Creator Weekly: Meta AI policy, Facebook video feed, YouTube Analytics

It seems like everyone here is talking about Monday’s eclipse. It will only be a partial eclipse here in the SF Bay Area, but I’m still planning to pause and observe (my colander is ready!).

This is an anniversary week:

Creator Weekly Live is one year old! I’m grateful for everyone who watches, chats and comments. I suppose it’s time I write up my experience with different live streaming platforms (soon!).
Consumer Google+ shut down 5 years ago. I wrote up my thoughts on social media since then, and into the future.I’ve also been hanging out with the OnEBoard crew for 5 years. We do weekly text chat on Twitter, YouTube and LinkedIn and bi-weekly live streams. See our event calendar.
Gmail launched on April Fool’s Day in 2004. Read the original announcement. I am a bit surprised that Google didn’t memorialize the anniversary, other than CEO Sundar Pichai resharing the retrospective at The Verge. It notes that “Gmail is like a passport for the internet”, used to sign in to various accounts, receive updates, and makes an excellent archive. When Gmail launched it was invite online, and I didn’t get my first Gmail account until later in 2004. The 1GB free storage was amazing!

Plus there are updates for YouTube and other video creators, bloggers, social media and more.

Fools?

🤡 I’ll also note that April 1st came and went, and there were few tech companies that posted April Fool’s jokes. A few of note: Discord posted that they were adding loot boxes (and somehow got a billion views on the announcement video by accident), X joked that DMs and drafts would be made public (which almost seemed real), Threads added scratch-n-sniff to posts, and Bluesky added Shorts. It all seems a bit cringy, and the period when all the big tech companies went all out with their jokes seems eons ago.

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To Do & Try

Check out Google’s Fact Check Explorer to find out the real scoop on eclipse claims circulating on social media.Then browse through the other recent rumors and try the newly-out-of-beta “Search by image” option. That lets you upload or link to an image to see if it has been used in a recent fact check.

Google Cloud Next ‘24 - Google’s conference for Google Cloud and Workspace - opens April 9. Watch the keynote.

The Coachella music festival will once again be live on YouTube, starting April 12. You’ll be able to use “multiview” to watch up to 4 live streams on your TV at once (you choose the audio).

Meta’s Policy For AI-Generated and Manipulated Content

Meta announced their policy requiring labeling of certain AI-generated content on Facebook, Instagram, and Threads.

Here are the basics:

If you use Meta AI, photorealistic images are already labeled “Imagined with AI”
Starting in May, self-disclosed AI-generated image, video or audio content will have a “Made with AI” label
The “Made with AI” label will also be added to content “based on our detection of industry-shared signals of AI images”
The label may be more prominent if the content has “a particularly high risk of materially deceiving the public on a matter of importance”.

This applies to content that does not violate the Community Standards. Policy-violating content may be removed.

Meta will actually stop removing some manipulated videos that don’t otherwise violate the Community Standards in July. So the change there is to label, rather than remove.

Here is the relevant part of the Facebook misinformation policy:

For content that does not otherwise violate the Community Standards, we may place an informative label on the face of content – or reject content submitted as an advertisement – when the content is a photorealistic image or video, or realistic sounding audio, that was digitally created or altered and creates a particularly high risk of materially deceiving the public on a matter of public importance.

Note that it does not only include AI-generated content, but any realistic digitally created or altered content, if it could deceive the public on an important matter (which isn’t defined here).

Some manipulated media may be removed.

We remove videos under this policy if specific criteria are met: (1) the video has been edited or synthesized, beyond adjustments for clarity or quality, in ways that are not apparent to an average person, and would likely mislead an average person to believe a subject of the video said words that they did not say; and (2) the video is the product of artificial intelligence or machine learning, including deep learning techniques (e.g., a technical deepfake), that merges, combines, replaces, and/or superimposes content onto a video, creating a video that appears authentic.

Video Creator and Live Streaming Updates

Facebook is rolling out a new video player on iOS and Android devices. If you tap a video you will now get a full screen vertically oriented video feed. There will be an option to flip to horizontal viewing. The feed includes Reels, longer videos and live streams. And there are new video controls that let you skim, jump back 10 seconds, or pause. And yes, they are leaning in on vertical Reels and better recommendations.

YouTube now lets you live stream in HDR, which has “crisper whites, inkier blacks and better looking colors that pop” plus more detail. Learn more from Creator Insider. You can use the recently released OBS Studio 30.1 with HEVC over RMTP with a camera that supports HDR video. There’s more technical details in the YouTube Help Center. As a viewer, you’ll see HDR video if you are using an Android device, TV, Windows or Mac with HDR graphics support (so not iPhones it sounds like).

If you live stream on YouTube you can now see analytics for live emoji reactions 🎉 in YouTube Studio on the web and mobile. Learn more from Creator Insider. Note that you can turn off emoji reactions in Live Control Room in YouTube Studio for the web if they don’t suit your live chat.

YouTube Analytics now also lets you filter impressions stats by new versus returning viewers. Learn more from Creator Insider. Why are these stats useful? Maybe your video has a terrible impression click through rate overall, but your returning viewers clicked and watched. Or you can see if an updated thumbnail increases the click through rate for new viewers.

In YouTube Shorts you can now Remix a Remix. There are some fun examples in the @YouTubeCreators announcement. I did try the Collab feature to collab with myself, but when the original video is just talking, all I can really do is point and nod. Maybe I should learn to dance.

