YouTube is trying to clean up its act by cracking down on sexually explicit videos that are just short of porn and spam videos with misleading titles and descriptions. (Porn has always been grounds for removal). On its most visited pages, YouTube will now apply a “stricter standard for mature content” and demote sexually explicit or graphic videos from its “most viewed,” “top favorited,” and other popular pages. Also, thumbnails will now be algorithmically selected.
These new standards are not just about YouTube trying to class itself up. The more it polices itself, the less likely that Congress or the FCC will try to police it in the future. (For the FCC, its jurisdiction would probably be limited to mobile devices that access the Web over cellular networks).
But the bigger consideration may simply be to get rid of what amount to spam videos taking over YouTube. If you are looking for puppy videos, you are probably not looking for a video with a lady in lingerie and bunny ears that is actually an ad for a porn site. (Or maybe you are, but in that case you should be searching for “lady bunny”). This is a real example, but I’m not going to link to it.
YouTube isn’t the only social media site cracking down on the sexy stuff. Build-your-own social network Ning will no longer allow “adult social networks” starting in January, even if they are legal. The advertisers Ning (and YouTube) are trying to lure, just don’t like being associated with that type of content. Ning CEO Gina Bianchini explains in a blog post:
Adult social networks don’t pull their own weight. Specifically, they require other social networks to work harder because they don’t generate enough advertising or premium service revenue to cover their costs. Plus, our ad partners aren’t big fans of the adult networks and therefore require us to identify adult networks or risk our healthy advertising revenue. We don’t want to be in the policing business and, unchecked, that’s where this is heading.
She also notes that legal adult social networks create more work for Ning by receiving “a disproportionate number of DMCA take down notices” and they also attract more illegal adult social networks. I guess, it’s like the broken car windows theory—small infractions lay the groundwork for bigger problems. Perhaps YouTube is thinking along the same lines.
now? that sexy content is what made them who they are today. sure will be nice not to get rick rolled anymore.
SexyLocator.com – we can help.
Sexy, spammy videos did not make youtube…Jeez
i do agree the sleaze made them
YouTube has been fighting sexy content from the start, to say that this is what made them for who they are is just plain stupid.
Does that mean all the kissing videos that are taken from actual porn, usually leaving the website’s logo in the video, will disappear? I find it funny to read all the comments such as “I wonder what happens next”, when it’s clearly a freakin porno vid!
Good bye “sexually explicit videos that are just short of porn and spam videos with misleading titles and descriptions”. You will be missed.
Excellent! The auto-generation of thumbnails is probably the bigger news. This affects all the content producers, not just the porn and spammy ones. It will be interesting to see if some channels start dropping off in terms of viewership.
This is great news, all the crap makes it hard to actually use the related videos features. I wish they could fix the spammy or down-right wrong tagging that goes on too.
With sites like tube8 around why do they even bother?
Seems like a practical move to appease ad partners and possibly pre-empt any future FCC oversight. I wouldn’t surprised if the traffic tanked. I mean, would it really be shocking to find out that most don’t go to YT for wholesome content?
They should shut Tanya IPowerWeb down.
lol this wat runs youtube and probably made it worth 1.8 billion
Your link to Ning CEO Gina Bianchini’s blog post actually goes to YouTube.
I think YT is making a mistake here. Rather than getting rid of the videos, YT should turn this into a separate “adult” channel and generate revenue as follows:
1] Charge a flat fee to post videos into the channel. I’m sure these porn guys would pay $20/month to continue uploading their teaser/trailer videos. Increase fees by # of uploads (1-5; 6-20; 21-50; 50-100)
Where else are they going to find such an audience?
2] Create a separate PPC ad network within the adult network. This creates revenue + eliminates any issues the major advertisers have by making sure their ads never run beside such content.
3] Though it won’t eliminate misleading titles, it should reduce the incentive to use them.
