- Hello
insiders.
This week we have a special sneak peek
with a very special guest.
Jenny, welcome to the show.
- Thank you.
Thanks for having me.
- You have been working on something
that we've been talking about
in the company for a little while now with great interest.
But this is going to be the first time
I think we've talked about what you're working on
more openly, publicly. - Yeah.
- And I think the audience is gonna be curious
to hear what you've been up to.
- Well, I'm excited to share - Yeah.
- because it's definitely been something
that we've been hearing from creators a lot and
you know, something that we can see as, hopefully,
depending on how creators respond and react to it,
an opportunity for us to do a better job
and chat a little bit more insight into
places where creators need help.
- What have you been up to?
What is this project?
- What is this thing? (both chuckle)
I've been working on a program called
the unlisted video review program.
UVR for short. - Very catchy name.
- So catchy.
So catchy.
It's a small pilot program
where we're helping creators do just as the title describes,
get their unlisted videos reviewed.
- Now interesting, so this--
we currently tell creators
to upload a video, put it as unlisted,
see if the yellow icon comes on.
If it does, then appeal. - Yup.
- But what you're doing is,
is a little more, little different than that.
- It's kind of an addition to that.
- Okay.
- So what we realized was, you know,
you have this kind of workflow
about loading, being able to appeal,
but you don't always get full diagnosis
of your video for why you may run into a yellow icon.
So what we're doing is similar to that workflow.
We are looking at your video from a monetization perspective
as well as from a community guidelines perspective,
making sure you're not gonna run into any age restrictions.
We'll take a look at your video
and actually send it to human reviewers,
so they're able to take a look at that.
Similar to what would happen if you appealed
for your yellow icon. - Wow.
Wow.
Okay, so let me just make sure I understand this.
Currently, the process is you upload it,
you see if the yellow icon comes on, then you appeal.
What you're talking about is you upload it,
you'll get a review from a monetization point of view,
whether the yellow icon will come on or not.
It sounds like you might even get some more
insight as to why. - Yup.
- Then you're also gonna give some
information around whether or not there's anything wrong
for community guidelines, but what about copyright?
You do copyright as well?
- We don't do copyright right now.
So, no copyright, sorry about that.
- So like, have we been doing this
or is this like an idea that we're just starting?
Like what's, where are we at?
- This is an idea that we're just starting.
We've only onboarded a few creators
and we're still iterating on the process
to make sure that we're providing,
you know, guidance, service and seeing if this is something
that the creators want.
And that's actually helpful.
- So how does it, like what have they been telling you,
these handful of them in trying it out?
- So the few that have been trying it out
have definitely been finding the insights helpful.
So not having to appeal.
Not having to go through that process.
And also actually getting some guidance
into what was the cause for that yellow icon.
I mean you might have some general idea
or you've read through the advertiser friendly guidelines
and see, oh, my video does have profanities,
so maybe that's what it was.
But actually being able to say, okay,
you know, your video has a bunch of profanity in it,
here's where there's going to be issues.
That's what creators have found most helpful
from the program so far.
- Wow, so then yeah, so they basically,
if they can understand what were the drivers of the issues,
not only does that help them, I guess, address it
for the video that they were about to publish,
but I guess it also makes them kind of
more successful for subsequent videos
'cause they can kind of calibrate
to what these guidelines really mean.
- Exactly.
And after you kind of submitted a few videos to us,
you've got a better sense of,
oh where am I coming up against the line
and what policies do I really need to kind of dive into
and better understand so that, you know,
I don't run into those issues in the future.
- Okay, so the first thing that comes to mind
is like, wow, that sounds amazing.
The other thing that comes to mind is like,
well wait a minute, we have like 500 hours of video
uploaded every minute. - (sighs) Yeah.
- How are we going to have, like you,
sit down with every creator?
- So, that's why we're a small pilot, so far.
And the other big thing about this too is
we're trying to take learnings from this
and then make them even more scaled in what we find.
So do we see, you know, a lot of creators
are struggling with our profanity policies
and we need to be more clear
or give better guidance to creators beforehand.
And what from this are we learning about
where creators are having the most problems?
- Ah, interesting.
So, not only is it good for
these creators that are in the pilot,
but then it helps us make better policies
and maybe kind of enhance and optimize how we do things.
- Exactly.
- That then that benefits everybody.
- Right.
- So, where are we with this project?
Is this like, are you planning on broadening availability
of it and who's gets-- cause I'm sure
everybody watching this is going to be like, yes please.
- Yeah, so I mean we have some questions, you know,
for your viewers to kind of figure out,
okay, is this something that you would potentially
be interested in and what of this sounds
like a good fit for you?
