Tag Archives: youtube

To Rate or not to Rate

Are there any benefits to the rating system on youtube? It is sort of a grey area on youtube. The staff have never commented on how the system works, so most of what we know is guess work and hearsay.

User feedback

At a very basic level the number of likes and dislikes can be used as feedback to you, the creator of the video, as to how well your video was received. You can presume over a short period of time that the initial likes and dislikes are from your subscribers, so the regular viewers. Any after that are from outside sources that have been driven to your video.
Keeping your subscriber base happy is always a good idea, so keeping an eye on those first few days and using that feedback to improve your videos.
In the long term, depending on the sort of topic you are documenting, the general viewer base may not find it as interesting/truthful/aligned with their beliefs and as such will dislike. I would ignore this as a whole.

User Sharing

Something that you may have missed, is how the like shares your videos via their subscribers. If they have their account hooked up to social media (twitter, google+ and Facebook), then it is automatically posted there. It is posted to their youtube page that they liked it and it goes into their subscribers feed. That is a huge way gain more views without actually having to do anything but allowing people to like.

Dislikes hide your video from results?

There is no documentation from Youtube that states this. From my experience with videos that receive a large number of dislikes, they still get views and comments. My most popular video  has over 200,000 views, it regularly gets the same amount of likes as dislikes, if not worse, and it still gets nearly 8,000 views a month, and that is a 2 year old video!  A large number of dislikes doesn’t appear to effect the views you get, they still come in strong.

Merged into one

I’ve seen it mentioned before, but I can’t see anything to back it up, that the dislikes and likes are merged into one value and just the fact that you are getting people to engage with your video is a positive, no matter if the dislikes out weight the likes. Youtube added a Total Engagement number last year, which could be this. But how it is used is unknown.

Suggested videos

This post and the below graph highlights how allowing people to like your video has a drastic effect on the views you receive. The poster states that the analytics shows that the majority of these extra views are coming from suggested videos. Which indicates that having likes (and potentially dislikes) puts your videos in the suggested videos and that those are very powerful when it comes to traffic.

Conclusion

Looking at this information, there appears to be no downside to dislikes. But there are huge disadvantages to turning the likes off, it doesn’t share your video the same or puts your videos in the suggested videos, you are loosing out on a huge amount of potential views by having it turned off.

Monetizing Videos

At some stage in your YouTube usage you will get the option from youtube to monetize your videos with adverts and earn money from them. But is it worth it?

I asked a few video camera cyclists who monetize their videos if they could give me some information that will allow me to analyse the usage of adverts and if it is worth it. Looking into subscribers, views, earnings and subscriber net change. All information was taken from the month of June, people who supplied information will be kept anonymous along with the data they submitted.

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Reporting Videos to the Police

Got a video of a particularly dangerous driver putting you or someone else’s life in danger on the roads?
Want to report it to the Police but don’t know how?

You may think it isn’t worth reporting poor drivers to the police. In some areas it may not be worth reporting the slightly poor ones but dangerous road users should be reported to the police, especially when you have video evidence of how dangerous they are. Your police service may not be used to it but don’t let that stop you. That dangerous driver could kill or seriously injure someone if they are not spoken to by the police.

General Tips

  • Don’t give up – you may get turned away by the police but keep at it.
  • Avoid talking to officers at reception about your incident – just ask to report a Road Traffic Incident (this is usually requires you to fill out a form, which is sent to a traffic unit). The desk officers will be opinionated and may not like cyclists, it just isn’t worth your time talking to them.
  • Be prepared to be let down. The Police will only push a case for prosecution if they believe the CPS will take the case. This usually means only the most serious incidences will ever see court action. A talking to by the police or a letter is a good result in most cases.
  • If a driver gets out of their vehicle and physically touches you, that is assault and should be reported as such. Assault is taken much more seriously than traffic incidences.

Hungary

You can find all the contact details of every police station here. Send a link of your video with a brief description and your details (name, date and place of birth, address etc..), the licence plate is not a must but things go a lot faster if you have all the numbers and characters.
Once this is done you will get a subpoena in the mail soonish to give a testimony at the station. Police will make a CD/DVD of your video, no need to burn it.
The whole process takes about 3 months if no hiccups occur.

Thanks to sajatzsiron for this information

United Kingdom

Avon and Somerset

Avon and Somerset police do have an online form which goes to the Roads Policing Unit. However this appears to be for general questions rather than reporting of incidences.

Thanks to Redvee2002 for this information

Hampshire

Report to the local police station, the traffic unit will look into it and see if they can use the video footage as an independent witness. They ask that you keep the footage off of youtube etc.. when reporting it to them. As they can’t use footage from the public domain as evidence. Technically that isn’t true, we have had cases go to court where the footage had over 15,000 views on youtube.

Thanks to Monkreadusuk for the information.

Kent

Kent Police only look into an incident if it could go to the Crown Prosecution Service, so no letters or visits from police officers. Otherwise it is automatically closed (without looking at the footage). Helmet camera footage isn’t seen as an ‘independent witness’.

Thanks to maidstoneonbike for the information

London / Greater London

Reporting general incidences

In London we are lucky enough to have the RoadSafe London reporting system. A simple web based form which goes straight to the Road Crime Intelligence Unit which is staffed by experienced traffic officers. They have the capability to view youtube videos and will watch videos submitted to them via the form. This form and unit is not aiming for prosecutions, if the incident is particularly bad then it is best to do the paper form method mentioned below.
RoadSafe London look to educate people in a simple way, by sending them letters. This has a noticeable impact as a few video camera cyclists have seen offenders a few weeks later and their driving has been near perfect the second time.
Reports are recorded on a database so repeat offenders are easily spotted.

Reporting serious incidences

These will need to be reported at a Police station, it can be done at any station in London or Greater London. Fill out form 207 Road Traffic Collision form, burn a copy of the whole incident on DVD or CD and take it and the form to a police station. Some of the form may not be applicable, just leave it out. I was advised by a traffic officer from RoadSafe London to fill out form 207 with this incident which resulted in the owner of the vehicle being prosecuted.

[Do you have more information about RoadSafe London or how to report incidences in London?]

Northumbria

In Northumbria they cant view videos at there call centres, not sure of the police station never used it. however they always send an officer round to view the video and the officer normally comes round the next day or the night of reporting it. Normally sorted in a few hours unless when they knock on the drivers door they dont get an answer. The police force round me is great.
easy to contact using 101 number or email.
10/10 for my police force

Thanks to PilotInCommand100 for this information

Sussex

Operation Crackdown is run by Sussex police and allows you to report anti-social and dangerous driving online.

Operation Crackdown will only take action against drivers that are reported more than once.

Thanks to SheffieldCyclist for information on Operation Crackdown.

[Do you have more information about Operation Crackdown or how to report incidences in Sussex?]

Surrey

Drive SMART allows road users in Surrey to report road incidences to Surrey Police.

[Do you have more information about Drive SMART or how to report incidences in Surrey?]

 

Have we missed your area? Do you have information on how you can report incidences in your area? Get in touch with us and we can update the post.