YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki decided to do another interview on free speech. It did not go well at all.
Susan Wojcicki, the CEO of Google’s video platform YouTube, was awarded the Freedom Forum Institute’s ‘Free Expression Award’ on Friday in a ceremony sponsored by her own company – despite YouTube’s track record of censorship.
In the digital awards ceremony, YouTube video creator Molly Burke praised Wojcicki as a free speech leader before the YouTube CEO detailed in her acceptance speech how much the platform censors its users.
“The freedoms we have, we really can’t take for granted,” Wojcicki declared, adding that “we really have to make sure we’re protecting them in every way possible.”
Wojcicki, however, went on to argue that “we also need to make sure there are limits,” and revealed that the company removed nine million videos in the last quarter, 90% of which were taken down by machines.
She also said there is “a lot of content that technically meets the spirit of what we’re trying to do, but it is borderline, and so for that content we will just reduce – meaning we’re not going to recommend it to our users.”
