 --> 00:44:58,600 Speaker 1: purchase stuff that's got tech on it. Deck stuff Stuff 730 00:44:59,400 --> 00:45:01,880 Speaker 1: and you can be super duper cool and remember that 731 00:45:01,960 --> 00:45:04,279 Speaker 1: every purchase you make goes to help the show and 732 00:45:04,320 --> 00:45:07,280 Speaker 1: we greatly appreciate it. And I'll talk to you again 733 00:45:08,040 --> 00:45:14,680 Speaker 1: really soon. Hext Stuff is a production of I Heart 734 00:45:14,760 --> 00:45:18,160 Speaker 1: Radio's How Stuff Works. For more podcasts from my heart Radio, 735 00:45:18,520 --> 00:45:21,640 Speaker 1: visit the i heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever 736 00:45:21,760 --> 00:45:23,280 Speaker 1: you listen to your favorite shows.