The Demonetization of YouTube
In 2005, Youtube had just launched on the internet. It was something interesting, yet confusing and a bit scary. But throughout the years, people have come to enjoy Youtube either by posting random videos or just fooling around with the site. Eventually, people started making a career out of posting videos. People were getting paid for the views they got for posting fun content everyone can enjoy. People were allowed to post many things, even things that weren’t considered “family-friendly.”
But times have changed, and now, Youtube has become a bit more restricted with the content people post on there. Youtube has been updating its restrictions and guidelines to keep children safe from inappropriate content. Youtube restrictions and policies hurt content creators, whether they are new or old. Youtube has become an even more demanding job not just for new content creators but for veterans as well. Ever since Youtube has been having its restrictions and guidelines updated, it has been a struggle for Youtubers to create new and funny content while trying to keep the videos as family-friendly as possible.
In the article titled “Ever-Changing Rules Not Only Threaten YouTubers Income, but the Platform’s Creative Soul states that, “some videos on YouTube have been disrupting children’s content and have been exposing inappropriate content to them, which led Youtube to start demonetizing and restricting certain content that wasn’t safe for kids, and led to many content creators having trouble creating new content that could be friendly for everyone to see. While some YouTubers were able to make social content for everyone, it also is a struggle for them because they have to step outside of their comfort zone posting content that they can’t put their personality into because of how inappropriate it can be. Most YouTubers are struggling to fit into the new restrictions and guidelines; some are even failing the job and starting to drop out of their YouTube career.
Another article entitled, “YouTube ‘demonetization,’ explained for normals,” explains what demonetization is and how it’s affecting content creators all over the world. Ever since 2012, YouTube has been demonetizing a lot of videos automatically due to the videos being unfriendly for the audience. No one ever found about it until in 2016, when YouTube started actively telling people about it. Once people heard about what was happening, this started to freak people out and got them worried. People started fearing the future of YouTube as well as that of content creators.
The article titled “‘Like you’ve been fired from your job’: explains how “YouTubers have lost thousands of dollars after their channels were mistakenly demonetized for a month. Additionally, some content creators have been getting demonetized for no reason. Many good content creators dispersed because of this. Many YouTubers were getting demonetized but were following the restrictions and guidelines. Unfortunately, this led to content creators losing a lot of money and having no option to recover their lost profit, which has caused an enormous fear for many YouTubers and many people who want to become YouTubers. YouTube’s accidental demonetizing has caused many problems for other YouTubers and made them lose a lot of money because of it.
In conclusion, YouTube’s new restrictions and guidelines have caused many people to either leave the platform, change the nature of their content, or lose money because of it. For future content creators and old veterans, there must be change to go back to normal and people can continue their careers for their love of YouTube and posting fun content for viewers to watch and enjoy.
Alexander Damour – Author