WQYU – Blog

I am deciding to share my story publicly in the hopes that if other people are going through the same thing on YouTube this is to let you know that you are not going through this alone, it is happening to other people and I hope more people decide to come forward and share their story publicly so YouTube can no longer ignore the problem. We must put a stop to this, or we will get to the point creativity won’t exist on YouTube and other platforms.

Friday, January 15, 2021

I uploaded a press conference of Donald J. Trump at the time he was the the 45th President of the United States speaking to cameras at a press conference. Four days later which would be Tuesday, January 19, 2021 my video was removed claiming that it had violated YouTube’s Community Guidelines citing “Violent Criminal Organizations”.

Wednesday, January 20, 2021

On Inauguration Day, upon I signing onto YouTube and greeted with a message that says “Your constant was removed due to a violation of our community guidelines. Your channel now has one strike. You won’t be able to do things like upload, post, live stream for one week. A second strike will prevent you from publishing contact for two weeks.” So I click on the blue button that says “Review content” and the video was removed is the video that I had uploaded on Friday, four days earlier. After reviewing the community guidelines and the video just to confirm that my video did not violate YouTube’s community guidelines. I submit an appeal and within maybe an hour to two hours I get a response via email saying that my appeal has been rejected and YouTube is uploading there decision on not to reinstate my video. I knew for a fact at this video does not violate YouTube’s community guidelines especially for what they are citing it for “Violent Criminal Organizations”.

The next days and now months that follow

I decided to try to contact YouTube via email; I had remembered that I was part of the YouTube Partner Program before YouTube changed the threshold and before this I had reached out to YouTube once before so I thought why not give this a try to see where this will get me.

In my first email I basically said that one of my videos was wrongfully removed because nowhere in the video does it contain violent criminal organizations, this is a press conference of the 44th President of the United States. This is a gross error in the removal of this video.

On or about 24 hours later I received a response from a YouTube employee saying that they need my channel URL in order to investigate this, so I provide them my channel URL i.e. YouTube.com/xyz or YouTube.com/c/xyz (for newer accounts).

On or about 24 hours later I receive a response from a YouTube employee saying that my video was carefully reviewed and that they have decided to uphold their decision by not reinstating the video and removing the strike as it does violate YouTube’s community guidelines.

I then respond back to the email and I say please provide a timestamp of where the alleged violation occurs as a video that I have uploaded does not violate YouTube community guidelines especially for what you are claiming “violent criminal organizations“. I further go in to say that what you see in the video shows the 45th President of the United States arriving via his motorcade, then the president gets out, shakes a few hands, then the president walks over to the border wall sign’s his name with a marker before walking onto the stage in order to make a speech. After his speech he gets off stage shakes a few more hands before getting into his motorcade and departing.

The next day I get a response on or about 24 hours later and they say they understand that I want my video to be reinstated and the strike cleared but the team (referring to the reviewer’s) has decided that it violated YouTube’s community guidelines. In the response the representative also says they are not able to provide me with a timestamp that I have asked for.

I then replied back to the email which I say that nobody review the video because if that was true it would have been extremely obvious that the video does not violate YouTube community guidelines citing “Violent Criminal Organizations”.I then asked them again to please provide a kind stamp of where the alleged violation occurs so that way I can review the alleged violation or provide a clarification if needed.

On or about 24 hours later I received a response that basically says the exact same thing as the previous emails as before, so this time I wanted to show YouTube that the video that was removed can also be found on three separate YouTube channels and yet they were not taken down, nor where they age restricted if they truly violated YouTube community guidelines. I also ask again to provide a timestamp of where the alleged violation occurs.

On or about 24 hours later I get a response from a YouTube employee pretty much the same thing as what was said in the previous emails. So this time I make a side-by-side comparison showing my video that was wrongfully taken down on the left in a video showing the exact same press conference that is still online on the right side and I played them side-by-side with a one or two second delay. I then upload this to a third-party website and then send them the video link telling them that my video is exactly the same and that this video was wrongfully taken down. I also provide three links to the same videos as mine and again I say provide a timestamp of where the alleged violation occurs.

