Hollywood Guns
My main issue is with the use of Copyrighted material.
YT’s systems see that I have used a movie clip in my video and then they flag this. Each copyright holder has a slightly different policy on the use of their clips – Most allow you to use the clips, however all pretty much prevent Youtube from allowing the video to be monetized.
To me this is short sighted on behalf of the Copyright holder.
They obviously know the use of their material is generally good for their brand, because they allow it to be used
But they don’t allow you to make any advertising money from producing the video, or they claim the revenue themselves. Thus, they remove the inventive from creators to use their material….. Very counter productive….
I have seen recently that copywrite holders of music are beginning to change their mindset in regards to this and when the Youtube system finds a soundtrack in a video, usually there is an option to share the revenue. With video clips, this is not an option today.
Therefore the business model of creators like me that use movie clips in their videos has to be based on sponsorships, affiliate marketing, memberships, etc.
I know from my channel comments that thousands of people worldwide see my videos and then comment that they are going to go and rent/buy the movie. So, as I feature older movies, this generates new income for movie studios on very old items in their back catalog. It seems crazy to me that the movie studios would not want to support creators and have them use more of their copyright material if it shines a positive light on this work and generates new sales.
Probably in time, they will realize that the volume of eyeballs looking at youtube/other social media channels deserves investment on their part, but we are not there yet.
The secondary issue which is more in line with your questions, is that many firearms channels get their videos demonetized by Youtube, not because Youtube hates Firearms (and perhaps they do), but at the crux of the matter, Advertisers do not want their brands advertised next to firearms content.
Secondary to this is that several anti-2A pressure groups make a nuisance of themselves and threaten (or do) sue Youtube. This is why Youtube has become more restrictive over the years on firearms content.
The main issues here is are that:
Youtube doesn’t want to be seen as promoting the sale of firearms (a lot of their lawsuits were related to that)
Youtube doesn’t want to be seen as promoting violence or glorifying firearms. (more lawsuits)
So they respond with actions like you detailed in your questions, by de-monetizing the video – I have had that happen to me. One of my sponsors is Gunsinternational.com and one of my videos (that beat the Copyright filter) got demonetized because I put their logo up on screen.
I am part of a group of creators that has a high level Youtube rep, so they then investigated and said that I could mention GunsInternational, just don’t put their logo (and especially the .com) up on screen
How did I get around that? In my recent videos I put a Tshirt with GunsInternatonal’s logo on it in the background of my video and their AI system isn’t able (yet) to detect it.
Another point on this – Since the election, the new administration has given some cover to Youtube and creators. I was told that under the Biden admin, the video that got demonetized would have received a community strike and all the previous videos that I had with the same issue would have been taken down too -perhaps resulting in the loss of the channel. However, now the video just got demonetized and didn’t get taken down.
It is possible that over the next few years we may see youtube change its policies like Meta has on Facebook and Instagram. We are seeing a huge push to reform the ATF and roll back infringements on the 2A right now. As other social media channels pick up more 2A content it seems likely to me that over the next few years Youtube will be less restrictive on Firearms – Not more. (be that through changing government policy, and/or commercial competition)
