YouTube is trying to bridge the gap between its dedicated Kids app and the regular YouTube for parents with pre-teens and teens.
You Tube announced Wednesday that will launch a new “supervised” beta experience that will feature additional features and settings to regulate the types of content that older children can access on the platform. The content will be restricted based on the selection of one of the three categories. “Explore” will feature videos suitable for children from 9 years old, “Explore more” will put them in a category with videos for children from 13 years old and “Most of YouTube” will show almost everything except age restrictions and topics who may be sensitive to non-adults.
YouTube says it will use a mix of machine learning, human review and user input to evaluate content – a system that has worked spectacularly to YouTube in the past. Apparently trying to get ahead of any problems that arise from his moderation system stuck, the announcement blog stated that YouTube knows “that our systems will make mistakes and continue to evolve over time”.
Obviously, any tool that tries to filter inappropriate content on YouTube is welcome and necessary. But caregivers cannot rely solely on YouTube to take control and guide their children’s experience. We saw how well it worked in the past, on YouTube’s dedicated Kids app – which means, it’s not great.
Part of the problem is that the YouTube platform, like other social media giants, is too big to moderate properly. A wrong turn can send your child to a rabbit hole of conspiracies whether they were looking for them or not. Also, if we’re being honest, teens and pre-teens are likely to find a way to watch whatever content they want to watch, regardless of how child-proof the home computer is.
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That said, creating a middle ground between YouTube Kids and normal YouTube chaos is something. Just don’t count on a perfect moderation system. Even YouTube says that.