On or about 24 hours later I get a response basically saying the same thing that I have been getting in the previous emails. It seems to me that no matter what I have said it seems that are just ignoring evidence as if they do not care. So I ask the following: why are you ignoring evidence? I also said that I have reviewed the YouTube’s community guidelines and the video that I uploaded and I have confirmed that the video that I uploaded does not violated YouTube community guidelines citing violent criminal organizations.

If my video allegedly violates YouTube community guidelines citing violent criminal organizations then it should be no issue in providing a timestamp of where the alleged violation occurs. If my video allegedly violates YouTube community guidelines than how come the same video that I have specifically mentioned why are they still publicly available on YouTube?

On or about 24 hours later I get a response from a YouTube employee pretty much the same thing as what was said in the previous emails, this time I do not say anything, I try to reach out to YouTube via Twitter.

At this point I then attempt to reach out @TeamYouTube to see if I would be able to get anywhere with @TeamYouTube. You can read the tweets as I have included the tweets below as I do not see a point to repost all of the tweets. Read the first tweet at https://twitter.com/wqyu/status/1358174247139631108.

While I was communicating through Twitter starting on February 6 though February 19, 2021, I did not send any emails to see what would happen on Twitter. When someone on @TeamYouTube they say “After a careful review, our team has decided not to reinstate your video bc it has violated our Community Guidelines”., if that was true, they would have seen that the Video does not violate the community guidelines.

After an unsuccessful attempt to get someone to actually review the video that I uploaded to YouTube that I know for a fact does not violate YouTube community guidelines I log into Gmail ready to send yet another email demanding that they provide a timestamp of where the alleged violation occurs. I see an email that is with the title “Re: [X-XXXXXXXXXXXXX]” coming from YouTube. (X represents a series of numbers, as this appears to be a ticket number.)

In the email it basically says that somebody else will now be taking over the case on behalf of the previous person. In the email it says that when videos don’t violate YouTube community guidelines we do not take videos down.

I then replied to the email by saying that I have provided at least three videos showing the exact same press conference that I had uploaded yet they are still online, I also did a side-by-side comparison showing that my video is exactly the same. I say why are you intentionally ignoring evidence? Why are you intentionally ignoring proof? The video that I uploaded does not violate YouTube community guidelines, this is not my personal opinion this is fact why are you ignoring facts? If the video does violate YouTube community guidelines as you claim then it should be no problem in providing a timestamp of where the ad violation occurs. I told you I have confirmed that this video does not violate YouTube community guidelines audio or visually.

If you cannot provide a timestamp of where the alleged violation occurs then that means that the video I uploaded does not violate YouTube community guidelines therefore no violation exist.

On or about 24 hours later I received a response that says I don’t want you to think that we are ignoring evidence, we will have somebody look into this we will get back to you when we hear anything.

As of Wednesday, March 3, 2021 no more e-mails have been sent as I am currently waiting to hear back from YouTube as stated in the email, we would get back to you when something is heard.

My views

After an unsuccessful attempt to get someone to actually review the video that I uploaded to YouTube that I know for a fact does not violate YouTube community guidelines I log into Gmail ready to send yet another email demanding that they provide a timestamp of where the alleged violation occurs. I see an email that is with the title “Re: [X-XXXXXXXXXXXXX]” coming from YouTube. (X represent a series of numbers, as this what appears to be a ticket number.)

In the email it basically says that somebody else will now be taking over the case on behalf of the previous person. In the email it says that when videos don’t violate YouTube community guidelines we do not take videos down.

I then replied to the email by saying that I have provided at least three videos showing the exact same press conference that I had uploaded yet they are still online, I also did a side-by-side comparison showing that my video is exactly the same. I say why are you intentionally ignoring evidence? Why are you intentionally ignoring proof? The video that I uploaded does not violate YouTube community guidelines, this is not my personal opinion this is fact why are you ignoring facts? If the video does violate YouTube community guidelines as you claim then it should be no problem in providing a timestamp of where the ad violation occurs. I told you I have confirmed that this video does not violate YouTube community guidelines audio or visually.

If you cannot provide a timestamp of where the alleged violation occurs then that means that the video I uploaded does not violate YouTube community guidelines therefore no violation exist.

On or about 24 hours later I received a response that says I don’t want you to think that we are ignoring evidence, we will have somebody look into this we will get back to you when we hear anything.

No further emails have been sent and this is where it currently is now.