YouTube's New COPPA Policies

[cafenurse]

So basically, COPPA laws (laws that project people under the age of 13 on the internet) have changed and because of this next year YouTube is making every channel declare if their videos are created for children or not. As simple as this sounds at first, there are some underlying issues with it-

The biggest issue with this is that if you make your content not for kids, and you mark it as such, but the FTC feels like it was made for kids- they can fine you. This gets really fuzzy in a lot of situations. Lets plays of games that kids like, like Super Smash Bros or Minecraft. You can mark them not for kids, but the FTC might feel like those are kid videos and fine you.
This issue can also spread to the voice synth community- if a song includes an animated characters that looks young (Rin, Miku, Yuki...) and they're singing a happy bubbly song, that can easily be considered kids content by the FTC, even if that wasn't your intent.
This is kind of a scary situation, and I'm wondering how it'll all go down in 2020. People have been saying for years that YouTube is on the decline and people should jump ship, but we never do. Will this be the final straw...?

 

[Overcast Immortal]

I'm reconsidering whether I will continue to have videos on Youtube. If I mark my videos as not for kids, I can get sued if the FTC thinks my videos are for kids. If I mark it as for kids, which it isn't, am I going to get fined for providing kids with angsty heavy metal? And considering I don't even run ads on my videos, does that mean I can post anything safely? I might only know once people either start getting sued or they don't.

I think vocal synth content will be considered for kids by the FTC, either because they have synthetic and sometimes cute voices, or because they often have cartoon appearances. Currently I've only tuned my synths to not sound super cute, and only have one image of a Vocaloid on my channel, and even I'm getting scared about it. I don't think this will be the end of all of Youtube, but it might be the end of people making voice synth and video game content on Youtube.

But hey, Youtube has also said it can delete channels that it believes are "no longer commercially viable", and my channel with 1 subscriber and 171 views in a year is certainly not a commercial success, so maybe Youtube will beat me to deleting my channel and it'll all be mostly fine.

 

[mobius017]

Wouldn't there be any kind of warning before the FTC sues? I mean, alleged copyright infringement cases result first with your videos being taken down, right? I'm guessing the FTC probably wouldn't sue right away--it would be too much work for them, and possibly too expensive.

Not that risking getting your videos taken down at random times would be any fun at all. It would certainly make me think twice about the potential hassle of dealing with YouTube. Which is too bad, since it would have been a good platform to put stuff on as far as letting people actually see it, and it would've been fun to collab with someone on artwork. For that, I guess there are other video platforms, obviously.

 

[cafenurse]

Wouldn't there be any kind of warning before the FTC sues? I mean, alleged copyright infringement cases result first with your videos being taken down, right? I'm guessing the FTC probably wouldn't sue right away--it would be too much work for them, and possibly too expensive.

I would hope so, but I don't think that they have to get give a warning before they fine you and thats scary.

 

[Blue Of Mind]

This is so poorly worded that I'd be surprised if content creators didn't take YT and the FTC to court over it. Besides, aren't under-13s technically banned from YT anyway? Why is YT catering to them?

 

[cafenurse]

This is so poorly worded that I'd be surprised if content creators didn't take YT and the FTC to court over it. Besides, aren't under-13s technically banned from YT anyway? Why is YT catering to them?

I think one of the videos I watched explained that even thought youtube is for 13+, some creators make content that is for people under 13. Thus, bringing kids onto their website and collecting their data. The FTC took YouTube to court for that and won a lot of money.

 

[Blue Of Mind]

I think one of the videos I watched explained that even thought youtube is for 13+, some creators make content that is for people under 13. Thus, bringing kids onto their website and collecting their data. The FTC took YouTube to court for that and won a lot of money.

If I were running YT, I'd actually ban the accounts deliberately catering to under-13s. YT is way too dangerous for little kids, and I'm saying this as someone who started browsing YT when I was 11. I saw some weird/freaky shit on there as a kid. XD

 

[Scarlet Illusion]

I'm glad you made this thread because I was thinking of making a similar one because I'm very concerned myself. I highly doubt vocal synth stuff wouldn't be considered "for kids" according to the FTC's bs guidelines (haha FTC, try telling that to the likes of song like Rolling Girl, lol), but what do they do when there's a disconnect between the visuals and the lyrics? Also, they need to state (if they haven't already) what to do about languages other than English.

Also, I'm highly concerned for my channel because I used to do a lot of MLP content back in the day (I'm embarrassed to admit), and while I wasn't targeting kids with this content, it's still considered kids content by the FTC's guidelines. Those videos are privated now, but I don't know what the policies are regarding private videos.

My vocal synth content is aimed towards a more young adult audience, but obviously vocal synths can appeal to anyone, and the more "cutesy" avatars might cause the FTC or whoever to flag it as "for kids". Though, I can't necessarily see them bothering with smaller channels, I don't want to risk being fined $42,000 because of vague guidelines.

This is so poorly worded that I'd be surprised if content creators didn't take YT and the FTC to court over it. Besides, aren't under-13s technically banned from YT anyway? Why is YT catering to them?

^Also, this. That's what I've been wondering the whole time, smh. And if it's because YouTube has been tracking them, well, they aren't supposed to be on YouTube anyways, so...

(Sorry for the long post...)

 

[Blue Of Mind]

Also, I'm highly concerned for my channel because I used to do a lot of MLP content back in the day, and while I wasn't targeting kids with this content, it's still considered kids content by the FTC's guidelines. Those videos are privated now, but I don't know what the policies are regarding private videos.