The other element here is, you know,
would this be something that you'd
be interested in paying for?
'Cause right now it obviously takes a lot of human hours
to make this thing work,
which is, you know, a tough challenge
for us to kind of deal with, so that's why we can't
open up the flood gates for it as of yet,
but we're hoping to get feedback if this is something
that creators would be interested in having.
- Okay, let me preempt the comments right now.
So someone's gonna say, (chuckles)
wait a minute, wait a minute,
I'm going to pay YouTube
to tell me how to navigate this crazy guidelines,
like what the heck is that?
Like, why are they trying to profit
off of my suffering and confusion?
- That's fair.
I mean and I think that the answer to that is, you know,
to your point, 500 hours--
we see so much video content uploaded all times.
We can't necessarily get that in front of a human
as fast as we would like. - Yeah.
- And the extra step of providing that individual diagnosis,
it's an extra layer of support.
So that's where it kind of just premium service comes in.
- That makes sense, I suppose in the long run,
we will try to automate as much of this as we can.
- Absolutely and that's the ultimate goal
is that our systems hit it out of the park every time.
But we understand that right now
there's some things that we still make mistakes on
and we want to make sure that we're learning from that
with each of the channels that are in this program.
- And then I guess on top of that,
like we are working on the new upload flow
like this preflight check, right?
It's not going to be nearly as good as like
a human personally looking at your thing,
but I think a lot of the insights that you guys have
are finding their way into our design
of the pre-flight check kind of upload improvements
that we have kind of coming later this year.
- Exaclty.
- So I guess maybe this program is not meant to be like,
hey, this is the new way to upload at YouTube.
- Right.
- It's more like, this is like the,
the tip of the spear in terms of us kind of improving
the systems. - Exactly.
- We then make it more scalable and free for everybody
through technology, but if you want to participate
- Right.
- and it's worth it for you - Right.
- then you can do that if you--
that might be an option. - Exactly.
- So, what are you talking about?
Is this like how much money? (chuckles)
How much does it cost?
- So, we don't know yet.
This is kind of like, is this something
that creators would want to pay for?
I think that's more of a question that we're at right now
in figuring out, you know, if this is something that
the creators would be willing to spend money on,
but we don't have an exact number yet.
- Interesting, yeah.
My guess and you know folks out there,
please leave in the comments what you think.
My guess is that
if someone's making a decent amount of money on YouTube,
that there's probably a number where
this makes sense for them. - Yup.
- Where it's like, you know what,
just having more certainty
and reducing the likelihood of being,
of getting, like finding out about demonetization too late.
Cause sometimes when you do the unlisted,
it catches it a lot of times, but some it doesn't.
I'm guessing you guys would maybe do more diagnosis.
- Exactly.
Yup.
And making sure that, you know, we've come through
and looked at it from all angles
so that you know, it would be pretty unlikely
that you would see any change in that rating down the road.
- Interesting.
- Yeah. - What other,
do you have any other questions that you're curious about
that you want to get the insider nations feedback on?
- Yeah, I mean I think the other question would be,
what types of creators that are out there
that are interested in this?
We talked a little bit about, you know, yellow icon, but
we're also helping with age restrictions and strikes.
And so, in that respect, you know
we're checking and looking at your thumbnail
to make sure that it wouldn't run into any issues like that.
So, things like that.
What items would you be interested in seeing
in a program like this
that takes a look at your unlisted videos
and any, you know, thoughts on that would be super helpful.
- Awesome.
Well I think people will be really interested
in giving feedback on this one.
And so definitely leave them in the comments
cause you will read the comments for this video?
- Yes, absolutely. - Awesome.
Well thank you, Jenny, for sharing.
I think what you're doing is super exciting
and even for the creators that don't participate
in this program, have no fear.
Because I know my team that's working on a new upload
for pre-flight check is working very closely with your team
to try and automate as much of that as possible
so that it can be broadly available.
- Absolutely.
- But I know what you guys are doing is kind of at the
the state of the art, so very excited to see
how that project evolves and grows
and maybe we'll get you back on the show
to give us an update as time goes on.
- That'd be great.
- Cool. - Awesome.
- Keep it real.
- Thanks everyone.
- Hello, insiders.
Hope you found this discussion I had with Jenny interesting.
I wanted to clarify some important criteria about the pilot.
First is, it takes human reviewers up to six hours
during business hours to actually do the review.
Second, is that at the moment, there's no weekend support.
Third, the pilot is currently English only.
And fourth, the creators chosen for the initial pilot
were folks who frequently bump up against our policies
and see yellow icons often.
We're not expanding the program at this time,
but we will circle back with the C.I. nation as soon as
we have more information to share.
Keep it real.