Still baffled as to why YouTube has not created commercial channels. We put all of our daily videos on YT and would gladly pay $20/month to be within a finance channel and even run some PPC ads within it.
http://www.yout...user=agoracomir
I wouldn’t charge everyone that wanted to post to the Finance Channel but I would give paying publishers premium placement.
YouTube is leaving a lot of easy money on the table with its strict adherence to “free” and I just don’t see the logic. If anybody can explain, I’d like to know.
Regards,
George
No public company as Google will support adult content of any type.
Actually most of the porn industry is run by large public companies these days.
That’s a man, baby
Awesome move by Ning. Actively court adult groups to make it appear that your platform is growing and then kick them out once you have raised piles of cash and, if you are honest, recognize you can never raise again.
I view this as a cost-cutting move more troubling than layoffs and I wonder when Allen & Co will write down their $60M. Bye bye traffic growth.
Youtube should says yes to sex . Just kidding
Ning is such a joke and hopefully this will kill off most of their traffic. Here are their top networks on ning according to Alexa.
# jimiphilsnetwork.ning.com – 5%
# gaytitus.ning.com – 3%
# americangay.ning.com – 3%
# sabu2u.ning.com – 3%
# remolachasocialclub.ning.com – 2%
# melayu3gp.ning.com – 2%
# xbrain.ning.com – 2%
# bigdickclub.ning.com – 2%
# mychicks.ning.com – 2%
Really high quality stuff, I especially feel bad for the members of the bigdickclub as they have spent so much time and effort into building and vetting their community.
wow. $100MM and all we got was a bunch of porn communities.
Case in point does anyone on this site or any other go to Ning or belong to any ning community (that they are willing to admit to)??
I thought not.
FAIL FAIL FAIL
Most of the Ning sites in your Alexa list, DtotheP, have been taken down (already). So what is your point actually?
fom – fit older men
My Point, regardless if some of the networks that Alexa lists as the top traffic urls under Ning have been taken down, is that most of them are very low quality and have little to no advertising value, kind of like your little network, good luck with that.
You know alexa doesn’t track networks that use their own domain, right? Just like on tumblr.
the thumbnail issue could have easily been solved by a rollover preview of the video as opposed to a random choice.
clearly this will hurt some of youtube’s top partners. Most likely people will now just keep re-uploading until they get a thumbnail they like = stupid
Can’t wait….
Since Ning will discontinue adult networks from Jan 1st 2009 on the next step after exporting your CVS data (as network creator) is to think about ways how to export a) photos b) vidoes c) music.
Widgetlaboratory had a tool called “Safety Blanket” in the making but it never was released. Now after Ning closed down API hooks it would not work anyway anymore. So one solution could be commercial web dump software. Videos are a much more complicated topic.
Any experiences and suggestions?
fom – fit older men
this girl also be in youtube
http://www.iamlittle.net/?p=89
I don’t understand how sites like Humaniplex.com (look it up) are allowed to stay in operation when the activities the promote are obviously illegal. Maybe I don’t understand the laws pertaining to the Internet and prostitution.
Nice, if people want to watch porn they can go to porn websites. All that stuff just adds clutter.
As an owner of one of the adults sites on Ning and paying Ning each month to keep my site there. I was surprise to get their E-mail. I have worked hard to build up my community on Ning and have spent a lot of money on trying to bring freedom to so many adults that have no were to go to learn about adult lifestyles. Yes, Talkingsexradio.com my not be most people cup of tea but it’s a safe place for people that think out of the box. Not everything labeled adult is porn and some is art and some is expression of how we view our life. It is the home of the Rev Mel Show that airs on Monday night and heights different lifestyles that adults do. It’s a talk show about its ok to have sex, our parents had sex government officials have sex, if they did not then how did we all get here.
My site is about adults having the freedom to adults. Having the FCC and the government controlling what is do in the our homes is outrages on many levels. My site is about freedom to be who are and that is adults. I’m very perplexed on what what Ning is doing here and really don’t know what to do with this. My site is not hurting anyone in fact we are educating adults on how to say safe out there in different types of lifestyles and saying to adults its ok be adults and do adult things. We have a live TV show on Talkingsexradio.com that talks about all sort of different types of adults lifestyles and it had helped alot people that would normally get hurt. Not all adults site are just about porn but because we talk about sex on my show and we have members from different lifestyles joining Talkingsexradio.com We are going to lose our home on Ning.
