The Logan Paul / Suicide Forest debacle

I just noticed the typo in the title how did I not pick up on "Logal" for like 5 days

Aliencommander1245 said:

I think there's kind of a difference because the demonetisation is purely algorithm based, rather than having human eyes attached to it. I'm not sure if pewdiepie doesn't know this or is saying that because he wants to play it up more as a victimisation thing. I mean, obviously there is a double standard because he got hit with more punishment than logan paul did despite logan paul breaking community guidelines way harder than he did (Although I wouldn't really say either of them can claim one did something objectively worse than the other)

Click to expand...

Oh, I didn't know that - might have gotten it mixed up but I just remembered hearing something like that in passing in one of his (non-serious) videos. Isn't there a way for YouTube to manually demonetize videos though? I've heard a few YouTubers complain about it in ways that seem like they were definitely targeted for specific things said. Philip DeFranco said the last time he criticized YouTube and called them out for fucking up, his video was demonetized but I guess it's possible he just said something else in the video that happened to raise flags.

With all the criticisms lately, YouTube actually decided to take further actions against Logan though - I think his movie(?) has been cancelled/put on hold, and he is no longer in the Google Preferred program so he'll be making quite a bit less money than he did before.

Esper said:

I can see your point. I take a more cynical approach when truck loads of money get involved in something that used to be for free / made for fun / less business-y. Though I think crowd sourcing is a much better way of integrating money and content and much less likely to have the same problems that Youtube has (though it has its own problems, of course).

Click to expand...

Yeah, more and more creators are turning to sites like Patreon for funding because they're tired of YouTube's bullshit and trying to figure out exactly what they want from them, what will get demonetized, etc. Although it's cool creators can make money off of it, that aspect definitely also seems to have created a lot of frustration, so I get the cynicism.

Juno said:

Oh, I didn't know that - might have gotten it mixed up but I just remembered hearing something like that in passing in one of his (non-serious) videos. Isn't there a way for YouTube to manually demonetize videos though? I've heard a few YouTubers complain about it in ways that seem like they were definitely targeted for specific things said. Philip DeFranco said the last time he criticized YouTube and called them out for ****ing up, his video was demonetized but I guess it's possible he just said something else in the video that happened to raise flags.

Click to expand...

So basically, after youtube got into huge advertiser trouble for running ads on things like the channels of neo-nazis they updated their machine learning algorithm in an attempt to make sure ads never run on anything "not advertiser friendly" what exactly that means has never been explained and is fairly cryptic to try and decipher. Because of this, huge amounts of videos are being hit with "we're not running ads on this" strikes effectively the instant they're uploaded. In the process of appealing this youtube makes it sound like they have a real person review the video, but in reality it seems like it's just another, different algorithm that can usually fix the mistakes of the first, but it takes so long a lot of people who earn their living through youtube have already lost a huge chunk of the money they would've earned (because most people who were going to view it have already viewed it)

This isn't a problem for giant channels like logan paul ect who have their channel's ad space auctioned off specifically by google through the google preferred program, but basically anyone outside of that program has had their income slashed hugely.

Youtube's algorithm does scan the content of videos (as well as the video's tags and descripton) to determine whether they're ad friendly, but it's not really capable of or interested in "silencing" people or anything, speaking out against youtube isn't something that can get you demonetised.

However, they've also rolled out a thing where you have to have something like 10k subscribers to put links to places where people can give you money into your video description, which feels like an incredibly overt attempt to stop smaller channels from using patreon and other crowdfunding sources to stabilise their income as the ad revenue is slashed massively

Juno said:

With all the criticisms lately, YouTube actually decided to take further actions against Logan though - I think his movie(?) has been cancelled/put on hold, and he is no longer in the Google Preferred program so he'll be making quite a bit less money than he did before.

Click to expand...