My channel's in a grey area - I just post random music (not my own stuff, I like sharing other artists' works, especially if it's obscure and needs more attention), but I sometimes use pictures of anime characters or cute anime girls as a background image because I like that aesthetic. The FTC guidelines throw in "cartoon characters" as kid-friendly material, because apparently, they're still trapped in that mentality that all animation is for children. Checking my analytics, the main age demographic I got in the last 28 days is actually from 20-40 something year old men who were presumably nostalgic and wanted to find some old trance songs, and no 13-17 year olds were recorded at all, so I don't think under-13s are watching my stuff, to be fair. But even then, it doesn't stop the FTC from finding my channel and randomly giving me an impossible-to-pay fine for possibly leading kids to watching my videos because of cute anime girls. The vagueness of all this is ridiculous for channels like mine, especially since I don't aim for little kids, but my content is kid-safe because I don't post any completely inappropriate songs.

 

[Scarlet Illusion]

Going off of their guidelines that "cartoon characters"="kid friendly" that means by that logic stuff like the Simpsons, Bob's Burgers, Family Guy, e/c/chi anime, R/1/8/ anime, etc. would be for kids, smh.

 

[cafenurse]

Going off of their guidelines that "cartoon characters"="kid friendly" that means by that logic stuff like the Simpsons, Bob's Burgers, Family Guy, e/c/chi anime, R/1/8/ anime, etc. would be for kids, smh.

Their guidelines also say they can target content with "kid language" which includes the words "free stuff", "whatever" and "duh"
I feel like the FTC doesnt realize that kids arent a different species. Kids and adults can say and like a lot of the same things. Banning everything that could possibly appeal to a child would mean.....banning everything.

 

[Blue Of Mind]

Their guidelines also say they can target content with "kid language" which includes the words "free stuff", "whatever" and "duh"
I feel like the FTC doesnt realize that kids arent a different species. Kids and adults can say and like a lot of the same things. Banning everything that could possibly appeal to a child would mean.....banning everything.

This is going to be impossible to actually enforce.

 

[cafenurse]

This is going to be impossible to actually enforce.

I'm interested to see how it'll play out. It sounds impossible to enforce, so I feel like nothing would happen, but they do have robots doing sweeps throughout the site to mark things as kids content. Even if you don't get fined, once your video is marked as kids content you lose a lot of features.
I'm really hoping it all falls apart because it's so stupid and vague and completely ridiculous.

 

[Scarlet Illusion]

I'm interested to see how it'll play out. It sounds impossible to enforce, so I feel like nothing would happen, but they do have robots doing sweeps throughout the site to mark things as kids content. Even if you don't get fined, once your video is marked as kids content you lose a lot of features.
I'm really hoping it all falls apart because it's so stupid and vague and completely ridiculous.

Honestly, I'm more nervous about losing the important features like comments, etc.. Comments are important to me bc I like getting that feedback and also comments boost your videos' chances of being recommended or some bs like that, so losing those creates a huge issue. Though, I get the feeling the bs probably won't go anywhere; it reminds me of the hysteria caused by the net neutrality stuff, and ultimately, I never ended up seeing any major changes to the Internet.

Hopefully someone will sue, because I've heard even lawyers are perplexed by this and can't give legal advice on it, smh.

 

[cafenurse]

Honestly, I'm more nervous about losing the important features like comments, etc.. Comments are important to me bc I like getting that feedback and also comments boost your videos' chances of being recommended or some bs like that, so losing those creates a huge issue. Though, I get the feeling the bs probably won't go anywhere; it reminds me of the hysteria caused by the net neutrality stuff, and ultimately, I never ended up seeing any major changes to the Internet.

Hopefully someone will sue, because I've heard even lawyers are perplexed by this and can't give legal advice on it, smh.

Yeah, you also lose the ability for your video to show up in recommended and be searched for. So basically, unless someone is already subscribed to you, no one's seeing your content. Which sucks for everyone.

 

[Scarlet Illusion]

Well, sh*t. I guess everyone is screwed then.

If only the big YouTubers would jump ship, I think others would follow. NND and BilliBilli could probably be viable alternatives, though they come with their fair share of issues. I love NND, but it's still kinda clunky and counterintuitive at times...

 

[cafenurse]

I think as far as the west goes, the biggest competitor for YouTube is Vimeo. But thats not saying much because I don't know anybody that uses Vimeo. Assuming that this doesn't fall apart in court (which I really like to think it will because its a mess), people will have to jump ship. There's really not another option.

 

[Scarlet Illusion]

I think as far as the west goes, the biggest competitor for YouTube is Vimeo. But thats not saying much because I don't know anybody that uses Vimeo. Assuming that this doesn't fall apart in court (which I really like to think it will because its a mess), people will have to jump ship. There's really not another option.

I haven't touched Vimeo in years, but from what I've seen the interface isn't exactly the nicest and no one I know of uses it anyways...

Though, I can't imagine it not falling apart in court. I could see this being taken to court over violating the first amendment and being extremely vague. I'm no legal expert, but I'm fairly confident the FTC has overstepped their bounds.

 

[cafenurse]

Yeah from what I know about Vimeo they also have a limit on how much you can upload a month for free, so I think a lot of people are put off by that. I'm willing to forgive their ugly interface because I don't even really like YouTube's interface.

 

[Blue Of Mind]

Whenever people complain about YT and someone mentions Niconico, they say they like the sound of the culture on Nico (it's kinda like pre-2012 YT in some ways), but the interface is still clunky and way behind YT on some features so I couldn't recommend it to non-otaku Westerners. (Not to mention that it only supports English in terms of foreign languages).

This kind of thing is why people joke that PornHub should set up a 'NoPornHub' of sorts, since they clearly have the infrastructure (for, erm, NSFW reasons...)