Thursday, 29 August 2019

Infowars relaunches YouTube channel one day after Susan Wojcicki takes action to reduce extremist content

Infowars' “War Room” created a brand-new hate channel on YouTube exactly one day after chief executive Susan Wojcicki's letter to content creators about reducing extremist content. YouTube deleted Alex Jones's all-new garbage channel shortly after receiving reports of its relaunch from VICE.

Yes, they're nuts. All the Infowars guys. This fluoride thing is *literally* from the “Dr. Strangelove” script, that's how old the right-wing macho conspiracy chestnuts they're pushing are.

YouTube has been taking more publicly visible action of late to stamp out hate content that the Google-owned video hosting company recommends via algorithm.

Reporting by Matthew Gault at VICE:

Infowars returned to YouTube today after YouTube's CEO, Susan Wojcicki, invited "offensive" content back onto the site. On Tuesday, Wojcicki published a letter to YouTube’s creators on the company's official blog. “Without an open system, diverse and authentic voices have trouble breaking through,” she wrote. “I believe preserving an open platform is more important than ever.”

The next day, the War Room—Infowars’ program for afternoon commuters—relaunched its YouTube channel. The first video uploaded to the new channel has been up for 17 hours. It shows War Room host Owen Shroyer reading a portion of Wojcicki letters in a video titled “Breaking! YouTube CEO says ‘Alex Jones’ and ‘Infowars Ban Is Over.’” Wojcicki didn't mention Infowars in her letter, but this is how Shroyer apparently interpreted it. Since going live, War Room has uploaded 13 videos covering topics typical to Infowars, like “liberal racism,” the end of “globalism,” and how Lizzo’s performance at the VMAs was “disgusting.”

Shortly after VICE published their story, YouTube deleted Infowars' War Room channel.

“We’re committed to preserving openness and balancing it with our responsibility to protect our community," YouTube spokesperson Ivy Choi told VICE. "This means taking action against channels that continue to violate our policies.”

Infowars Returns to YouTube After CEO Said It Will Allow ‘Offensive’ Content [Updated]

[via techmeme.com, image: Screengrab from Infowars]