> Bonus irony points will be conceded to correctly flagging a Google Project Zero video, or a YouTube security team video, as in violation of the terms of service as stated.

Without reading the ToS too carefully, I'm all but certain academic and industry-leading security work is deliberately carved out. Clearly this rule is designed to disallow liability concerns like a viral "how to see someone else's snapchats!" video, etc...

In the case of the linked tweet, it seems to have also hit a legitimate-seeming-if-not-industry-leading security source as a false positive. And that's bad, and a reason to oppose this policy in general.

But treating this as an "Ah hah! Hypocrisy!" kind of thing is missing the point and not going to help anyone. You know what they're trying to do.

Sadly, this is the moment where the terms of service that do permit such work would have been precisely what we need to counter the direction of the entire post. I hope you or someone are able to discover it and cite it here. (I couldn’t manage to find the terms from my device, but that’s likely more my device’s fault than any. I’ll try again later if I remember, but it might be too late for today’s comment.)

Ok, here we go:

In section 6.E. of the YouTube ToS (https://m.youtube.com/static?template=terms), they say you cannot submit content contrary to the Community Guidelines.

On this page (https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/2801964?hl=en) of the Community Guidelines they say you may not post “Instructional hacking and phishing [content]: Showing users how to bypass secure computer systems or steal user credentials and personal data.”

Interpret that how you will. It seems broad enough to include academic/security work.

Indeed it does. I look forward to their response after the US Holiday tomorrow.

That's probably a great way to get your own Google account banned, and there is no way in hell I'm risking that.

> and there is no way in hell I'm risking that.

Yes. You need to keep a good balance in your social credit.

Self-sensure. Works as designed

Well I suppose he set himself up for that one.

This is a good example of what people do in real life when confronted with change they want vs repercussions.

Compounded by the fact that it was posted by username 'gambiting'.

I'm always curious what people think my username means. I thought of it when I was only starting to learn English at around age 10, and my young brain thought it would be amazing to combine "game" and "biting" (as in, eating games, since I loved playing them). I only discovered the word gambit much later.

this is way off topic, but what the heck. i read your name as doing a gambit, playing a gambit, or something along those lines.

risking your google account by making a report, as you observed, is a gambit :-)

I read it as gam-biting. Seemed nice enough if a bit out there for hn.

At least in real life you get a chance to face your opponent, even if it's a goliath and david mismatched weight-class scenario. An angry mob may be outgunned by the police, but at least they can still throw bricks. What can realistically be done online to hurt Google? Does there exist a digital brick heavy enough for google to even notice you throwing it?

this comment makes me happy having removed gmail from my life.

I dont give a fuck about my google account anymore.

Why do you only have one google account?

Is having multiple (non-company) Google accounts allowed per their TOC?

Since you don't need to verify your true identity, such rule would be totally pointless even if it were there.

For a number of years now you have to give a phone number to make an account. Doesn't need to be a one-to-one mapping, but it still connects the accounts.

It can be evaded by using multiple phone numbers, but if you're working that hard to not be violated by Google then chances are you aren't using Google in the first place.

> For a number of years now you have to give a phone number to make an account. Doesn't need to be a one-to-one mapping, but it still connects the accounts.

Even if the number is required (a sibling comment challenges that), it only connects your accounts if you only have one phone number, or all the phone numbers you have and use for Google accounts are publicly (or privately but through Google) tied to your identity. Otherwise it does not, to Google, connect the accounts.

I thought they keep track of "associated accounts" via IP address, browser cookies, fingerprinting and so on. There have been plenty of instances where innocent Google Acounts have been terminated due to a different account holder's activity on the same machine.

You don’t need a phone number to open a google or gmail account. It asks for it but it’s a skippable step

That hasn't been my experience on a few occasions over the last few years. Guess they changed it.

Nah it still occurs from a desktop browser.

Though I learned it does not ask for one (or is skippable) if you create an account on an android device (I use a tablet for that).

It depends, if you are signing up on a mobile device (say creating an account as part of an Android device setup) it is absolutely required in my direct experience with no way to bypass it.