Being not an expedience webmaster this really has put me in a tail spin. I have been very happy with Ning and there social network program and it pains me to see this happening on many levels.
We as adults have lost a lot of rights and have lost a lot of our freedom when do we stand up and say .. Enough?
Good luck to Ning and sorry
Someone should tell these people who are posting porn and sex related content to go to youporn, instead of youtube. I wonder if the world will ever come to the point when porn is no big deal and it is widely accepted everywhere? Hmm….I will probably be dead before that happens, what a shame…
BTW – TechCrunch – it really sucks that you put those TWO issues in ONE thread. The a) YouTube matter is totally different than the b) Ning matter.
Please report about the newest Ning developments in a separate thread and lets discuss it there. People get too confused otherwise (like Adrian Eden).
Adrian – the big difference is that Ning openly publicized that Porn Ning sites ARE!!!!! ok. They had an agnosic viewpoint and welcomed network creators who did so. This lasted about one and half year.
This is over now. Porn Ning sites are not welcome anymore. 30 days notice! The arguments Nina Bianchini have some good points – agreed – but that Network Creators have a hard time getting “their” content off now is not funny.
Ning still telly you: “You own your content”. But how do you get it off? API hooks are closed. Developers like Widgetlaboratory and Scripts4Ning are gone and there is NO way to download content in an automated way. The only thing you can do is save the member base (with profile questions) as a CVS file. This is an even bigger issue than when they nixed WidgetLaboratory that time.
So please – a new thread, TechCrunch!
fom – fit older men
I am working on a Ning type site, and maybe, just maybe, Adult websites may be allowed, now after hearing about this.
However, there are different sides to the Ning thing. First, I understand with the advertising, but on the other hand, many have worked hard to build up their networks. Long, hard work, for nothing?
http://www.nettags.net
Another thing, TechCrunch. If you would want to do something good for the community besides creating misleading news topics you could post alternatives for those adult network creators. Let’s face it – Ning not only removes pure porn sites but also “vanilla” adult sites like travel sites for gay men which avoided any naked profile photos or contant from day one. No chance for them neither. This shows the whole dilemma. Ning just sent out a message to ALL network creators who have ANY network behind an adult warning. Not only to the mentioned “illegal” or copyright infringing networks. All have to go. Period. THATS the real issue you should discuss.
So what alternatives are there?
a) alternatives to Ning (like SocialGo) Will they allow adult content?
b) alternatives when you want to build your OWN adult social network on your OWN server with your own code or bought framework.
I am very reluctant to trust ANYBODY like socialgo, nettags – whatnot. If you want to go adult you have to control it yourself it seems.
Not?
fom – fit older men
Excuse me, is this illustration to the article an example of what will be deemed as obscene, adult and sexy? Pardon me, but it seems to me it is time for YouTube (and Ning?) to demand that all female characters in videos should wear burqas and hire some unemployed Taleban mullahs as moderators.
Wow people work fast I just found these blog about Ning and that they are booting off web site owners from Ning and they are not giving them any of the code or their content. Wow, how can a company do that.
Here is the Blog that I found
http://ningwhy.wordpress.com/
This is what Ning writes in their TOS
“Subject to this Agreement, as a Network Creator, you control your Social Network and own all of Your Code and Your Content.”
via Ning: About: Terms of Service
The problem is that Ning has changed their APIs. There is no way to get “your content” out of the Ning system anymore. External developers who had solutions to do that have been removed from Ning. Right now network creators only can export member data via an CVS export. Content like videos and photos are stuck in the system for the time being.
Ning is suggesting in this blog post
“As part of this transition, we are exploring ways for adult networks that will no longer be available on Ning to export their content in addition to their members, which is readily available today from the Manage Members page. As we make progress on the specifics, we’ll communicate them in the Ning Help Center.”
