The period of great news for YouTube continues with more new features on the way. If at the end of October we reported the introduction of full-screen Ambient mode to remove black bars, allowing colors to blend with the interface of the device in use, now the time has come to observe the features dedicated to teenagers which will allow the company to protect younger users when using the platform. Let’s see in detail what it is.
YouTube thinks of teenagers with new features
To prevent exposure to harmful content for teens, YouTube worked collaboratively with the independent team Youth and Families Advisory Committee in order to analyze the stages of psychological development of children and frame the right measures to apply so that it can happen with the lowest possible influence from the video sharing platform.
For example, an important step forward is the removal of video recommendations regarding comparisons of physical characteristics, i.e., regarding the idealization of certain types over others. In short, it is one strong limitation on the risks of discrimination.
Another new feature concerns i reminders for breaks and ideal sleep times. Notifications will be turned on by default to accounts aged under 18 and will be more visually noticeable. Furthermore, they will appear more frequently not only in videos, but also in Shorts. Finally, YouTube announced the expansion of panels related to sensitive issues such as suicide, self-harm and eating disorders in related videos and wherever ad hoc tags appear.
So this is a remarkable and extremely useful set of features, but will they really help the public? We’ll see.
