@Brovo while you do make good points and I mostly agree with you, you have to understand that YouTube has NO competition whatsoever which is pretty much the main reason why they're pulling this shit and why they've been fucked up ever since Google took over. If Twitch or Netflix had their own video platforms, YT would lose a LOT of users. This policy is bullshit and there is NO justifying it AT ALL. Just because you disagree with a video or don't like it doesn't mean it should be demonetized. I don't care if it's Anita Sarkessian or Devon Tracy. NO ONE should lose money because of their content or opinions.
As for making money, while you are right that people could just use Patreon and PayPal, some YouTubers don't want to do that because they fear being called sell-outs, losing subs, and a bunch of other bullshit. Yes that has happened. The logic of the interwebs no? Not much of an argument I know but still.
So yes people do have the right to be angry because this is screwing with some peoples' livelihoods and yes I consider this censorship because they're losing money due to YT and advertisers not liking their content/opinions. They're bringing their personal feelings into their work. Biting the hands that feed them. YouTube needs PEOPLE in order to be successful. If it wasn't for the many channels and users, the site wouldn't exist. How can we broadcast ourselves with that stupid policy? I sure as hell can't see how.
I missed replying to this so I'll just do a quickie.
#1: YouTube does have competition. Cable TV, Hollywood, Video Games--other forms of entertainment media. Within its own industry? Twitch is an up and coming contender that is looking to do blows with YouTube, especially since Twitch has started hosting videos, and YouTube has started a live stream service. If YouTube pisses off enough of its creators and they decided to move to another site, they would drag hundreds of thousands of people with them.
You'll also want to note that some channels (like Cinemasins and Collegehumor) have created their own sites and hosted their own videos. Collegehumor in particular is a company that
does actually hire people to create new videos for them. ThatGuyWithTheGlasses has been doing this for several years.
When YouTube decides to go so puritanical that they fully embrace the Hays Code era of advertiser-friendly way of doing things, yes, some creators will not survive. Others will happily go their own way and create content on their own sites, and ironically probably just use YouTube as an advertising platform to redirect people to their own website.
#2: On that note about Nintendo and Sony and Microsoft and so on, take note of the PC platform. There are big triple AAA giants on the playground here, of course. EA and Activision are going nowhere and they're going to keep releasing terrible overly expensive tech demos that they dare to call "video games." On the other hand, you'll also note that over the past few years, the Indie genre has
fucking exploded and there are now more indie games than there has ever been before. When there's a market for something, and people are willing to pay for it, that market will come to exist.
The last time the video game industry became choked in corruption and people hated it too much to use it, it ended up crashing. Nintendo brought it back to life, and did so via methods that avoided the previous crash.
That's the thing about Capitalism that a lot of people don't really seem to understand. There's a term called "Creative Destruction" which means that industries which become too petulant to survive and which are ultimately unnecessary (most entertainment mediums) collapse, or an alternative market appears that fills a niche which the bigger market doesn't fill and satiates people.
If YouTube wants to try and Atari the industry and turn their entire platform into kiddie-friendly garbage, they'll destroy themselves, and the market that still exists for entertainment of this nature will very easily fund a new YouTube. That, or one of YouTube's competitors will set up and take the mantle and learn from their mistakes.
It's like evolution, but applied to economics.
#3: Those people that accuse YouTubers of being sell-outs were never fans to begin with, and probably don't understand that there is nothing truly free in the world. That, or said YouTubers were providing garbage content that nobody really wanted anyway which only 13 year old boys found fun... And 13 year old boys are not the most
stable economic market.
#4: I'm not saying that people don't have a right to be angry. People have every right to be angry at whatever they want, they just have to understand the reality of the world in which they live. For example, I think Capitalism is a flawed economic system in dire need of repairs. It infuriates me that services which everyone needs--like electricity, or water--are privatized and charged fees, even though nobody has any choice but to take these things to survive.
I'm also mad that Battlestar Galactica had a fucking stupid ending.
This does not mean however, that anyone owes me anything. I don't like the way the water and electricity companies are set up here, but I have to live with them and play by their rules, because I'm smaller than they are, and I have no interest in competing with them in their market.
Always read the fine print before you dedicate your life to something. I have a job, but they can fire me if I fuck up at that job with two weeks notice. Even
that, however, is still more security and stability than a YouTube career. People had every opportunity to realize at some point that this is not a stable career. It is a volatile market run by a bigger fish.
You can complain that the bigger fish isn't playing fair, or isn't playing the way you want it to, but unless you're willing to do something else for a living, you play by the rules of the bigger fish... Or the fish will swallow you whole.
