YouTube, We Have a Problem
The Lawfare Podcast
The Lawfare Institute
4.7 • 6.4K Ratings
🗓️ 25 March 2021
⏱️ 57 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
This week on Arbiters of Truth, the Lawfare Podcast’s miniseries on our online information ecosystem, Evelyn Douek and Quinta Jurecic sat down with Brendan Nyhan to discuss the crucial platform that often seems to slip under the radar in discussions of mis- and disinformation: YouTube.
Brendan is a professor of government at Dartmouth College, who has just co-authored a report with the Anti-Defamation League on “Exposure to Alternative and Extremist Content on YouTube.” There’s a common conception that YouTube acts as a radicalization engine, pushing viewers from mainstream content to increasingly radical material. But Brendan and his coauthors found a somewhat different story: YouTube may not funnel all viewers toward extreme content, but it does reliably recommend that content to users who are already viewing it. They discussed his findings and how we should understand the role that YouTube plays in the information ecosystem.
Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | The following podcast contains advertising. |
| 0:04.0 | To access an ad-free version of the LawFair podcast, |
| 0:08.0 | become a material supporter of LawFair at patreon.com slash law fair. |
| 0:14.0 | That's patreon.com slash law fair. |
| 0:18.0 | Also, check out LawFair's other podcast offerings, |
| 0:22.0 | rational security, chatter, law fair no bull, and the aftermath. |
| 0:29.0 | The first order conclusion that I come away with is the people watching this stuff already have negative views, |
| 0:40.0 | and they're finding content that seems to reinforce those, and it might even make them worse. |
| 0:44.0 | And I just think YouTube is a platform that I think really seriously about whether they want to facilitate that process, |
| 0:50.0 | because it seems to be working quite well. |
| 0:52.0 | It seems to be helping those people find that kind of content, and helping the creators who want to find those audiences, |
| 0:57.0 | reach them. And that seems like a terrible pairing for us to be facilitated. |
| 1:03.0 | I'm Quintedurusic, and this is the LawFair podcast, March 25th, 2021. |
| 1:10.0 | Today, we're bringing you another episode of Arbiters of Truth, |
| 1:14.0 | the LawFair Podcast's mini-series on our online information ecosystem. |
| 1:18.0 | Today, we're discussing the crucial platform that often seems to slip under the radar in discussions of misinformation. |
| 1:26.0 | YouTube. |
| 1:27.0 | I've even been doing this with Brendan Nihon, a professor of government at Dartmouth College, |
| 1:32.0 | who was just co-authored a report with the Anti-Defamation League, |
| 1:36.0 | an exposure to alternative and extremist content on YouTube. |
| 1:40.0 | There's a common conception that YouTube acts as a radicalization engine, |
| 1:44.0 | pushing viewers from mainstream content to increasingly radical material, |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from The Lawfare Institute, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of The Lawfare Institute and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.