YouTube is the most popular website on the internet for regular (i.e. non-rich) people to participate in the public political debate by posting/watching videos. This means banning regular people from it substantially reduces their ability to meaningfully participate in the public political debate. When people can't peacefully advocate for their interests, they do so violently. We don't want real world violence, so it's probably not a great idea to give YouTube carte blanche to decide who can meaningfully participate in the public political debate.
YouTube is just not that important. It's not some type of important political fixture, it's pretty universally regarded as a cesspool with regard to political discussion and most of the content is non-political anyway.
What exactly do you mean by "not that important"? Is it your position that if, say, YouTube took down all content that was in favor of Democrats, and pushed content that was in favor of Republicans to the front page, and put it all over recommendations, that there would be no impact to elections?
The impact would be negligible, not only because the YouTube demographic skews very young (i.e. people who don't vote), but also because most of the content on YouTube is not political content.
None of the top channels are political. Do you have any evidence to support the idea that YouTube is so important to politics that the government should step in to regulate it?
The second to most subscribed channel is not political as its main function, but there is most definitely political content on there.
>Do you have any evidence to support the idea that YouTube is so important to politics that the government should step in to regulate it?
Do you have any evidence to support the idea that people speaking on soapboxes are so important to politics that the government should step in to prevent municipalities from regulating their messages? There are billions of views of political videos on YouTube. It's a place where many millions go to consume political content. People get angry when political content they agree with gets censored.
> Are you suggesting that their impressionable young minds are uninfluenced by what they see on YouTube?
They will be influenced by hundreds of factors, YouTube perhaps among them, but YouTube is not of any particular our outsized importance.
> OK, but there is still a whole lot of political content on there.
And? Political content exists on the bathroom stall as well, that doesn't mean it's important.
> The second to most subscribed channel is not political as its main function, but there is most definitely political content on there.
PewDiePie is not a political channel and is completely irrelevant with regard to politics.
> Do you have any evidence to support the idea that people speaking on soapboxes are so important to politics that the government should step in to prevent municipalities from regulating their messages?
>They will be influenced by hundreds of factors, YouTube perhaps among them, but YouTube is not of any particular our outsized importance.
Outsized in comparison with what?
>And? Political content exists on the bathroom stall as well, that doesn't mean it's important.
Political videos on youtube have billions of views.
>PewDiePie is not a political channel and is completely irrelevant with regard to politics.
Like I said, not the main function of the channel, but there is certainly politically oriented content. Do you think his politically oriented content has no impact on the politics of his ~100 million audience?
With any of the other hundreds of platforms that cater to political discussion.
> Political videos on youtube have billions of views
So what? I'm not suggesting that YouTube isn't popular, I'm saying that just because its popular doesn't mean YouTube should be prohibited from curating it's own platform.
> Do you think his politically oriented content has no impact on the politics of his ~100 million audience?
The impact is negligible. Nobody cares what PewDiePie thinks when they enter the voting booth. And even if they did, it's YouTube's prerogative to kick off whoever they want, and if they decided to kick off PewDiePie... who cares? YouTube drama isn't important.
>With any of the other hundreds of platforms that cater to political discussion.
Which platforms in particular are you referring to?
>So what? I'm not suggesting that YouTube isn't popular, I'm saying that just because its popular doesn't mean YouTube should be prohibited from curating it's own platform.
I'm not saying that either. I'm saying it should be prohibited from curating its own platform because it's popular and because it's where a substantial part of the public political debate takes place.
>The impact is negligible.
Maybe, but he's only one person.
>Nobody cares what PewDiePie thinks when they enter the voting booth.
You could say that about just about anyone that isn't a cult leader, because that person isn't the only one the voter is listening to.
>it's YouTube's prerogative to kick off whoever they want
90% of all views of some particular type of political media, e.g. videos produced by people not associated with corporate owned media outlets. So if YouTube serves 40% of those views, and Facebook serves 30%, and Twitter serves 20%, then regulate those three.
> I would argue that it is not at all substantial and the evidence is on my side.
You keep suggesting that the amount of non-political content on YouTube somehow reduces the effect of the political content on YouTube. What is your reasoning behind that bizarre suggestion?
