Popular YouTuber Summoning Salt is fed up with the platform after his video on the history of Mega Man 2 speedrunning world records was age restricted for containing sexual content.
Summoning Salt is a big name in the speedrunning community thanks to his documentary-style videos chronicling all sorts of games from Super Mario 64 to Ninja Gaiden.
On September 17, he uploaded a video about Mega Man 2 – his longest to date – and everything seemed to be going well. Unfortunately, not long after, he received an email informing him that his video would be restricted.
As it turns out, the video had been flagged for containing “sustained use of heavy profanities” – something the YouTuber disputed heavily. Little did he know, however, that his troubles had only just begun.
This is an absolute joke.This is your own example of what would qualify a video for limited ads. It cites a video that has "strong profanity mentioned in every sentence."I have a 78 minute video, with one brief clip in the middle with someone saying the f-bomb a few times. https://t.co/6XjExtl9Du pic.twitter.com/vWf4ATCgch
— SummoningSalt (@summoningsalt) September 21, 2022
Summoning Salt video hit with multiple restrictions
The content creator explained on Twitter that while his video did include a three-second clip of speedrunner Ellonija dropping a few f-bombs, it hardly constituted as “sustained use of heavy profanities.”
“Videos with 21x the amount of swearing per capita remain un-restricted. YouTuberefuses to explain,” he added on September 21.
While the nightmare appeared to be over a day later when YouTube admitted they made a mistake, just over a week after, the Mega Man 2 video was age-restricted once again, this time for violating the platform’s policies on “sex and nudity.”
Subscribe to our newsletter for the latest updates on Esports, Gaming and more.
Eventually, YouTube said it was wrong to remove the original age restriction, to begin with, prompting Summoning Salt to make a video addressing the situation, but the restriction would remain in place.
“I’ve received no clarification as to why I was ever told that it was flagged for sex and nudity. I guess it’s not too surprising that the same ‘careful reviewers’ that think a 3-second rant is sustained also think that Mega Man 2 somehow has sex/nudity,” he blasted.
Final decision from @YouTube – the age-restriction will remain in place.It is really sad that "senior members" of YouTube's policy team somehow see a 3 second clip as a "sustained rant". I don't understand how someone, let alone a team could have that as their unbiased opinion. pic.twitter.com/GZmMhYSRU3
— SummoningSalt (@summoningsalt) October 4, 2022
He also revealed that YouTube offered no reason why the three-second clip of Ellonija swearing would be classified as a sustained rant, further infuriating him.
For his part, Summoning Salt is still deciding how to go forward, explaining he might cut the scene from the original video or reupload it, but it seems like the damage had already been done.
As YouTuber noted in his video, despite all his criticisms, at the end of the day, he’s still at the mercy of the platform.