WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:05.440 A few days ago, Facebook proudly announced that they'd acheieved eight billion video views a day 00:00:05.440 --> 00:00:09.903 That's really impressive, until you learn that in the first quarter of 2015, 00:00:09.903 --> 00:00:17.303 725 of the thousand most viewed videos on Facebook were stolen, amassing a total of 17 billion views. 00:00:17.303 --> 00:00:22.993 Sites and content aggregators steal videos from YouTube to go viral on Facebook. 00:00:22.993 --> 00:00:26.893 These videos go viral because Facebook is cheating. 00:00:26.893 --> 00:00:31.943 The rig their algorithm so that videos uploaded to their player are preferred to YouTube links 00:00:31.943 --> 00:00:37.453 Because users should be kept as long as possible on the site, so Facebook can show them as many ads as possible. 00:00:37.453 --> 00:00:40.493 This is, after all, their business model. 00:00:40.493 --> 00:00:42.503 But it also cheats when it comes to views 00:00:42.503 --> 00:00:46.993 A view is counted after three seconds, even if the video is muted 00:00:47.283 --> 00:00:52.803 Which means that because of auto-play, if you scroll through your timeline slowly enough, you count as a viewer. 00:00:52.803 --> 00:00:56.013 That means engagement is terrible 00:00:56.013 --> 00:01:02.293 Compared to YouTube views, Facebook views plummet after a few seconds, because most views are not real 00:01:02.293 --> 00:01:06.293 But large numbers are impressive, so Facebook keeps pretending 00:01:06.293 --> 00:01:13.123 While this forced virality is weird, the real problem is the so-called "Freebooting", the stealing of videos 00:01:13.123 --> 00:01:18.253 Since Facebook prefers its own player, stolen videos reach way more people than the original. 00:01:18.253 --> 00:01:20.733 Lately this has happened to us more and more often 00:01:20.733 --> 00:01:26.673 The most recent example amassed 3.2 million views and 140 thousand shares in two days, 00:01:26.673 --> 00:01:31.423 While our own post reached just 100 thousand people and got shared 1000 times. 00:01:31.423 --> 00:01:33.813 Other creators are hit even harder. 00:01:33.813 --> 00:01:39.153 Smartereveryday's videos get stolen constantly, getting viewed up to 17 million times 00:01:39.153 --> 00:01:47.643 But even this is dwarfed by examples like Tyrese Gibson, a singer who steals viral videos like this one, with 86 million views on his Facebook page. 00:01:47.643 --> 00:01:50.323 He adds a link to buy his music too. 00:01:50.323 --> 00:01:51.463 He's not alone in this, 00:01:51.463 --> 00:01:56.233 A whole group of people have built their online presence around stealin other peoples' work 00:01:56.403 --> 00:01:59.783 This is really bad for independent creators. 00:01:59.783 --> 00:02:01.283 Contrary to popular belief 00:02:01.283 --> 00:02:04.743 Stolen content gives creators close to no exposure at all 00:02:04.743 --> 00:02:08.073 Only the thief and Facebook profit from this. 00:02:08.073 --> 00:02:12.213 Quality content takes a lot of creativity, time, and love. 00:02:12.213 --> 00:02:16.673 In our case, a single video literally takes hundreds of hours to make 00:02:16.673 --> 00:02:21.523 Even we, with more than a million subscribers, are dependent on the ads and exposure. 00:02:21.523 --> 00:02:26.363 Without ads, and the support of our generous Patreons, we could not make videos. 00:02:26.363 --> 00:02:30.783 For a small creator, a viral video can mean the difference between a career and a hobby 00:02:30.783 --> 00:02:37.033 On YouTube this kind of theft is not a problem because they have major safeguards that protect content from being stolen, 00:02:37.033 --> 00:02:42.665 Although the content ID system is far from perfect, especially for film critics and gamers. 00:02:42.665 --> 00:02:48.859 Facebook, on the other hand, pretends everything is fine and constantly announces one milestone after the other. 00:02:48.859 --> 00:02:54.627 But things are not fine. Let's look at the process of claming your copyright on Facebook in the last year: 00:02:54.627 --> 00:02:59.439 1. Get an email or tweet from a fan that gives you a direct link to your video. 00:02:59.439 --> 00:03:05.639 It's not possible to search for your videos on Facebook yourself, you depend on luck to find your stolen videos. 00:03:05.639 --> 00:03:11.505 2. Search for "Facebook copyright infringement" on Google, because it's actually faster this way 00:03:11.505 --> 00:03:15.155 3. Fill out an annoyingly long contact form. 00:03:15.155 --> 00:03:18.984 4. Watch the views on your stolen videos rise. 00:03:18.984 --> 00:03:21.723 5. Facebook finally pulls the video 00:03:21.723 --> 00:03:26.518 Conveniently, the video has already gained 99% of all the views it will ever get 00:03:26.518 --> 00:03:30.168 The thief doesn't have to fear any negative consequences at all. 00:03:30.168 --> 00:03:33.459 This is what successful creators have to deal with constantly, 00:03:33.459 --> 00:03:38.963 and on top of losing out in terms of exposure and money, it just feels like violation to be treated like that. 00:03:38.963 --> 00:03:42.213 In a recent statement, Facebook announced that they want to change 00:03:42.213 --> 00:03:47.137 But it's hard to take them seriously when it still takes days for a stolen viral video to be taken down 00:03:47.137 --> 00:03:50.167 and Facebook does not share the profits made from it. 00:03:50.173 --> 00:03:55.193 At this point, Facebook is not a partner creators look forward to working with. 00:03:55.193 --> 00:04:00.800 They've built their video empire on stolen content and disregard for original content creators. 00:04:00.800 --> 00:04:05.390 This is absolutely unnacceptable for a corporation worth billions of dollars. 00:04:05.394 --> 00:04:11.590 Facebook is already testing various monetization models that will give uploaders a cut of the ad revenue 00:04:11.590 --> 00:04:14.415 Which, with the current state of play, is troubling. 00:04:14.415 --> 00:04:23.012 RIght now this is just being tested with big media companies, but as creators, we don't feel like we're being asked or taken into consideration by the giant that is Facebook. 00:04:23.012 --> 00:04:25.803 What can you, as a viewer, do to help here? 00:04:25.803 --> 00:04:30.223 If you spot stolen content of FB, make a comment linking to the original content. 00:04:30.233 --> 00:04:34.412 Alert the original creator, because only they can file a copyright report 00:04:34.412 --> 00:04:37.872 Share this video or the one done by Smartereveryday 00:04:37.883 --> 00:04:43.960 We all want the same thing, the free internet that is based for creativity, community and great stuff 00:04:43.960 --> 00:04:48.920 We sincerely hope that Facebook will some become a parter, instead an obstacle to this goal 00:04:48.925 --> 00:04:52.658 For more indepth information, we recommend this article by Hank Green 00:04:52.658 --> 00:04:57.650 And if you want to support us in our quest to survive in the world of online videos. Or make more videos. 00:04:57.650 --> 00:05:02.110 You can do so on Patreon.com