Dear YouTube,
I’ve been thinking a lot about transparency and I hear you have been, too.
In a time of seemingly endless sources of news, and increasing manipulation of the technology to deliver it, it seems like a good thing to focus on.
You and I are in agreement that transparency is generally a good thing and anything that can be done to provide clarity for the audience should be pursued.
But, as with everything else in life, it’s complicated.
You know that you are not just a source of cool user generated videos of cooking how to’s or toddlers who dance like Michael Jackson or inspirational travelers or garage bands and everything in between.
You are also a vital source of news content for millions of viewers. And with all this news of the influence of bots and fake news, you want to do everything you can to make sure the audience understands something about sourcing.
So your recent announcement that you are going to provide notices “below videos uploaded by news broadcasters that receive some level of government or public funding” as one small step towards your commitment of “providing greater transparency across the board to our community of creators, advertisers, and viewers” got my attention.
In theory it seems like a good idea to help educate the audience. In practice I’m not so sure this does that.
Here’s the rub: “some level of government or public funding.” This ruling lumps the Russian Broadcaster RT, and China Central Television, CCTV, in with the BBC and PBS to name a few.
Furthermore, you are relying on definitions of each from Wikipedia.
Here’s how Wikipedia describes these entities:
CCTV is the “predominant state television broadcaster in the People’s Republic of China…CCTV is one of the official mouthpieces of the Communist Party of China.
RT is “a Russian propagandistic international television network funded by the Russian government.”
BBC is “a British public service broadcaster…its work is funded principally by an annual television license fee.”
PBS is “funded by member station dues, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, government agencies, corporations, foundations and individual citizens.”
You might have good reason to use Wikipedia for your definitions, we could debate that.
But, let's say we are both fine with that. Looking at those definitions, do you think all these broadcasters are the same because they get some or all their money from the government? Do you think they warrant being lumped into the same group?
I don’t.
CCTV is a mouthpiece for a government.
RT is a propaganda channel for another government (in fact, RT America has had to register as a foreign agent with the Department of Justice).
BBC is funded by a tax on people who own a television.
PBS is funded by a mix of sources including, but not limited to, seed money from CPB. Here’s a pie chart that explains the sources of funding for PBS. In fact, the defining feature of public television and public radio stations is that they are independently owned, operated and managed, and they must be representative of their local community. That's a far cry from being a governmental state broadcaster.
Money provided by the federal government is grant funded and is not a foregone conclusion. In other words, there is no one at the United States Treasury sitting there signing a check every year for a state broadcaster called PBS. Because "PBS is a private, nonprofit corporation, founded in 1969, whose members are America’s public TV stations -- noncommercial, educational licensees that operate 350 PBS member stations and serve all 50 states, Puerto Rico, U.S. Virgin Islands, Guam and American Samoa." You can learn more here.
One only need compare PBS News & Information or BBC content with that of RT or CCTV to know that the content you are receiving is vastly different and the underlying missions are different.
I looked to see how transparent each company is about itself and its financials. You won’t be surprised to hear that on their websites, both PBS and the BBC provide information about their funding. The CPB even has a handy tool that helps you find out where every dollar goes to across the country.
It’s really hard to find something similar for either CCTV or RT.
It's also unlikely that you'd see something like this excerpt from a CCTV documentary, on the BBC or PBS.
You seem to be substituting source of funding as a proxy for quality or validity or reliability of editorial content. That just doesn’t seem like a particularly helpful tool for the audience.
If it’s your role to guide the audience about editorial content, can you provide notices on Infowars? Or Young Turks? Or Fox News? Or MSNBC? Will you provide a notice below content from The Washington Post, to let consumers know that this publication is privately owned by the richest man in the world?
Why single out government funding? Your implication is that government funding equals propaganda of some sort. Do other forms of funding not need transparency? I would argue that the BBC and Public Media in the U.S. are motivated by journalistic standards absent at CCTV and RT.
My point is, using funding (whatever form it takes) is a poor proxy for anything, particularly the quality of editorial content.
Models for government funding vary across the board, and, in democratic countries at least, public broadcasting wins high marks for trust and integrity. I’d suggest you take a look at this report to learn a little more about the range of public funding models across democracies.
You’ve acknowledged a problem. You are trying to do something about it. I say, good for you. I give you high marks for thinking about transparency.
But in this effort at least, you are potentially tarring a lot of organizations with the same brush. So I’m afraid I’m going to have to fail you on execution.
Sincerely,
PBS Public Editor
