Will you be participating in the YouTube blackout starting August 13th?
Yes
No
I don't watch YouTube anyway
The what?
Voting ended onAug 17, 2025
For those who don't know, YouTube will be adding AI age verification for US-based users starting August 13th. This will attempt to use "the types of videos a user is searching for, the categories of videos they have watched, or the longevity of the account," to determine their age, regardless of what birthdate they have entered. If an adult is incorrectly determined to be a child, they will need to give YouTube a government-issued ID or a credit card to verify their age. As with many such things, YouTube claims it is for the children's safety. Obviously, I am all for protecting children, and I don't want them to be exposed to things they shouldn't see, but this is most likely more about data collection. Even if it was about children's safety, this was the logic used for creating YouTube Kids, and we can all see how "safe" that is.
If you don't want to directly send your driver's license to Google, you'll need to deal with "age appropriate product experiences and protections," such as "digital wellbeing tools" and disabling personalized ads. The second part is because in the US, it is illegal to collect certain information about people under the age of 13. Now, the people at Google (which owns YouTube) love collecting information about their users, but they don't want to get in trouble, and they believe AI moderation is the answer. Not only can the AI work around the clock, but if anything goes wrong, they can say it was the machine that made the mistake, not them. And, as with any moderation, there will be mistakes (again, look at YouTube Kids).
Because of this, creators and viewers alike are planning to stop using the site starting on August 13th. I personally doubt YouTube will care much, at least at first, but if they lose enough ad revenue, they might reconsider their decision. YouTube says they'll be rolling this out to a small test group first, so it might not affect you right away, but if nothing is done, it will soon. If you're an American who uses YouTube regularly, I encourage you to join, whether just for a day, or as long as it takes. And if you have kids, please teach them internet safety and monitor their internet access so that companies can't make this garbage excuse anymore.
If you have the YouTube viewing habits of a teenager — watch out.
For those who aren't aware, UK/Canada/Australia are pushing anti-pornography, whorephobia and increased internet surveillance really hard right now because the US opened the doors for that.
Sex workers in particular tried and are still trying very hard to fight this shit by the US government (with SESTA/FOSTA and currently with KOSA, SCREEN, and IODA) but this is exactly why they've been sounding the alarm.
Settler colonies in particular are desperately trying to thrust themselves as far into fascism as possible and all they need is one of them to make a big enough move to open the doors and make an example for the rest of them to further that goal. (Much like the UK and transphobia!)
This is why, in order to successfully keep up with the issue of payment processors trying to control what you're allowed to buy and censoring porn, sex work, and LGBTQ+ people in general, you also want to be keeping an eye on different bills, organizations and settler colonies.
(And keep in mind how they use their power as settler colonies to push colonies and even "ex" colonies into doing it first and/or following their lead!)
It's actually the US/UK governments in particular that have pushed payment processors into believing they could so blatantly and easily censor and control people's payments. So targeting them hard is a good idea.
Especially if you live in any of those places and have the opportunity to make calls, go to protests, organize, spread information, etc, do it! Not just for the mastercard stuff but for whatever fascist bullshit you can.
The script to oppose KOSA (the Kids Online Safety Act) is now officially on https://5calls.org/. Call if you wanna kill KOSA again! It's a must if you don't want age verification in the US!
Okay, so here’s the updated plans for fighting against youtube's new ai age policy and privacy violating rule (I believe in us!)
Plan 1. Black out and leave youtube/ youtube boycott (August 13 to the point where the policy is gone)
It’s a very simple plan, but this time we just leave until it’s fully reversed. That way YouTube doesn’t just ignore us and the original black out. We have to stand our ground and show them we aren’t going to give up. We have to last as long as possible and let their revenue drain until they concede or someone else comes in and makes another platform (that isn’t based on politics but the same ideas as the original YouTube)
Plus I would like to add some small extra things that will help with the blackout though. That being mass downloading YouTube content. Now this might be the easiest thing for certain people, but it’s something.
Mass downloading YouTube content can help in case there a couple of videos or channels you want to watch during the blackout.
(I use something called a ytdlp but there might be better options for you out there, there might even be built in ones in a web browser or two, just search around the place, you'll find it eventually)
Forget what I said about alternatives that block YouTube, avoid anything that even remotely connects to YouTube. If it connects to YouTube it still provides traffic and helps it out, we want to disconnect from it completely, don’t let it have a drop of traffic
Plan 2. Bugging the crap out of them.
Now since they have a mail box for us to use, that can be used for our advantage here. So here’s what we do, send them letters asking them to reverse the decision, that way they will be overwhelmed by letters that have to eventually give up. Now I don't want you guys to send out slurs, curses or whatever. I need you guys to be kind and critical. I want you to point everything wrong with this and why it is destined to fail and leave the company crumbling
In addition to these letters, if at all possible, I want you guys to include photos of comments made by other people (Twitter, tumblr, whatever) criticizing this and making it known that it’s not just you guys who are angry, but people all over too.
