Behind the Scenes: YouTube and the FTC

This post might be boring, and the bottom line will likely not affect the Fun With Shorts Patreon. I'm just sharing these thoughts for the curious and those who might find themselves in a similar conundrum. 

YouTube has been found in violation of COPPA, a 20-year-old law intended to protect the privacy of children online. As part of their settlement they are requiring that all content creators mark their channels/videos as either "for kids" or "not for kids." Sounds simple enough, but it's actually very complicated and potentially devastating to many creators. Because, ultimately, the designation "for kids" has nothing to do with the creator's original intent and everything to do with the FTC's definition of what children's content *looks like*. Failure to comply with this completely external and superficial judgment could result in a fine of $42,000 PER VIDEO IN VIOLATION. So this is serious business.

This video is the best and most digestible explanation of the situation I've found, from a LEGO YouTuber named JANGBRiCKS: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qu18mjLhCCM 

My takeaway as regards Fun With Shorts is that I have no choice but to mark my animated and kid/school-related shorts as "for kids," even though NONE of them is actually intended for children, in order to be in compliance with the terms of YouTube's settlement. This will eventually mean no comments, end screens, or subscriber notifications on those videos. Even then, I'll STILL run the risk of running afoul of the algorithm or the judgment of a human investigator. This is true for all creators, but I feel like my content is in a weird sort of limbo where it looks silly and kid-friendly but is generally not. 

I initially thought that I could sidestep this issue by not riffing animated content, or just keeping those videos on another service. But now I see that it will certainly apply to Coronet and Centron school films and safety films, and many many others. Another approach would be to just mark all of my videos as "for kids" and forfeit the ad revenue and connective social features. My revenue is next-to-nothing, but losing the comments and end screens would be a real blow. 

YouTube's new policies don't take effect until January 1,  so I have a little bit of time to figure out what I'm going to do. Regardless of my YouTube situation, I will continue to produce shorts and deliver them to you, my beloved patrons. 

-Josh