[HN Gopher] A WWII documentary series is being demonetized by Yo...
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       A WWII documentary series is being demonetized by YouTube [video]
        
       Author : comeonbro
       Score  : 35 points
       Date   : 2023-09-03 17:37 UTC (5 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.youtube.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.youtube.com)
        
       | penjelly wrote:
       | this guy covers wars "in real time". Really cool videos
        
       | nextworddev wrote:
       | What's the background behind this?
        
       | comeonbro wrote:
       | 'World War Two' is an enormous documentary project that's been
       | following WWII week-by-week in ~real-time for the past 5 years.
       | 
       | Its content is increasingly being age-restricted and demonetized
       | by YouTube.
        
         | extraduder_ire wrote:
         | The D-day hour-by-hour 24 hour coverage was great, even if it
         | took me a few weeks to watch all of it. Still need to watch the
         | Pearl Harbor videos.
        
       | barelysapient wrote:
       | The video mentions an exception for educational content. Fine,
       | but who decides what is educational? What about some of the truly
       | horrific WW2 content. Is that educational? Hard to blame YouTube
       | for being very cautious here.
        
         | manuelmoreale wrote:
         | Isn't learning history educational? And yes, some history is
         | horrific but I don't see the problem with that.
         | 
         | I was in elementary school when we took a field trip to see a
         | ww2 concentration camp.
         | 
         | Was that appropriate for our age? Hard to say. Did I still
         | remember it all these years later? Yes. Was it educational?
         | Also yes.
        
           | ianai wrote:
           | (US) I think every year in public school for me included a
           | WWII/Holocaust remembrance period. I think across both
           | literature/English and history classes.
           | 
           | Seems like public education doesn't do that anymore. And
           | society is much worse off.
        
             | manuelmoreale wrote:
             | I'm in northern Italy. Traces of those wars are literally
             | everywhere. One of the largest war memorials is near here
             | [0]
             | 
             | Learning history is important. And it's educational. And if
             | to learn it you have to see something gruesome, so be it.
             | 
             | [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redipuglia_War_Memorial
        
               | ianai wrote:
               | And of course we must avoid presentism https://en.wikiped
               | ia.org/wiki/Presentism_(literary_and_histo...
               | 
               | History is many things including terrible and gruesome.
               | But ignorance of history is no answer.
        
           | barelysapient wrote:
           | I like your example because its a specific, physical place.
           | Probably part of a syllabus for your class. And hard to argue
           | that, in this context, a profound and educational experience.
           | 
           | Now contrast that with online 'educational' content. That's
           | way to vague. One could argue that really just about
           | _anything_ is educational. But that same thing in the eyes of
           | another person is pornography, extreme violence, or a hate
           | crime.
           | 
           | Take executions. There's footage of illegal executions in
           | Word War 2, and recently with ISIS. Are both of those
           | educational? Maybe with the right context and in a
           | curriculum, sure. But gosh, sure seems it should at least be
           | age restricted on Youtube.
           | 
           | I think we have two choices to fix this: First, if the
           | regulators want an educational carve out they need to get
           | incredibly clear what is and is not educational.
           | 
           | Or, barring that, then lets create an "educational" platform
           | that can host this sort of content. You know, like OnlyFans,
           | but for "educational" topics.
        
         | fyrn_ wrote:
         | Google finds itself in a postion of largely unchecked power
         | over many users of its platform, that rely on it for primary
         | income. These people work in an environment without any of the
         | typical legal protections around their livelyhood, so I think
         | we should be cautious to side against the worker, if only in
         | the spirit of labor day weekend.
        
           | barelysapient wrote:
           | I like this, and wonder if employee style protections for
           | Youtube content creators isn't warranted.
        
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       (page generated 2023-09-03 23:02 UTC)