No more shorts: YouTube gives parents more control
YouTube is improving the protection of minors: Parents will be able to hide the short format Shorts completely in future, teenagers will be able to see more curated content - and creators will be able to produce better content.
Until now, a single click has taken you from the maths learning video to the tiktok-like feed on YouTube Shorts. In future, you can avoid this by letting your children use Youtube with parental supervision. It has recently become possible to limit the daily limit for YouTube shorts in the Family Centre or in the Family Link app to a minimum of 15 minutes. Soon, a zero will also be available for selection there and the feed will no longer be displayed accordingly.
This should help to prevent excessive scrolling in the short videos. This could also help: The set limits can no longer simply be clicked away in future and parents can set pause reminders when they see fit. If you have not yet set up a YouTube account for your child, this and switching between different family accounts should also become easier.
New guide for high-quality content
In the settings, you can currently only roughly define the age range for which your child can see content. When it comes to recommendations for teenagers, YouTube also wants to improve and has formulated clear guidelines for the first time. Videos with educational value or positive social messages are to be weighted more heavily in future and shown more frequently to young people. The guidelines were developed with experts from the American Psychological Association, among others.
To ensure that the algorithm has the right feed, there is also the guide «Creating for Teens» - after all, someone has to produce the high-quality content that YouTube wants to use to become a better platform for young people. And Youtubers will do this above all if the corresponding videos are actually prioritised.
Source: Screenshot Youtube/@TEDEd
A necessary step
Youtube is praising itself for introducing the industry's first function that gives parents full control over how many short videos their children consume. In sober terms, it is simply a necessary step. After all, shorts are the very Tiktok and Snapchat content that many parents want to keep their early teenage children away from.
The new functions are also a response to political pressure. Australia has already introduced a social media ban for under-16s and some European countries are interested in similar regulations. The EU Commission is currently examining whether the platforms implement sufficient protection mechanisms for minors. Criticism has also come from academia: A study by Cornell University, for example, found that YouTube accounts of 13-year-olds are even more likely to display videos classified as harmful than is the case for adults.
There are therefore good reasons for YouTube to change something. And good reasons for parents to take a closer look. Incidentally, this also applies if you want to hide the shorts feed: «From» in the corresponding menu means that no limit is set at all - and by no means that your child can no longer search for shorts.
Simple writer and dad of two who likes to be on the move, wading through everyday family life. Juggling several balls, I'll occasionally drop one. It could be a ball, or a remark. Or both.
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