Hopefully this problem will be solved bevore January 1st 2009. Otherwise adult network creators have “owned” content but never got a chance to “get” it.
First of all sorry about my last post with all the typos, guess I was really upset about ning closing down all adults social network sites. So many of us have been living and breathing our ability to create a site that deals with adult topics and the freedom to express ourselves like an adult.
When you get up at 9 am and go to sleep at 4 am in the morning everyday because your working creating a site that does a lot of good in helping adults understand alternative adults lifestyles. Then to find out that you have less then 30 days and it’s all going to be gone it would upset anyone.
I have contacted Ning by phone and by e-mail and I have not been able to get any answers on how to get our content and the code so we can try to find some how to keep our site going.
But I did find this on one of the Ning forums.
Reply by Tim 3 minutes ago
The Ning Blog isn’t very specific about what constitutes adult content, so I wrote to request clarification. Their definition in the reply goes way beyond images and videos.
Adult content includes, but isn’t limited to:
· Pornography
· Depictions of sexual acts
· Sexually explicit or obscene themes
The inclusion of sexually-explicit themes is going to hit a lot of networks which aren’t usually dumped into the “adult” category. LGBT networks, HIV/AIDS support and education networks, relationship guidance, art, literature and many more.
oh….that’s bad (just kidding)
Good Night Sexy Videos. Google team don’t love to see you
Maybe Chad got an awaking at YouTube live when ‘whatthebuck’ claimed that these sort of videos were popular and that they made youtube.
http://www.redtube.com, this is a real PornoTube…jejeje…
They could try and move out of the USA so there would be no government interference.
I suggest Somàlia as a new company base, where the only interference comes from sea pirates.
this is a money thing, pure and simple. mainstream ads will bring in bigger bucks, but only if the naughty stuff is nixed.
of course, youtube and ning built their initial audiences thanks to the naughty stuff. see my blog, “today’s internet is brought you by porn” for more on what this really means.
http://blogs.co...om/youtube_porn
cheers,
dt
rSitez (http://www.rsitez.com) is one of the leading white label social networking platform and a competitor to Ning. Because of this we have received a number of questions regarding Ning’s action to shut down its ‘Red Light District’ of adult sites. Questions have been mainly regarding our position on this topic. We have a different approach. Therefore, the following is where we stand on the subject. Check our blog
http://socialsh...h-for-new-home/
Thanks
It is about time!
hmm……..
Hi Erick,
I just wanted to let you know that THEWEEK.com linked to your article today in a piece we wrote titled ‘YouTube’s new sex rules,’ (http://www.thew...s_new_sex_rules). We enjoyed reading your take on this subject.
Thanks, and all the best,
Harold Maass
Editor
THEWEEK.com
2 points
1-youtube deleted my account after I posted a video shot in a gay leather bar. why am I pissed?
this video clip aired on national tv and met all the FCC Rules. My messages to you tube went un answered as to why they were in violation. Sounds like a witch hunt to me.
2- Ning. I have run a site on ning for the past 2 years and paid for services they are shutting me down because we are a gay fetish site. and we fall into their adult content..
They still have not relesed my media/content but just today they said it will happen next week but they dont know how.
their site has gotten a big hit of traffic from our sites, mine alone with over 24,000 members and a daily average of page hits of 110,000 as reported by google tell me that my traffic is helping them.
here is the big kicker that most of you dont know and Im sure that ning will continue to use this info to make money off of us. they are deleting my site but the members accounts will still be in their data base, so MY 24,000 members will add to the total member count for ning. seems like they are still making money off of my network.
So I advise all you ning site owners to have your members delete all ning accounts after you get your data so that they can see the error of their ways.
Just my 2 cents worth
RR
ebay’s biggest profit center comes from their adult auctions section. Its hard as hell to find on the site but it generates alot of dough.
ITs good that they are trying to class itself up.