Does ‘Elsagate’ prove YouTube is too big to control?

Scandal of violent and sexual videos aimed at children exposes the difficulty of relying on algorithms

Children playing with tablet
(Image credit: Catrinus Van Der Veen/AFP/Getty Images)

In February, YouTube announced it had hit a staggering milestone: visitors were now consuming the equivalent of a billion hours’ worth of video every day.

The sheer size of the platform’s userbase is equally astounding. “More than 1.5 billion people use YouTube,” says The Guardian’s Roger McNamee, giving it a global reach comparable to Islam.

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