Now we can also include emails in this, but that might be harder than excepted, but in case you do want to send in a email, you can send it that way
I can't find any other way of sending them an email, but good to you if you do find it (though I would recommend a letter much more)
UPDATE, someone has pointed out that we should all send out our letters on a single day, Im taking around August 5th about a week before the thing actually rolls out and than maybe we’ll do another batch on the 8th just in case
Make sure you mass send a bunch of letters
WIP plan 3, legal bull
I wish I could say this plan was finished, but unfortunately, it is not at all. All we have to go for here to filing a complaint towards the FTC about this and or using what this user recommneds (though I can't fully say if it'll work or not)
This plan will be worked on as much as possible
I want everyone if they can to spread to outside of tumblr, talk about it on twitter, facebook, blusky, youtube itself, this plan has to spread to as much people as possible.
I believe we can do our best and shine a light through these horrible times, we can be light in the darkness that will help others shine a burn a hole in this horrible system of censorship
I believe in every last one of you, I believe you can do good and spread good, because in your hearts, you are good
If you have any other ideas, let me know, cause i know more minds are better than one.
thank you! Total YouTube blackout to respond to the awful AI age policy
The way that it is suggested age could be assessed is by using AI to analyse Internet activity. A multitude of problems here. Firstly, a statistical group so large they cannot even be called outliers - parents. parents will use YouTube for their children this will result in so many false analyses of childhood based on Internet activity that the method is rendered pointless.
Additional points would of course be that children could quite easily have an 'adult seeming' Internet history, and vice versa, and of course the fact that in many cases, what counts as childish will be entirely arbitrary. This would especially affect anyone with "childish" interests.
Okay, so here’s the updated plans for fighting against youtube's new ai age policy and privacy violating rule (I believe in us!)
Plan 1. Black out and leave youtube/ youtube boycott (August 13 to the point where the policy is gone)
It’s a very simple plan, but this time we just leave until it’s fully reversed. That way YouTube doesn’t just ignore us and the original black out. We have to stand our ground and show them we aren’t going to give up. We have to last as long as possible and let their revenue drain until they concede or someone else comes in and makes another platform (that isn’t based on politics but the same ideas as the original YouTube)
Plus I would like to add some small extra things that will help with the blackout though. That being mass downloading YouTube content. Now this might be the easiest thing for certain people, but it’s something.
Mass downloading YouTube content can help in case there a couple of videos or channels you want to watch during the blackout.
(I use something called a ytdlp but there might be better options for you out there, there might even be built in ones in a web browser or two, just search around the place, you'll find it eventually)
Forget what I said about alternatives that block YouTube, avoid anything that even remotely connects to YouTube. If it connects to YouTube it still provides traffic and helps it out, we want to disconnect from it completely, don’t let it have a drop of traffic
Plan 2. Bugging the crap out of them.
Now since they have a mail box for us to use, that can be used for our advantage here. So here’s what we do, send them letters asking them to reverse the decision, that way they will be overwhelmed by letters that have to eventually give up. Now I don't want you guys to send out slurs, curses or whatever. I need you guys to be kind and critical. I want you to point everything wrong with this and why it is destined to fail and leave the company crumbling
In addition to these letters, if at all possible, I want you guys to include photos of comments made by other people (Twitter, tumblr, whatever) criticizing this and making it known that it’s not just you guys who are angry, but people all over too.
Now we can also include emails in this, but that might be harder than excepted, but in case you do want to send in a email, you can send it that way
I can't find any other way of sending them an email, but good to you if you do find it (though I would recommend a letter much more)
UPDATE, someone has pointed out that we should all send out our letters on a single day, Im taking around August 5th about a week before the thing actually rolls out and than maybe we’ll do another batch on the 8th just in case
Make sure you mass send a bunch of letters
WIP plan 3, legal bull
I wish I could say this plan was finished, but unfortunately, it is not at all. All we have to go for here to filing a complaint towards the FTC about this and or using what this user recommneds (though I can't fully say if it'll work or not)
This plan will be worked on as much as possible
I want everyone if they can to spread to outside of tumblr, talk about it on twitter, facebook, blusky, youtube itself, this plan has to spread to as much people as possible.
I believe we can do our best and shine a light through these horrible times, we can be light in the darkness that will help others shine a burn a hole in this horrible system of censorship
I believe in every last one of you, I believe you can do good and spread good, because in your hearts, you are good
If you have any other ideas, let me know, cause i know more minds are better than one.
Good luck!
Update! We have a discord server now! We will be planning, spreading news and of course sharing ways to deal with YouTube’s ID policy
💬 0 🔁 0 ❤️ 1 · Join the Blackout YouTube Discord Server! · To those who have been wanting a YouTube blackout discord server (and other cen
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