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How Facebook is Stealing Billions of Views

Kurzgesagt – In a Nutshell

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10M views10 years ago3 recommendations

Web developmentCareers and interviewsInside tech companiesHTTP, REST and GraphQLThe tech industry

Kurzgesagt explains how Facebook inflated its video view counts and allowed freebooting, harming independent creators by hosting stolen YouTube content.

Facebook just announced 8 billion video views per day. This number is made out of lies, cheating and worst of all: theft. All of this is wildly known but the media giant Facebook is pretending everything is fine, while damaging independent creators in the process. How does this work? Hank Greens Article: medium.com/@hankgreen/theft-lies-and-facebook-video-656b0ffe… Video by Smartereveryday: youtube.com/watch?v=L6A1Lt0kvMA Video about Youtube content ID by YMS: youtube.com/watch?v=nuTHhtCyzLg SOURCES & FURTHER READING ▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀ theverge.com/2015/3/31/8312987/please-dont-share-tyrese-gibs… mashable.com/2015/07/08/facebook-video-theft-problem/#fpVrTq… broadmark.de/allgemein/facebook-erreicht-8-milliarden-videoa…? mashable.com/2015/09/01/facebook-could-soon-start-to-crack-d… de.slideshare.net/socialogilvy/the-rise-of-multiplatform-vid… youtube.com/watch?v=dLqCz5xBwGk slate.com/articles/technology/technology/2015/07/freebooting… mic.com/articles/123368/facebook-video-vs-youtube mashable.com/2015/07/08/facebook-video-theft-problem/#fpVrTq… media.fb.com/2015/08/27/an-update-on-video-management-on-fac… OUR CHANNELS ▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀ German Channel: kgs.link/youtubeDE Spanish Channel: kgs.link/youtubeES HOW CAN YOU SUPPORT US? ▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀ This is how we make our living and it would be a pleasure if you support us! Get Merch designed with ❤ from kgs.link/shop Join the Patreon Bird Army 🐧 kgs.link/patreon DISCUSSIONS & SOCIAL MEDIA ▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀ Reddit: kgs.link/reddit Instagram: kgs.link/instagram Twitter: kgs.link/twitter Facebook: kgs.link/facebook Discord: kgs.link/discord Newsletter: kgs.link/newsletter OUR VOICE ▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀ The Kurzgesagt voice is from Steve Taylor: kgs.link/youtube-voice OUR MUSIC ♬♪ ▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀ 700+ minutes of Kurzgesagt Soundtracks by Epic Mountain: Spotify: kgs.link/music-spotify Soundcloud: kgs.link/music-soundcloud Bandcamp: kgs.link/music-bandcamp Youtube: kgs.link/music-youtube Facebook: kgs.link/music-facebook The Soundtrack of this video: soundcloud.com/epicmountain/facebook epicmountainmusic.bandcamp.com/track/facebook epic-mountain.com Help us caption & translate this video! youtube.com/timedtext_cs_panel?c=UCsXVk37bltHxD1rDPwtNM8Q&ta…

Why it's here

3 people recommend this, 3 dispute it

What people say. Recommended as a clear explanation of how Facebook's lack of content protection systems and inflated metrics harmed independent video creators.

rryanon Hacker News • Recommends

On “Content ID and the Rise of the Machines”

While you're right that Google's implementation of Content ID doesn't handle fair use well, Content ID is critical for indie creators. Facebook's lack of protections lead to tons of lost revenue for them (and for indies, it matters!). This video changed my opinion on Content ID when I saw it last year: link to this video
View on Hacker News

sean_patelon Hacker News • Recommends

On “Facebook Overestimated Key Video Metric for Two Years”

"How Facebook is Stealing Billions of Views" - Kurzgesagt – In a Nutshell exposed this with detailed analysis and evidence. Watch it here => link to this video This is neither a bug nor a "mistake". It's straight up fraud. Fraud because Facebook uses these false #s to prove to their advertizing clients that they are getting a HUGE ROI, when they really aren't. Also the investors and analysts bump up their ratings and the stock goes higher and higher on false ad view #s. By counting a view as a legitmate view after the video plays only for 3 seconds, their "algorithm" counted billions of views even when the user has not even seen it, because Auto-play is enabled by default and you have to opt-out / disa…
View on Hacker News

sean_patelon Hacker News • Recommends

On “Facebook Overestimated Key Video Metric for Two Years”

Yes. straight up fraud. "How Facebook is Stealing Billions of Views" - Kurzgesagt – In a Nutshell exposed this with detailed analysis and evidence. Watch it here => link to this video
View on Hacker News

sean_patelon Hacker News • Recommends

On “Facebook’s ad metric problem is becoming Zuckerberg’s headache”

