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Sky News Australia has been suspended from YouTube after a review of old videos

90 points| roenxi | 4 years ago |skynews.com.au | reply

98 comments

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[+] shaicoleman|4 years ago|reply
YouTube spokesperson: “Specifically, we don’t allow content that denies the existence of Covid-19 or that encourages people to use hydroxychloroquine or ivermectin to treat or prevent the virus. We do allow for videos that have sufficient countervailing context, which the violative videos did not provide.”

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2021/aug/01/sky-news-austr...

YouTube is part of the Trusted News Initiative (TNI), which is commited to censor anything that would impede the vaccine rollout, including any early treatments.

https://www.bbc.com/mediacentre/2020/trusted-news-initiative...

[+] rvz|4 years ago|reply
'Trusted News Initiative' 'which is committed to censor anything that would impede the vaccine rollout, including any early treatments.'

Also including censoring the official CDC.gov guidelines because somehow that is 'False Information' according to Facebook. [0]

I don't know about you but I think this initiative is going to give big tech companies the green light to mass sweep and ban anything that moves or crawls against any criticism of their guidelines.

This is just the beginning, with lots of users getting their accounts banned without reason. Oh dear.

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27999720

[+] deadalus|4 years ago|reply
Youtube Alternatives :

Centralized : Dailymotion, Bitchute, Rumble, DTube, Vimeo, Vidlii, DLive, Triller

Decentralized : Odysee(LBRY), Peertube

[+] ekianjo|4 years ago|reply
Odysee is decentralized?
[+] intellirogue|4 years ago|reply
In case anyone doesn't know, Sky News Australia is their Fox News (same owner).
[+] p1necone|4 years ago|reply
For even more context - Rupert Murdoch was actually born in Australia.
[+] ksec|4 years ago|reply
But at the same time Fox News [1] is still on Youtube.

I felt there is something missing in context. Is this something to do with Google paying for AUS News content or some other bad blood going on between the two?

[1] https://www.youtube.com/user/FoxNewsChannel

[+] thinkingemote|4 years ago|reply
It will be interesting to see the range of comments here as Europe and the US wakes up. Assuming it doesn't get flagged.

It appears to me that Australian users are very supportive of this (but I could be wrong) but are there any reasons why, culturally?

Edits: we hear and understand the political reasons. I'm wondering about the cultural reasons. In other cultures around the world, people wouldn't be so supportive of a tech platform banning a news broadcaster.

[+] tonfreed|4 years ago|reply
It's the intellectual class that are going to be generally supportive of this. The same people that are currently telling the people that have lost everything in the lockdowns that they're being selfish protesting.

While I was a little irritated that I was constantly getting their content pushed onto me and autoplayed even though I've blocked the channel, it's disgusting that a Yankee company is effectively playing politics here.

[+] aaron695|4 years ago|reply
Australian's somewhat proudly consider themselves apathetic.

They often don't have strong convictions and if they like something they don't think it through.

When someone headbutted a former Australian Prime Minister, people generally thought it funny. To be fair most Australia thought it funny to call that Prime minister a cunt (The official reason given for the headbutt) even if they voted for his party. Jim Jefferies on the incident - https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=1759051187728612

Generally a physical attack on a ex-leader of the county would be considered serious and a danger to democracy. Here the Ex-Prime Minister's only media recourse was to say the guy was a bad headbutter, he really said this. (The attacker did eventually get 2 months prison)

Overall if the apathy is good or bad is a hard call, it's somewhat anarchistic, but ironically gives those in power more control.

[+] aryonoco|4 years ago|reply
Sky News peddles everything from flat earth conspiracy to vaccine FUD. I blame a lot of the US's problems with polarisation and truth losing its meaning to its culture of cable news talking heads which pander to anything and invite anyone just to prop up their ratings. We in Australia have mostly avoided that, and Murdoch, via Sky News, is intent on changing that. As an Australian, I want Sky News to disappear because its success would bring a kind of politics to Australia that causes harm.
[+] mrcsharp|4 years ago|reply
Horrible news! There's nothing wrong with questioning narratives and this is what Sky News is doing. They questioned the effectiveness of lockdowns and why wouldn't they? Sydney and other parts of NSW have been in lockdown since 23/06 and the case numbers have been either steady or increasing. Today over 230 cases.. A few days ago it was around 170. Isn't it reasonable then to question the lockdown?

Well Youtube says no. Google says no. And apparently many here are ok with an unelected private entity dictating what information they can access and how. And frankly, even if they were elected I wouldn't want them to have such control.

Essentially, an American private company led by un-elected individuals are controlling what Australian individuals can see and hear.

[+] rvz|4 years ago|reply
Well after seeing that Facebook is now censoring links from CDC.gov [0] and now this, it seems that you are going to get banned regardless of whatever the algorithms say about the guidelines. [1][2] You can get banned for no reason other than 'guidelines' and they can edit and alter them ahead of the ban. Good luck trying to appeal this.

This is all fine right?

At this point, it is time to delete your accounts off of these websites.

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27999720

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28003635

[2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28005238

[+] EspadaV9|4 years ago|reply
The lockdowns have been the least locked down lockdowns I've heard of, and they are weeks too late. Queensland has had 6 cases and entered a 3 day hard lockdown with no messing around, and I wouldn't be surprised if it is extended. Lockdowns do work. They stop people mingling and spreading the virus though the community. The videos that Sky News put out are dangerous to the larger community and cause issues like the completely over the top protests that have been happening, and result is further transmission of the disease.
[+] Krisjohn|4 years ago|reply
Wow. Ok. A lot to unpack here.

