
Creators Say They’ve Cracked YouTube’s Monetization Algorithm - colinprince
https://ffwd.medium.com/creators-think-theyve-reverse-engineered-the-p-score-youtube-s-monetization-algorithm-ce64c95a4510
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ImpressiveWebs
The problem with YouTube’s algorithm is that it’s clearly biased towards the
mainstream sources that have high P-Scores.

If Jimmy Kimmel does a monologue about his anti-gun stance, or about a recent
mass shooting, he’s monetized, no problem.

But if an indie YouTuber talks about guns or school shootings, they’re almost
immediately demonetized due to “non advertiser friendly content.”

Independent creators are obviously upset because they are demonetized. But
they are also upset that there is a clear double standard.

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jkoberg
Youtube was way better before it was seen as a way to make a living. People
did stuff just because they loved it.

Now it's a lot of spam. Every channel constantly begs for "patrons", sometimes
for 2 or more minutes at the beginning of a short video. I can't trust any
"creator" to be doing it for any reason other than inserting ads.

I paid $10 a month to Youtube to remove ads, and now this is the state of the
world. It sucks.

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GaryNumanVevo
"Begging" for Patreon subscribers should be more than enough of a red flag for
the state of Youtube Creators. They're resorting to platforms like Patreon
because they have a much clearer estimate for their paychecks, unlike Youtube
where your video can be claimed, demonitized, etc and you instantly lose that
revenue.

This is exactly why content is suffering on the platform, you can't afford to
invest money and time into a video which might be taken down by some Copyright
bot.

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nodesocket
Pretty impressive and amazing besides the late night talk shows and two news
channels, Linus Tech Tips is the highest "p-score" individual channel. Not bad
for a tech centric concept that essentially builds PC gaming rigs.

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calhoun137
One of the key dynamics of the modern era is the result of a conflict between
the old beauracracy on wall street and the rising aristocracy of silicon
valley tech executives. While wall street controls the flow of money, silicon
valley controls the flow of information. The secret algorithms of social media
companies like youtube are their primary source of power, and to control the
algorithm means to have a massive ability to manipulate public opinion and
control the public mind. I believe its only a matter of time until silicon
valley emerges as the victor of the current conflict.

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LegitShady
It's only a matter of time until Facebook and Twitter are regulated or partly
under state control. The battle isn't between Wal Street and silicon valley
it's the existing political structure attempting to rein in but benefit from
them.

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calhoun137
I agree it was a pretty big simplification which ignored the role of the
state. I consider "the existing political structure" to consist of both "wall
st" and "silicon valley" and that these elites are in conflict with each
other.

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microsage
Maybe I'm missing something, but I don't see how this has anything to do with
"cracking" the algorithm, or really with cracking anything.

YouTube openly admits to having a metric for scoring videos, which, of course
they do. Then they accidentally, seemingly, leak the scores of videos. It
turns out that content that is really successful on YouTube has a really high
score. Meaning the score... works.

I suppose there's the question of whether the score is the cause or an effect
of the success of these videos, though it's almost certainly a bit of both,
since that's how virality and feedback loops work.

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Accujack
I think the thing a lot of content creators object to is the lack of equity in
the system and the sieving process that happens to content.

All else being equal, content that can be paired with ads is preferred over
other content to the extent that equal access to the base service is impaired.
IE, Youtube is not a fair place where anyone can upload a video and become a
sort of "star", it's just another extension of the existing Media
corporations, where advertising dollars rule and the standard for what content
is "ok" is based on the complaints of the most easily offended segment of the
population.

