Last week, YouTube sparked outrage, at least on one side of the US political spectrum, after the platform restricted and demonetized a video in which political commentators Ben Shapiro and Dave Rubin sat down for, as they described it, a thoughtful discussion on issues of the day.

YouTube ultimately reversed their decision after complaints and a manual review. However, the fact remains that the video was demonetized in its first 24 hours, which effectively halted its monetization potential.

This was hardly the first time that YouTube came under fire. For example, early in 2017, it was discovered that YouTube’s restricted mode, which is supposed to allow parents, schools, and libraries too filter out content deemed inappropriate for children, was also removing a large amount of LGBT content. In one instance, a perfectly harmless video titled “GAY flag and me petting my cat to see if YouTube blocks this,” which featured, as labelled, an image of a rainbow-colored flag and a cat — got blocked.

Then, in October, conservative educational site PragerU, sued Google and YouTube, accusing them of censoring online videos due to their political leanings. The lawsuit cited more than 50 PragerU videos which were condemned to “restricted” or “demonetized” status by Google/YouTube.

“Watch any one of our videos and you’ll immediately realize that Google/YouTube censorship is entirely ideologically driven,” said Dennis Prager, founder of PragerU. “For the record, our videos are presented by some of the finest minds in the Western world, including four Pulitzer Prize winners, former prime ministers, and professors from the most prestigious universities in America.”

“Google and YouTube’s use of restricted mode filtering to silence PragerU violates its fundamental First Amendment rights under both the California and United States Constitutions. It constitutes unlawful discrimination under California law, is a misleading and unfair business practice, and breaches the warranty of good faith and fair dealing implied in Google and YouTube’s own Terms of Use and ‘Community Guidelines,’” added former California Governor Pete Wilson.

Meanwhile, Wikileaks founder Julian Assange called YouTube’s policies “economic censorship.”

YouTube’s algorithm — not a real person — plays a huge role in deciding which videos can be embedded, commented on, and monetized. During the censorship process, videos marked as “not suitable for most advertisers” get limited, if any, revenue because content gets automatically flagged.

Synereo’s WildSpark provides a solution to such automated economic censorship, offering fair and free monetization solutions for creators — regardless of the platforms they choose to work with, and their attitudes towards “ad-friendly” content.

In Synereo’s user-centric universe, content creators and curators are rewarded with AMPs (Synereo’s native cryptocurrency) for the high-quality content they provide. If people enjoyed a video by PragerU, Ben Shapiro, Dave Rubin, or footage of a “GAY flag and me petting my cat,” — then irrespective of what YouTube’s advertising policy was, the video would still be able to be monetized via AMPs.

In the end, it’s all about giving agency to creators and curators, empowering them to address their audience without restrictive intermediation.

Ben Shapiro, Dennis Prager — you create content that is highly appreciated, and your channels have already gained traction among WildSpark users (i.e. your videos have been AMPlified by appreciative followers).

We invite you to contact us to link your YouTube channels to WildSpark so that you can access the AMPs associated with them and join the monetizing revolution.