Watch the YouTube Creator Liaison’s new series of Shorts about declining views and The Algorithm.

YouTube Music has a generative AI tool to let you create a cover image for your playlists.

When watching YouTube on your TV, you can skip ahead to auto-generated key moments in a video.

Twitch changed their Suspension Evasion Policy to allow streamers to discuss or react to content from suspended users, but still prohibits just sharing their content or hosting a suspended user.

Streamyard has a new AI thumbnail generator to go along with its new AI video clip editor.

Podcasting and Audio

YouTube is working on a “Podcasts for You” shelf in the mobile app home feed.

If you are a creator interested in YouTube Podcasts, there is a YouTube Podcasting 101 free session with the YouTube podcasting team on April 26.

Web Publishers and Search

WordPress 6.5 “Regina” is now available. Updates include a new Font Library to easily install Google Fonts across your site, see a detailed revision history for templates, use background and shadow tools to customize blocks, improved link management and new data views.

The WordPress desktop editor and Jetpack mobile app have made it easier to add photos directly from your phone to posts and pages.

Google sent a reminder that they are in the final transition from Universal Analytics to Google Analytics 4. By now you should have migrated your properties to GA4. Starting July 1, 2024 you will no longer be able to access any Universal Analytics. Learn more.

Google Search posted a video explaining How Google Search indexes pages that’s pretty easy to follow. Watch now.

This is a new twist on gaining backlinks. Ars Technica reports Fake AI law firms are sending fake DMCA threats to generate fake SEO gains

Photos and Image Design on the Web

Flickr is working with NASA to curate a gallery of eclipse photos. Be sure to tag your Flickr photos with #TotalEclipse2024 for them to be considered.

Social Media

Patreon is expanding its community chats. New features include availability on the web (previously mobile only); new settings to choose whether a chat includes all members or only paid members; and trusted teammates and fans can be designated chat moderators. Also, they are adding video reply stickers.

Instagram shared some tips for Stories, with Mosseri suggesting you use the new Notify sticker to remind people to turn on notifications for upcoming announcements or updates. Also, did you know that when you post to your Insta feed you can add a poll in the captions?

Instagram is testing an invite-only “spring bonus” for some creators who post original reels, carousels or single images. According to Tubefilter, “Two creators eligible for the bonus told BI they’re seeing RPMs of between 14 and 16 cents so far,” which seems pretty low. RPM is revenue per thousand views, and ad revenue sharing on YouTube long form videos usually has an RPM in multiple dollars, not cents.

Instagram is also offering a Threads bonus, which is, again, invite-only. It requires being set up for bonuses on Instagram and pays out based on the performance (minimum 2500 views) and number of posts.

Adam Mosseri, head of Instagram and Threads, riled people up (started a conversation?) by stating that “Follower counts matter less than view and like counts”, and he noted that you should not expect that all followers will see your posts. Why? Some don’t open the app every day and even those who do don’t view all the posts by the people they follow. It’s harsh, but matches my own viewing behavior.

X is automatically adding a blue check back to “influential members of the community” with at least 2500 “verified” (paid X Premium subscriber) followers. As Techdirt put it: Elon Recreates The Lords & Peasants Bluecheck System He Hated, But Makes Sure It’s Even Dumber

X is suspending accounts that “violate the Rules against platform manipulation and spam”, resulting in decreases in follower numbers for popular users.

X announced “all-time high” traffic, but Andrew Hutchinson at Social Media Today points out that the big jump was actually caused by the data source (SEMRush) changing the way they measure traffic. Plus the data only reflects web traffic, when most visitors use the mobile app. It’s hard to know if Elon Musk is intentionally misleading about this, or if he doesn’t understand the numbers.

And X is removing the option to add your pronouns to your profile. Not at all surprising, based on owner Musk’s whining about such.

This seems like a bad use of AI: Elon Musk's X pushed a fake headline about Iran attacking Israel. X's AI chatbot Grok made it up. This is part of a redesign of the trending tab, so expect to see more bad AI-generated takes.

Lindsey Gamble reports a new creator reward system on Telegram, with ad revenue sharing, and all ad purchases and payments with the Toncoins cryptocurrency.

Security

Many users have their accounts hijacked by malware that steals their cookie sessions. That bypasses other security measures like 2-step verification. Google is working on what they call Device Bound Session Credentials (DBSC), which associates a particular session to a key in the browser. That makes stolen cookies useless. Read more about how that can be done in Chrome without affecting user privacy.

Communication and Collaboration

Event platform Brandlive is integrating with Google Meet. Brandlive provides event registration, support and tools. Meet can host up to 1000 participants in the meeting, and up to 1 million viewers of the Brandlive live stream. More information from Brandlive, but no pricing, which I assume means expensive. This is aimed at enterprise Google Workspace customers.

More AI Updates

YouTube CEO Neal Mohan says that if OpenAI trained its text-to-video Sora AI model on YouTube videos, that would violate YouTube policy.

You can now edit the images you create in OpenAI’s DALL·E AI image generator.

If you are interested in prompt engineering, the article by AI expert Lance Eliot is worth a read Prompt Engineering Boasts New Practice Of Telling Generative AI To Be On Your Toes And Stridently Question Wishful Miracles

404 Media reports Google Books Is Indexing AI-Generated Garbage. Google Books powers Google’s Ngram viewer, used to analyze language use over time. Apparently recent books are not included in the Ngram viewer data, but it could still become a problem.

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