YouTube’s full of conspiracy videos and fake news stories. To make things worse, those videos are often showcased. That might be changing soon, however.
YouTube has announced it’s investing $25 million into legitimate news organizations all around the world. As for the YouTube’s own news problem, the company is implementing shelves of trusted news content and links to reliable sources across YouTube’s search results, trending tab and homepage.
YouTube’s lending a hand in the fight against fake news
According to a blog post from YouTube, the $25M it’s giving away will create a group of news organizations and media experts that will advise YouTube about new features. The money will additionally be used to expand YouTube’s team that collaborates with new publishers.
Part of the money will be distributed to “news organizations of all types” in the form of grants. The news organizations that win the grants will use their winnings to “build key capabilities, train staff on video best practices, enhance production facilities and develop formats optimized for online video.”
What changes are coming to YouTube to combat conspiracy videos?
YouTube last March revealed it was going to incorporate a new feature for breaking news stories and conspiracy videos that would allow access to credible sources on the subject. It looks like YouTube could be launching this feature soon. The update will implement text boxes with links to sources to reliable source pertaining to the news story being watched. Nationally, the platform will link to fact-checking articles for a small number of videos that deal with topics bombarded with conspiracy claims.
Additionally, YouTube will be highlighting more local news stories.
YouTube is full of misinformation and it’s going to be an extremely hard fight to remove it all. Hopefully, YouTube’s ambition to combat fake news continues to grow and the platform, at the very least, begins to promote outlandish conspiracy videos less frequently.
Go to the YouTube blog if you want to read more about the updates that YouTube has planned.
