YouTube finally released what they are calling a statement on the fact one of their employees allowed the vlog Logan Paul put up about a suicide victim on their site.
Not in a press release, but in a series of tweets.
They are now acknowledging that Logan violated their conduct policies by posting the video, which he himself removed after public outcry.
"Suicide is not a joke, nor should it ever be a driving force for views. As Anna Akana put it perfectly: "That body was a person someone loved. You do not walk into a suicide forest with a camera and claim mental health awareness."
"We expect more of the creators who build their community on
@YouTube, as we’re sure you do too. The channel violated our community guidelines, we acted accordingly, and we are looking at further consequences."
YouTube has not acknowledged their part in the video going live. YouTube has not said they fired the person who not only let the video go up but allowed it to go up without an NSFW warning. YouTube has not taken down Logan Paul's channel which now has 15,691,286 subscribers and continues to grow. Nor have they removed his secondary channel, The Official Logan Paul, which has 4,358,661 subscribers.
He is still on the payroll for YouTube Red - even PewDiePie got fired from there!
Their policies are pretty clear on what you cannot post, which has led the internet to wonder if the content had been put up by anyone other than LoganPaul, would YouTube have allowed it to remain up?
The other concern is the reposts of the video, whether put up in full or in clips, it's still easy to watch the whole vlog if you have the time and patience to do some searching.
Harmful or dangerous content
Don't post videos that encourage others to do things that might cause them to get badly hurt, especially kids. Videos showing such harmful or dangerous acts may get age-restricted or removed depending on their severity.
Violent or graphic content
It's not okay to post violent or gory content that's primarily intended to be shocking, sensational, or disrespectful. If posting graphic content in a news or documentary context, please be mindful to provide enough information to help people understand what's going on in the video. Don't encourage others to commit specific acts of violence.
What is also interesting that while promoting Jumanji neither Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson nor Kevin Hart, who both have videos with Logan on his channel, have not replied to fan comments about the vlog. Johnson is reported to have unfollowed Logan and removed videos from his channel, however.
YouTube has a lot of work to do to recover from not only this incident, but also from the issues with predatory videos and major advertisers jumping ship.
Even Logan Paul gave a heartfelt apology. Even if he monetized it.