UPDATED 17:10 EDT / DECEMBER 17 2013

NEWS

The fight against spam and users outcry in the YouTube new Google+ commenting system

In recent weeks, YouTube has introduced a new commenting system, based on the platform of Google+. Google decided to give the comments section of the popular video streaming site a makeover, but it wasn’t prepared for the massive backlash from thousands angry users.

Google chose to integrate YouTube comments with Google+, forcing users to login to the social network before leaving their two cents after watching a video. The goal is to make it more social, highlighting those most interesting comments and showing priority users comments written by contacts or friends.

With this integration operation, Google certainly is trying to boost the number of users of its Google+ social network. Indeed, the service created in 2011 has long struggled to attract users as the number of active members was only 190 million last May. But the trend seems to be reversing for Google+ which claimed 300 million users in September.

YouTube has started the new commenting system to stop the increase use of spam messages. The system was introduced in order to improve the quality of discussion among YouTube videos. As per the new system, a user can delete a comment, prohibit a user comment on videos of his YouTube channel, submit each comment to approval before publication for a video or a string and submit comment to each filter: based on a list of approved comments or excluded from a list of banned you configured for spam or words.

Apparently, the Mountain View company is receiving numerous reports relating to spam from users. Google+ takes the liberty to sort incoming comments after their supposed importance. The problem of the new order is that it doesn’t work. New comments appear also to have no character limit and the new system has led to an increase in spam, flaming, and the posting of ASCII art pornography. Google claims to have already put to work to solve the problem.

In addition, many people are unhappy that they must sign up for and be logged into a Google+ account before leaving comments, believing that Google is coercing people into using yet another social media site. Jawed Karim, one of YouTube’s original creators, also took to the comments for the first time in eight years and asked, “Why the fuck do I need a Google+ account to comment on a video?”

“Since we launched the new comments experience on YouTube two weeks ago, we’ve received a lot of feedback from creators on the increase in comment spam,” YouTube said in a blog post. “While the new system dealt with many spam issues that had plagued YouTube comments in the past, it also introduced new opportunities for abuse and shortly after the launch, we saw some users taking advantage of them.”

However, changes that were made with the intention of cleaning up YouTube’s free-for-all comments section has come at a cost. More than 221,620 users have signed a petition on Change.org asking the search giant to reinstate the original YouTube comment section.

Google, to remedy the situation, announces the introduction of three updates – better recognition of malicious links and impersonation attempts, identification of ASCII art detection, and changing the length of the text shown. Soon, Google will introduce most advanced tools for moderation, which allow you to keep track of comments to your videos and intervene promptly in case of need.


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