Google’s video streaming platform, YouTube, has introduced a new comment moderation feature called “Pause”. This feature allows creators and moderators to temporarily disable new comments on their videos without removing the existing ones.
In a recent blog post, YouTube said, “We’re rolling out a new, optional comment moderation setting called Pause that allows you, as creators, to prevent the creation of new comments at the video level while preserving comments that were already published.”
To pause comments on a video, users can go to the comment settings in the upper right-hand corner of the comments panel on the watch page in the app or YouTube Studio. Once you enable the Pause option, you can see that all comments will be paused, including previously published comments.
The Pause feature has been under experimentation by YouTube since October. According to the company, creators and moderators in the experiment group have found the feature helpful in gaining more flexibility in managing their comments.
Previously, creators had only two options to prevent new comments from being posted on their content — to hold comments for review before publishing them or to disable comments from their channels entirely.
To attract more users to its paid Premium service, YouTube has introduced a collection of mini-games named “Playables”. With over 30 mini-games available, users can play them instantly on Android, iOS, and desktop, without the need for any downloads.
Meanwhile, YouTube is taking a more aggressive approach to tackle users who have installed ad blockers on the platform.
A warning message is being sent to an increasing number of YouTube users, asking them to either turn off their ad blockers and watch ads or subscribe to YouTube Premium for $14. This initiative has been launched worldwide to encourage users to view ads or try YouTube Premium, which includes YouTube Music.
Many users with ad blockers installed have reported being unable to watch videos on YouTube in recent weeks. A company spokesperson stated that the use of ad-blockers goes against the platform’s terms of service.
According to the spokesperson, ads support a diverse ecosystem of creators globally and allow billions to access their favourite content on YouTube.