YouTube clarifies policies around AI slop and upsetting videos

A recent one change sees YouTube further crack down on AI sloppiness by clarifying its policies on how content on its platform can be monetized. To discourage creators from using AI and other tools to create low-quality content, YouTube’s policy now explains that there are three types of videos that fall under the broader category of “inauthentic content” that cannot be monetized.

YouTube already had policies around AI content. Last year, the company announced it would limit creators’ ability to monetize what it called “inauthentic content,” which includes mass-produced videos and other forms of repetitive content that have become easier to generate with the help of AI technology.

Rather, the recent update is about adding more nuance to the existing policy.

The updated guidelines divide inauthentic content into three categories, including generic, repetitive or template-based content, followed by unpleasant or disturbing content, and then any content that uses AI personas to discuss sensitive topics such as health and finances.

While AI slop, like adult content, is a “you’ll know it when you see it” situation for many, YouTube’s policy is intended to more specifically define when the use of AI in content creation is or is not allowed for videos monetized through the YouTube Partner Program (YPP).

The program, which allows creators to make money through ads and subscriptions, is the lifeblood of YouTube; it wouldn’t be in the company’s financial interest to clutter it with AI slop or other low-quality fare. This is especially important because YouTube competes heavily with TV and other streamers for TV advertising dollars. Google’s video platform now and has generated more ad revenue than rival streamers Overtook Netflix in average daily views worldwide.

As YouTube’s trust and safety chief Matt Halprin explained in a Creator Insider Video Last week, the company’s goal with its policy review was to reduce content farming efforts — a reference to low-quality videos that exist solely to generate revenue.

“AI can enable people to create a lot of videos,” says Halprin. “Sometimes those videos are great and it really increases creativity. And you can create a greater volume of high-quality content that we want to encourage and have in the YPP.”

“But with the exact same new tool, you can create a lot of videos very quickly that are very similar. They’re very generic and they don’t really have a storyline and they don’t really showcase your creativity. So the same technology enables really great things, but it also enables things that are kind of content farming, and those are the things that we don’t want in the YPP,” Halprin added.

The first category, he said, includes repetitive content, such as material easily created with AI, computer-generated imagery (CGI) or templates, with little variation from video to video. This will populate a channel with cookie-cutter videos. Halprin notes that how-to videos may also fall under this policy if they reproduce content already on the platform, rather than being original.

The second category focuses on what YouTube calls “unpleasant” content, or content designed to be disturbing or emotionally manipulative in order to pursue opinions. These could be videos of an animal in distress, which is then rescued by someone, Halprin said.

“We’ve heard from our viewers that they don’t like that. They find it unpleasant. They don’t want to go back to that channel, or maybe even the platform,” Halprin said.

Channels dedicated to this content will be removed from the YPP, regardless of whether the content is AI-generated or not.

The third category focuses more directly on the use of AI personas: representations of real people created with AI. YouTube says it does not want to encourage creators using AI personas to discuss more sensitive topics, such as finance, legal, healthcare and medical issues.

Any YouTube channel that contains too much of these three types of content will be unable to generate revenue, Halprin said. The policy clarifications rolled out on July 16 and impact all YouTube Partner Program members.