This is not new, and I've spoken about this here before. Facebook used fraudulent methods to artificially inflate their view counts, and pedelled those fake and grossly exagerrated #s for "eyeballs" to the unsuspecting advertizers. "How Facebook is Stealing Billions of Views" - Kurzgesagt – In a Nutshell exposed this with detailed analysis and evidence. Watch it here => link to this video I contracted with their Ad team for a few months, and can't say more for NDA reasons, hence I am pointing you to publicly available media / expose.
View on Hacker News

apexalphaon Hacker News • Recommends

On “EU Copyright: Block Everything, Never Make Mistakes, but Don't Use Upload Filter”

link to this video This does a very good job of explaining how small content creators are practically powerless now on the web in terms of protecting their content being stolen.
View on Hacker News

apexalphaon Hacker News • Recommends

On “European Parliament approves copyright reform”

A lot of European media sees their content stolen and re-uploaded by anonymous users on YT, FB, etc... FB in particular have not responded to this and thus content creators lose a lot of views and money. This video sums it up nicely: link to this video
View on Hacker News

pen2lon Hacker News • Disputes

On “A letter to our daughter”

Consider as well that Facebook steals money from content creators who really need the money . See link & link to this video Also, the idea of having Facebook at the cost of giving up your privacy to this behemoth, and more importantly, at the cost of this company exploiting your cognitive biases to get you to buy things hardly seems conducive to a spirit of bettering the world.
View on Hacker News

pdkl95on Hacker News • Disputes

On “Facebook ad click numbers are inconsistent with other analytics”

Facebook has a history of fraud in their other services. Veritasium fell victim to FB's scams as a publisher a couple years ago1. I know first-hand that Facebook's advertising model is deeply flawed. When I paid to promote my page I gained 80,000 followers in developing countries who didn't care about Veritasium (but I wasn't aware of this at the time). They drove my reach and engagement numbers down, basically rendering the page useless. They also have a history of encouraging video fraud23. 1 link 2 link 3 link to this video
View on Hacker News

sly_foxxon Hacker News • Disputes

On “Facebook Climbs to 1.59B Users, Beats Q4 Estimates with $5.8B Revenue”

Facebook is the biggest scam for most businesses. 1) They've pulled bait and switch when they decided to charge to reach users that have already liked your page. Most of those users liked your page because you've posted a link to FB on your site. 2) Click fraud is rampant 1 3) They make money on copyrighted videos + ripping off YouTube content creators 2 1 link 2 link to this video
View on Hacker News

u/Cono52in r/haskell • Mentions

On “Made some 4k wallpapers for you haskellers.”

Since some seem to like them I leave for now however in future I will carry out rigorous searches into the licensing of such images if I ever decide to make a desktop wallpaper ever again :|. Here is a youtube link showing some of the effects that are caused by people ignoring licenses link to this video
4View on Reddit

rryanon Hacker News • Mentions

On “Content ID and the Rise of the Machines”

This video claims that Facebook's lack of a content ID system is harmful to individual / small content creators as their videos are copied and go viral with no compensation to the content creator. link to this video The video paints Google and content ID in a very positive light. If what you're saying is true, where does this video go wrong?
View on Hacker News

rryanon Hacker News • Mentions

On “Content ID and the Rise of the Machines”

What do people think of this video? link to this video IMO Content ID is essential for a healthy video creator ecosystem. Google's implementation may give the big media companies too much power, but for indie creators it is crucial. Facebook, on the other hand, seems to not care about video piracy at all and as a result small creators suffer.
View on Hacker News

gthtjtkton Hacker News • Mentions

On “Facebook Says It Found More Miscalculated Metrics”

That reminds me, did they ever address the Click Farm problem that was essentially rendering likes and views worthless for many advertisers? link Or the rampant Freebooting? link to this video
View on Hacker News

Veratyron Hacker News • Mentions

On “Facebook Will Introduce Ads as Videos Start, a Move Long Resisted”

It's also rich, considering video creators have been pissed at Facebook for doing nothing about people stealing their videos: link to this video
View on Hacker News

apexalphaon Hacker News • Mentions

On “The EU Copyright Directive: What Redditors in Europe Need to Know”

Guys this is meant for platforms that continuously allow users to upload fully copyrighted stuff, offer no good takedown and just point to the users when asked. "We're a platform so the user is responsible". Thousand, maybe millions, of Youtube videos by small channels are re-uploaded to FB everyday and essentially stolen. Watch this, for example: link to this video This law just says: ehm no Facebook, you ARE responsible for this, and you can't just say 'talk to the user / page who stole it'. The way Reddit and others interpret it is just because they don't want to be legally beholden to laws that protect people smaller than they are. And they're calling it a 'ban on memes' to get people online to pro…
View on Hacker News