Sydney's current virus problems are due to a slow, reluctant, partial and piecemeal lockdown. Meanwhile, other states doing a rapid, hard, comprehensive lockdown have far fewer cases, with some that had to deal with infections spreading from Sydney already out of hard lockdown and just keeping an eye on things with masks required for a little extra time.

If Sky Australia is, in fact, using Sydney's disaster to question lockdowns (and your post isn't satire), they absolutely should be de-platformed.

[+] belltaco|4 years ago|reply
>Sydney and other parts of NSW have been in lockdown since 23/06 and the case numbers have been either steady or increasing. Today over 230 cases.. A few days ago it was around 170. Isn't it reasonable then to question the lockdown?

Won't the numbers be way worse without the lockdown?

[+] oliwarner|4 years ago|reply
> ... controlling what Australian individuals can see and hear on YouTube.

FTFY. It's important we remember that Google is exercising its rights to not host certain content and people on its own platform.

This is the Internet. Australians still have access to the Sky News website. There are other third-party video platforms too. This idea that because they're the biggest they have to operate like a public utility is utter nonsense.

[+] undersuit|4 years ago|reply
>Today over 230 cases.

And now let's go to the other side of the world where the "lockdowns don't work" propaganda was shat out as an argument for months:

>29692 new cases for the US on July 31st.

Good job people.

[+] stonith|4 years ago|reply
Excellent news! Now every Australian that visits youtube isn't recommended and suggested hateful rhetoric that contributes to right wing extremism.
[+] hedora|4 years ago|reply
> Essentially, an American private company led by un-elected individuals are controlling what Australian individuals can see and hear.

No sympathy from over here. Australia brought us the plague that is Fox News, and therefore Trump, etc. If starting a shooting war with the land of Murdoch would somehow repair the damage he has personally done, I’d be all for it.

(Edit: To be clear, I don’t have anything against Australia specifically, but Murdoch has done more economic damage and killed more Americans than any foreign aggressor since WWII. Actually invading Australia would be a pointless, but proportional response, aimed at the wrong people. Kind of like the second Iraq war, which was largely brought to us by Fox News.)

[+] refurb|4 years ago|reply
What is with Australia and it’s authoritarian bend? First soldiers are enforcing their covid curfew and now this?

And nothing but support. Seems like some of the authoritarian culture of SE Asia (Singapore, Indonesia, etc) has rubbed off on them? The UK is far more anti-authoritarian.

No doubt any video about a lab source of Covid would have been banned too.

[+] tvphan|4 years ago|reply
YouTube is an American company.
[+] danielmarkbruce|4 years ago|reply
Australians, for whatever reason, don't have the same concern for civil liberties that Americans have. I can't explain why, but as a citizen it's a little troubling.
[+] iratic0|4 years ago|reply
Lying to the public to maintain power, keeps their hands on the government purse. Loss of trust in institutions. Loss of sense of prestige in the traditional tracks, they make up for it by becoming authoritarian to maintain sense of utility.
[+] tiew9Vii|4 years ago|reply
Great news.

I had blocked Sky News from my Youtube account as didn't want to see it's content but was still having Sky News content pushed to me in the app. I suspect because of the recent News Media Bargaining Code https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/News_Media_Bargaining_Code. Now Sky News has gone completely from my feed.

Being Australia and Rupert Murdoch's business, I suspect this won't be the end of it and they'll be some rushed through laws so this never happens again. The News Media Bargaining Code was for propping up Murdoch's businesses after all.

[+] patchtopic|4 years ago|reply

[deleted]

[+] alanfranz|4 years ago|reply
I think this comment misses the point. Should youtube be the arbiter?
[+] refurb|4 years ago|reply
Wow, seems like a pretty extreme approach to block your own internet access.
[+] 0xy|4 years ago|reply
This article uses criticism of lockdowns as evidence of "virus and vaccine misinformation", which is extremely disingenuous.

Criticism of lockdowns is not denialism of the virus or even close to it.

[+] guilhas|4 years ago|reply
Or is it a punishment for accurate reporting?

Joe Biden 'has to be taken out of circulation' after 'rambling about men on the moon' and aliens

https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/other/joe-biden-has-to-be-tak...

Second video

Or is this fake? There is no shame in admitting your president is a loony

[+] gamblor956|4 years ago|reply
Full context: he was talking about how children get their news: if they wanted to find out about if there are men on the moon, etc., would they go to tik tok or newspaper?

So, in other words, the Sky propoganda piece was not accurate reporting.

[+] newbamboo|4 years ago|reply
Well there’s the Streisand effect so this will actually help them more than it hurts. Everybody already hates YouTube, now skynews will get a bump from those who seek out censored books and media. Such people exist. Deplatforming works as well as book burning. It doesn’t.
[+] belltaco|4 years ago|reply
Deplatforming can work. r/fatpeoplehate and other right wing hate subreddits pretty much fizzled out after they went to Voat and couldn't be on the front page of Reddit anymore.
[+] King-Aaron|4 years ago|reply
Well, I guess that's what you get for constantly airing misinformation.
[+] ballerburg9005|4 years ago|reply
That is what you get for airing neutral opinions.

In neutral journalism, all sides are interviewed and given grounds to discuss the matter fairly. You don't for example just interview Arabs when it comes to Israel, you interview all sides. But with Youtube's Covid censorship policy in place, each time a so to speak "Jew" was interviewed, the journalist would receive a strike for it and just be banned after 3 strikes.

That people didn't go out and instantly boycott Youtube for this anti-democratic experiment is ridiculous.

[+] jycr753|4 years ago|reply
They all do.