However if you create a new account via a desktop browser, it's not been required.

it’s not.

for your first account, it is not required. once they think you are opening more than one, or they think you may be a bit, a working non-voip humber is required.

tragedy of the commons.

Does Google have a real life name policy?

I have 3, had them for years. Haven't been struck down by any gods yet.

This will be ineffective. Google whitelists many channels by large organizations and they are sheltered from any such reports. If 200k reports came in on the next Microsoft video posted, someone at YouTube might notice, but the video would never be taken down. You should read (as should everyone else) Eric Schmidt's book 'A New Digital Age'. In it he lies out his view. Basically (and obviously this is my perspective, this is the meaning not the language he uses to sell it), because Google is rich, they are Better. The teeming masses of the unwashed must be yolked by their betters. Left to their own devices, the public would destroy themselves and it is the responsibility of Google and other gigacorps to create culture in order to preserve civilization.

> because Google is rich, they are Better. The teeming masses of the unwashed must be yolked by their betters. Left to their own devices, the public would destroy themselves and it is the responsibility of Google and other gigacorps to create culture in order to preserve civilization

(probably an unpopular opinion, but...) sounds like neoliberalism

Really? It is almost the textbook definition of Conservatism. Not like 'Republicans are conservative', but the political science sort of Conservatism that ruled the world for centuries, the ideology that supports monarchies, dictatorships, theocracies, etc. The belief that the rights of the state (or church or similar) are primary, that some people are 'special' in a way that destines them to lead while the majority are destined to follow because they are constitutionally incapable of anything else. A refutation of that was the meaning of "all men are created equal" in the Declaration of Independence which was the first official codification of Liberalism. Liberalism then conquered the world, but I imagine there's nothing absolute in place that would prevent it from re-emerging.

This is a great strategy when dealing with a corporate entity that isn't actively evil.

I can say from experience this does not work at scale. YouTube has allowed large public accounts to be in blatant violation of the terms of service. They are selectively enforced.

Here are some good candidates: https://www.youtube.com/user/AtGoogleTalks/search?query=secu...

This reminds me of the Charter 77 movement in Czechoslovakia. They protested against the Communist regime by reporting to the it its own violations of its laws and agreements. It was a brilliant way of unveiling the lies of their government. Somehow, this approach is very similar.

It's called selective enforcement.

You can make it a PR issue. Go through reporting and if the videos clearly violate TOS and aren't taken down, point out the double standard to the activist press.

> out the double standard to the activist press.

Except the activist press only cares about their side. If you're censoring anything they don't like or critical of them, they will shower you with praise.

They will actually cheer at Google to ban more. Just wait until a US President, British PM, or other leader they like is in power - they'll beg Google to merge with the government.

Technically you can.

In practice it’s playing the outrage lottery: you can’t complain not winning if you don’t buy into it, but you only have one in a million chance to have your issue blow up to any proportion, and then some more astronomically low chance it leads to anything.

I am still thinking about the Vox presenter Carlos Maza who painstakingly documented and published how youtube didn’t enforce its hate speech rules, gathered 20 000 retweets, got an official youtube account reply to assure they’ll look into it. And nothing (well, some more harrasment and hate speech)

Do you have a link where this is documented? Reports on this seem quite polarized.

It seems to be very polarizing yes. Then Steven Crowder's channel has 4 000 000 subscribers, so someone asking youtube to punish the channel is garanteed to have "strong opinions" facing him.

This is the original tweet series: https://twitter.com/gaywonk/status/1134263774591037441

The final response from the youtube team: https://twitter.com/gaywonk/status/1136056663927087105

What is?

Reporting their own content doesn't matter, because the rules don't apply to them. Ergo, selective enforcement.

asdf21 is implying that your strategy probably won't be effective because YouTube may only enforce this policy selectively (i.e. not on their own parent's content or other powerful entities).

When you "report" videos of large companies, they will likely simply ignore those reports, rendering your outlined tactic futile.

Policies like these are almost always selectively enforced.

can you clarify which options to click on? I dont see a label that best fits this complaint. there are options like terrorism/child abuse/offensive content, etc.

I cannot, sorry.