Three weeks ago, YouTuber GradeAUnderA took a look at everything that is wrong with YouTube starting with the site’s lax attitude towards actually enforcing copyright laws, fair use and its own community guidelines. This week, GradeAUnderA looks at the other six YouTube community guidelines that YouTube purports to enforce but doesn’t seem to unless it’s against a channel trying to produce quality content.
Copyright Law
Everything That’s Wrong with YouTube According to GradeAUnderA
In the wake of the Fine Bros disaster, a video by YouTuber GradeAUnderA is making the rounds on Twitter and Reddit. It takes a look at the broken copyright protection system in place on YouTube and how that’s impacting business on YouTube. I mention the Fine Bros at the start because a good portion of GradeA’s video is about how many reaction videos (with the noted exception of The Fine Bros) violate YouTube’s community guidelines and copyright law with their videos for their own financial gain at the expense of those who created the videos being reacted to.
The Fine Brothers React to Backlash, Rescind Trademarks and Discontinue React World
The reaction was pretty entertaining to follow but the reaction to the reaction means that the internet will have a happy ending. After enormous public backlash and pressure following the announcement of React World and the discovery of numerous trademarks, The Fine Bros and Fine Bros Entertainment announced that they would be rescinding their trademarks and cancelling React World.
The Internet Reacts Badly to The Fine Bros Licensing React Videos
They pitched it to the world as if they were doing this great service to their fans and YouTube creators alike. When YouTube mega stars The Fine Bros announced the creation of “React World” to allow users to license their format for a share of the revenue the video generates, it turned out that almost no one agreed with their self-assessment.
Over the last week, the Fine Bros and their team have been in complete damage control mode as they try to quell the internet uproar over the brotherly duo and their company trademarking “react” and apparently claiming ownership of reaction videos on YouTube.
YouTube’s Content ID System is Hurting Your Favourite Channels
Not only are YouTube content creators having to deal with a massive change to the networking system that will affect their ability to make money, but YouTube made a massive sweep of videos in a content matching check that caused a lot of YouTubers to lose the monetization rights to many videos.
YouTube’s content ID system is fairly indiscriminate. If it finds content that matches copyrighted content in their data base, the monetization rights revert to the original creator. The problem is that it makes no provisions for fair use and the dispute system is often considered as non-existent.
But rather than rehash this week’s column about YouTube on monetization, this detailed explanation of YouTube content matching, monetization and the implications of the current system by Force of Force Strategy Gaming does a much better job than I ever could.
The Humanoids: Madness
The whole world has gone mad! Not just March Mad but generally mad. People doing ridiculous things that would be extremely newsworthy if it wasn’t for a little basketball tournament that was known as March Madness. Celebrities have gone mad. Sport organization management has gone mad. Governments have gone made. And Gus Johnson has gone mad. Oh, Gus is always that amped up? Well, that’s why we love him.
Speaking of madness, cheap radio show/podcast plug: Our 50th show to air on radio is coming up on March 30th. That’s going to display our complete and utter madness. Continue reading
The Lowdown 