The wandering conspiracy theories forced YouTube to take drastic steps. As a way out, the Google subsidiary will display a text box from Wikipedia on every conspiracy theory video.
The plan, the text box from Wikipedia in each video will be a conspiracy that will be a reference of additional information for the audience. The goal is none other so that their audience is not raw to swallow information from the video they watch.
This change was submitted by YouTube CEO, Susan Wojcicki, in the South by Southwest (SXSW) event.
The idea was praised. Whitney Phillips, professor at Mercer University, acknowledged the steps YouTube has taken.
"Finding ways to fight conspiracy theories and media manipulation is important and I commend YouTube to be aware of this issue,"
But there is a gap from the YouTube idea. Phillips rate the Wikipedia article is not strong enough to be used as a reference to counter the conspiracy theories. Professor who studies digital culture and online abuse is concerned that the Wikipedia page used has been edited by conspiracy theorists.
As is known, Wikipedia is a free, editable, and uploaded information sharing container by anyone.
"I'm not sure the editing and moderation process on Wikipedia is free of manipulated and planned attempts," Phillips added.
Meanwhile, Wikipedia is about to be hooked up by YouTube actually refutes to have a plan of cooperation. Through Wikimedia's official account, the Wikipedia-funded foundation, they write an official statement.
"Neither Wikipedia nor the Wikimedia Foundation has an official partnership with YouTube."
YouTube argues that the use of old Wikipedia in their videos is not an official collaboration and is only part of their larger effort to eradicate hoaks.
When compared to Facebook, efforts taken by YouTube is relatively mild in the fight against hoaks and conspiracy theories. Facebook has long announced its cooperation with the examiner of facts to check the validity of the information in circulation.
Nevertheless the way taken YouTube is considered to be better than Facebook. Rob Brotherton, professor of psychology at Barnard College, considers this lighter YouTube approach to reaching more people than the drastic steps that Facebook uses.
"Facebook's approach invites speculation from people who question mainstream narratives, and fact-checkers can not escape allegations of bias," Brotherton said.
YouTube is part of their effort to discredit hoaks. The reason, YouTube is a platform that has a lot of hoaks content in it. Criticism also came upon the situation.
All this discourse surfaced since the shooting case at Florida school, USA, some time ago. Not long after the incident was publicly known, evolved conspiracy theories about David Hogg who survived the mass shootings.
The conspiracy theory accuses Hogg of being the mastermind of mass firing. This theory is so popular that it becomes a popular topic on YouTube.