Yeah, youtube has removed him from a "comedy" show he was part of, and put his own show/movie on hold as well as removed him from the preferred program. It's still kind of sad that he's getting the same response any outrage would, rather than having the rules of youtube actually apply to him (he hasn't been hit with a strike or anything despite breaking the community guidelines) but i'm glad he's getting some kind of actual punishment.

gimmepie said:

So, I don't know much about the situation, but for this to actually be making him more popular... what would you say it says about global culture atm?

Click to expand...

It says that most people care more about getting entertained through vapid shock value while having basic human decency and being wholesome are traits that go neglected.

Thankfully, I hadn't heard of this guy before he made the suicide video. But I'm glad he's being punished by YouTube for what he did, not just using a dead body to get views on YouTube - then faking an apology after being heavily criticised for it - but also for mocking Japanese culture.

What made him think it was a good idea to put that video up for his generally young and impressionable audience? Other than the views, of course. The fact that the video received over 500,000 likes is possibly the most disturbing thing to come out of this.

Hopefully he has his YouTube deleted. Awful human being in my opinion. Deserves all the abuse he gets.

Keiran said:

It says that most people care more about getting entertained through vapid shock value while having basic human decency and being wholesome are traits that go neglected.

Click to expand...

I think this is not a surprise. It's been the case for centuries from the gladiators to public execution.

What's more concerning is that despite consistent efforts, it doesn't seem to be changing. All that's happened is the medium of delivery has shifted to a faster and easier one; now, the Internet.

I have no interest in him or his channel. His fanbase is made up of a demographic that quite frankly isn't the most logical thinking people, and there are a lot of them. Like other fanbases, a large portion of the middle school girls in particular that are subscribed to him are obsessed with him. It matters very little what he does, because he has an army of followers that will follow and watch whatever he puts out, and thus a steady income that's generated from that following. The apology was made not because he was apologetic and sincere, but because he is in a business and needs to do damage control to protect his brand and any opportunities that may present itself in the future. YouTube did a solid job by swiftly removing him as a partner.

Everyone needs to stop talking about him. People are jumping on the Logan Paul hate bandwagon because he exploited a suicide victim for his own popularity. Now, people are trashing on him and making blogs and YouTube videos about him while it's a popular subject to gain popularity for themselves. In a way, that's indirectly exploiting the suicide victim for popularity. Albeit indirect, it's still exploiting a suicide victim and no better than what Logan Paul did.

I appreciate that he realized that he messed up, but it is revolting to make light about the suicide of what must've been a good person. Likewise, it is disgusting to insult one's culture while visiting the country. I have never heard of this guy but I don't think I will watch his vlogs at this point.

His grand comeback tour is tasering dead rats and killing fish, so obviously he's learnt his lesson

I'm going to move this topic to Deep Discussions, an area of POkéCommunity more suited to handle deep or uncomfortable topics. However, I'll let those moderators decide if this is a futile and toxic thread or if it can remain open.

He's another egotistical callous person who got lucky on youtube.

The most hated person in the world, well that's impossible to tell. There are many jerkwads and truly evil people on this planet. As inconsiderate and vulgar as Logan Paul is, he doesn't even scratch the top 100 list.

The fact his channel grew during the controversy should really answer that one for you.

Would imagine the general population saw it on the news, were surprised but never thought about him again after that.

I tend not to label people to viciously, but I would consider him a completely garbage human. The only people surprised by this are people who have never heard of him before. I've seen some of his videos and heard a lot about him, and this type of behavior is right up his alley and I'm not shocked in the slightest that some dumbass like him would behave so horribly.

I don't really give a shit about his apology, but that's because I don't really give a shit about him. Anyone who lacks the basic minimum awareness required to not post a video containing an actual suicide victim is a lost cause that will not get a single ounce of my empathy.

Any artist, entertainer, or person of power that continues their careers after controversy like this is the root of the problem. As vile as it is to simply monetize an apology video, him continuing his career is setting an example for the younger/more impressionable/thoughtless fans who follow him that throwing a half hearted apology is enough to atone for disgusting behavior like-this.

Using Louis CK as a very loose example; he is the only person that's been involved in some sort of scandal/controversy that has done the right thing and stepped away from his platform.