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Windows is dangerous and harmful, YouTube says so

YouTube has some pretty strict community guidelines and anyone who transgresses those guidelines is in for some pretty severe censure.

In fact, if you're silly or unfortunate enough to breach those guidelines three times in any 90 day period and your YouTube channels will be lost forever. What's more, you'll be forbidden from ever starting a new channel for eternity.

The doors to the kingdom of YouTube creatorship will be locked to you forever.

With this in mind, those of us who have a YouTube channel or two are constantly on tenterhooks, making sure we don't purposely or accidentally stumble across the line of acceptable content, lest we be cast out of that kingdom, doomed to walk the earth in the darkness of places like Rumble or Odysee.

However, with the advent of AI-based moderation, an increasing number of innocent souls are being falsely accused of the most horrific violations of those community guidelines for the most innocent of content.

A great example of this are the growing number of channels that have been receiving community guideline strikes for making videos about Windows 11.

What could be wrong with that, I hear you ask.

Well several channels have already been struck for such videos and their appeals have been roundly denied by the YouTube AI overlords.

What was their crime? How did those videos violate the sacred rules of the platform?

Well one video was from the popular and highly respected channel Britec09 and here's his video explaining the situation:

Just a glitch in the AI perhaps? A never to be repeated anomoly that flagged this harmless video as anything but?

You'd be tempted to think so but then this channel also got hit for a very similar reason and with a similar outcome:

Clearly, something is very wrong with YouTube and its AI channel-asassins.

How on earth can these videos constitute "harmful or dangerous content", as alleged by YouTube?

Is there some deal now in place between Microsoft and YouTube which allows the software company to strike any videos that might show users how to either install Windows 11 on non-compliant hardware or without the hassle of setting up a Microsoft account?

One could perhaps understand that -- but to allege that those videos are "harmful or dangerous" is utter BS. The only harm or danger may be to Microsoft's attempts to force users into junking their older hardware or avoid the waste of time and energy associated with creating an account that will never be used again once Windows 11 has been installed.

The irony of all this is that while YouTube "makes shirt up" about videos that pose no threat to man nor beast, it also continues to totally ignore the endless stream of scam ads that run on the platform. Those "seven second health hacks" that claim to fix diabetes, macular degeneration and dementia, promise limitless free energy from secret plans or try to flog you scientifically impossible fully self-contained air conditioners that can cool an entire room by 12 degrees C in minutes using only a USB-C power source are in almost every ad-break. All of these ads fall foul of YouTube's "scams or misleading information" rule -- but apparently that doesn't count if you're paying YouTube for the privilege of scamming people.

Interestingly enough, I queried Google Gemini about the situation and it felt strongly that a class-action lawsuit against YouTube by those who have been scammed out of their hard-earned cash by ads on the platform would likely succeed -- given that those ads appear to continue running for weeks after they are reported as scams. Apparently the fact that if a user-uploaded video is reported as being scammy or deceptive it gets removed within minutes of that report being received sets the benchmark for "reasonable time" to respond to any complaints of scammy behaviour, including ads.

Right now YouTube is digging its way into trouble. Creators are unhappy, viewers are unhappy and the platform is repositioning itself into the market currently dominated by Netflix, Disney+ and the like. Instead of being "the world's largest user-generated content VOD streaming platform" with insurmountable dominance, it will become "just another VOD streaming platform" due to its abandoning the creators who made it great and instead encouraging the production of AI-slop and repurposed broadcast TV content. It will soon discover that instead of "owning" its former market it will be competing with some very large and well-funded competitors for a share or their market.

Meanwhile, the people that made YouTube great in the first place are busy building new platforms and networks of servers. Once the great unwashed masses tire of AI-slop and the same old repurposed broadcast material, they'll abandon YouTube and once again seek out the genuine, authentic content that made YouTube great. Sadly for YouTube, by the time they realise what they lost, it will be too late.

We have already passed peak YouTube and the decline is gathering momentum, spurred on by the platform's contempt for the needs and wants of both creators and viewers.

Carpe Diem folks!

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