> Good joke. First of all, this site actively tries to ban political discussion
Yet here we are. Are you banned yet? YouTube also bans certain types of political discussion as you are well aware... so what?
> . Second, it's tiny in comparison to YouTube.
So you think the uninformed conversations occurring in a video entertainment cesspool are more impactful than the discourse between the engineers, founders and investors that actually built, maintain, understand and operate these platforms on a day to day basis? That's totally absurd. You're so hung up on popularity that you seem to have lost sight of relevance.
> ...
So in summary, if the site isn't a top 10 alexa ranking you regard it as politically unimportant. Popularity != political relevance. League of Legends is the most popular online game in the world, there are millions of people having political discussions on that platform every day, should Riot be prohibited from banning people?
> You keep suggesting that the amount of non-political content on YouTube somehow reduces the effect of the political content on YouTube.
No, I'm demonstrating that YouTube is primarily and overwhelmingly an entertainment platform and your attempts to suggest that it's so important to the fabric of political discourse that YouTube should not be allowed to ban people is not supported by the evidence of the activity on the platform.
>So you think the uninformed conversations occurring in a video entertainment cesspool are more impactful than the discourse between the engineers, founders and investors that actually built, maintain, understand and operate these platforms on a day to day? That's totally absurd. You're so hung up on popularity that you seem to have lost sight of relevance.
Each of those people engaging in uninformed conversations gets a vote that matters just as much as the vote of the people that built these platforms. I don't think many people are overwhelmingly concerned with making sure their message reaches the tiny number of people on this site.
>So in summary, if the site isn't a top 10 alexa ranking you regard it as politically unimportant.
I regard websites as being unimportant as far as this topic goes if they're not one of the most popular sites for people to participate in the public political debate. Banning an ideology from being espoused on HN isn't going to make people that subscribe to that ideology feel like they're being prevented from peacefully advocating for their interests. Banning that ideology from YouTube, or Facebook, or Twitter might. Banning it from all three almost certainly will.
>No, I'm demonstrating that YouTube is primarily and overwhelmingly an entertainment platform
What I'm trying to tell you is that I don't disagree with that statement, but that it doesn't matter.
>and your attempts to suggest that it's so important to the fabric of political discourse that YouTube should not be allowed to ban people is not supported by the evidence of the activity on the platform.
I've explained what I mean by substantial/important, and why I think YouTube qualifies. You keep saying it doesn't qualify because there are other videos on there and/or because the quality of discussion is low, but that doesn't address my argument.
> Each of those people engaging in uninformed conversations gets a vote that matters just as much as the vote of the people that built these platforms.
I agree. Getting banned from YouTube doesn't prevent you from voting. YouTube is wholly irrelevant to the civic imperative, it's just a video sharing site, yes, the most popular video sharing site on the web where people also happen to discuss politics, but its popularity doesn't change its fundamental nature.
> I don't think many people are overwhelmingly concerned with making sure their message reaches the tiny number of people on this site.
Right. Exactly my point. That's a mistake. Despite being orders of magnitude less popular than YouTube, this site has catered to an audience that is wealthy and well-connected relative to the YouTube audience and the political discussions on this site have a ripple effect in the tech community and thus the tech industry and people's livelihoods. My only point here is to illustrate that "popular" doesn't necessarily mean "important".
> it doesn't matter.
It does matter. The primary function of the site is a business built around video entertainment, just because some fraction of the site's users decided to have political discussions on YouTube doesn't mean that the fundamental nature of YouTube has changed into something that should now be owned by the commons. The creators and owners of YouTube still have rights to, and creative control over the product they created, even if that control resulted in a blatantly partisan culling of political content. If YouTube's behavior displeases the people they should seek redress with the platform's owners or abandon it. The reasoning you describe is a strange kind of mob tyranny where a corporation becomes obligated to give up creative control over its products because a bunch of people decided to start squatting political banners on the front lawn.
YouTube is not a political forum, it's a place where people shoot the shit about every topic under the sun, and there are plenty of places to do that on the internet.
>Getting banned from YouTube doesn't prevent you from voting.
Right, it prevents you from taking part in the public political debate that tens of millions of voters are participating in.
It's like telling someone "You can't talk about your political message on this popular street corner where there are actually people to hear you. You are welcome to go stand on the street corners way outside of town, though, where practically no one is listening. Those other people are fine to spread their message on this street corner, though, because I agree with them."
There are very good reasons why we don't allow that sort of thing on street corners. The very same reasons apply to the major social media platforms.
>this site has catered to an audience that is wealthy and well-connected relative to the YouTube audience and the political discussions on this site have a ripple effect in the tech community and thus the tech industry and people's livelihoods.
Ah, so middle/low class people should grovel to the elites that gather here, even though those people don't share their interests, and hope that they somehow convince elites to act against their own interests, and do some ripple effect thing on behalf of people that have interests opposed to theirs.
>My only point here is to illustrate that "popular" doesn't necessarily mean "important".
And you've forgotten not everyone has the same interests. If some low skilled workers feel that some policy is driving down their wages, they're not going to go grovel to a bunch of engineers who probably want their wages to go down so they get cheaper vegetables.
People want to be heard by people that have, or may have, similar interests to them.
>The primary function of the site is a business built around video entertainment,
So? The primary function of sidewalks is so people can walk on them.
>just because some fraction of the site's users decided to have political discussions on YouTube doesn't mean that the fundamental nature of YouTube has changed into something that should now be owned by the commons.
Right, it's the fact that said fraction represents a huge number of people.
>The creators and owners of YouTube still have rights to, and creative control over the product they created, even if that control resulted in a blatantly partisan culling of political content.
Subject to the limits that the government puts on that control.
>If YouTube's behavior displeases the people they should seek redress with the platform's owners or abandon it.
"Feel free to go talk on that street corner a mile outside of town. Only people who say things we like can talk on this one."
You really think that's going to be satisfactory?
>The reasoning you describe is a strange kind of mob tyranny where a corporation becomes obligated to give up creative control over its products because a bunch of people decided to start squatting political banners on the front lawn.
> Right, it prevents you from taking part in the public political debate that tens of millions of voters are participating in.
I don't think that's true, but even if you could prove it, it doesn't matter. You should not be entitled to use YouTube just because its popular and people discuss politics there.
> You can't talk about your political message on this popular street corner where there are actually people to hear you
Bad analogy. YouTube is not a public street corner, it's a private business and platform that you don't pay to use. It's more like saying you can't talk about your political message inside a popular tavern because the owners have decided they are not friendly to the political message. That is not a violation of your rights, that is how private property works. I get that you don't like it, but its their property and its a non-essential service, even if its very popular.
> Ah, so middle/low class people should grovel to the elites that gather here
Wow. That's a very disingenuous reading of what I wrote. I didn't say anything resembling that, AT ALL, I even explicitly stated that my only point there was to demonstrate that the popularity of a site doesn't necessary correlate with its political importance, but you still managed to twist it into a completely ridiculous strawman. Since you're arguing in bad faith I see no reason to continue wasting my time trying to have a conversation.
You don't think tens of millions of voters and future voters are have watched political videos on YouTube?
>but even if you could prove it, it doesn't matter.
You keep saying it doesn't matter without actually addressing my argument.
>You should not be entitled to use YouTube just because its popular and people discuss politics there.
Says who? You?
>YouTube is not a public street corner, it's a private business and platform that you don't pay to use.
The point of analogies is not that the two things are identical, but that they are similar in some particular important way.
>It's more like saying you can't talk about your political message inside a popular tavern because the owners have decided they are not friendly to the political message.
A popular tavern with tens of millions of people in it, maybe.
>That is not a violation of your rights
Depends on who you ask. Rights aren't written anywhere in the stars. People make them up.
>that is how private property works.
Private property rights are not absolute.
>Wow. That's a very disingenuous reading of what I wrote.
Actually you revealed a lot about your opinion from what you wrote. You said it's a mistake for people to value being able to post political content on YouTube more highly than they value being able to post political content on HN, because HN is filled with elites who do some ripple effect thing, whereas YouTube is filled with poor uninformed simpletons. In other words, they should value being able to beg the elites to do the ripple effect thing for them more than they should value being able to spread their message directly to like-minded people. Poor uninformed simpletons can't make changes on their own, they need elites to do it for them.
The problem is that the elites want cheap vegetables, so they don't want the poor simpletons to get paid more.
