Another attack against YouTube channel through abuse of the report function

On April 7th, I got an email about a removal of content from my YouTube channel, which was a recording of multiple people teabagging other players in Destiny (for PlayStation 3) recorded back in 2015 (it took me a while, but I was eventually able to locate my backup of the video, which was an exportation from Twitch, so the original better quality version is likely still on Twitch), which came through while I was trying to get some last minute tasks done in Warframe (which unfortunately I was unable to complete before the weekly reset).  It was these particular attacks why I made it a point to back up each & every video on YouTube/Twitch & link everything over to Steam to preserve the descriptions of each video, the latter I would suspect is what lead to it getting hit with the mass of Steam trolls apparently still looking for ways to penalize me over my online content (ousting people for who they are based on their actions in games or on various sites).

Note that this isn't the first time one of these videos have been hit with a takedown in the past (the first one being back in 2015), however there was never a publication about it to WonderGamer.net because it was successfully appealed & the removal reversed.  Of course I've been keeping backups for this particular reason, specifically so it could be re-uploaded if necessary (to another site if necessary, although it should still be on Twitch regardless).

If the appeal does fail, I do intend on re-uploading the video, however it will have a different title & description if I do (at least on YouTube if it gets re-uploaded there).

As with any other case, I document everything that happens & keep logs of it to not only publicize these injustices, but also to keep track of when it happens for myself.  On the latter point, this resets the 2-year monitoring date of the thread where these attacks started on Steam, now potentially ending on April 7th, 2026, including more IP bans are likely to be placed on my personal site (after I get a chance to go through raw access logs again & see if there has been any excessive access of the site, which I haven't been doing for a while, but knew I would ultimately have to when I saw certain names popping up in my IRC logs for my Twitch channel, those logs still being kept track of here).  As I stated, this is a potential ending date, which is likely only to be extended because the attacks clearly haven't ended yet & probably won't until arrests are made.

This will likely result in a restriction on YouTube for uploading larger videos (over 10 minutes) for 90 days as it has in the past, any new videos will be held onto & uploaded at a later date if necessary, making it a point that their publications were postponed due to the attacks that lead to the publication of this new channel update in each of those videos' descriptions.

This also puts a longer hold on the lockups that are affecting public joining of my Discord channel & the increased chat restrictions on my Twitch channel back to the new 2-year date previously mentioned in this article.  This means that new Discord members on my server will need to be issued a private invite link to join (and they'll only get that if I already trust them) & the chat restriction for Twitch accounts that don't have a verified phone number on their accounts will either have to be at least 6 months old or have followed for 3 or more months (previously at 1 week & 10 minutes prior to the mass attacks coming from Steam).

Needless to say, the restrictions in place on YouTube (non-visible channel ratings, blocked comments & my personal refusal to stream to YouTube due to easy-to-manipulate standards) will be a PERMANENT restriction, given YouTube is 1 of 2 sites where trolls have managed to manipulate the report functions in their favor (the other being Steam after the attack that succeeded on January 14th, 2024, which is now detailed on my Steam profile & WonderGamer.net).  This also gives further reason why even though I've been on a waiting list for Google Fiber in my neighborhood for over 8 years (since moving to where I'm living now, there were a few years prior to that at the previous residence as well), I will be unlikely to switch to them when it does become available because I don't know that I can trust them with my payment information (probably the only exception I was going to make for paying for anything through them, but if the appeal fails, I will be looking at other options for my ISP when fiber does become available in my neighborhood)...

Regarding streaming

The lack of decent internet has been the primary reason why streaming has ended (or at least postponed indefinitely) on my Twitch channel, after switching from Xfinity back to CenturyLink (only to find they had the same problems that caused me to switch from them 4 years prior when I came back) & finding they do not offer a high enough upload rate to be effective in streaming online multiplayer games (Xfinity offering 10 mbps where I live now with the Boost plan, CenturyLink only offering 3 mbps at a higher cost), but perhaps somewhat effective for offline games.  Within a year of moving to my current residence (in 2016), CenturyLink (previously Qwest) were going door to door to tell people they were going to be putting in fiber, of course I was with Xfinity at the time & had some choice words for them when they came by to tell people; 8 years later, CenturyLink STILL has not followed through with their claim of putting in fiber in the neighborhood.

My father told me some time last year that there was a low income credit that was being offered through Xfinity, something that had me considering going back to them, but only if they weren't going to try & seek the early termination fees I had to file an FCC complaint against (their own staff telling me there wasn't a current active contract, only finding out after I had already had CenturyLink installed that they were hitting me for almost $200 in early termination fees); these fees were dropped through the FCC complaint, but Xfinity still refused to admit the actual reason for dropping them, giving another reason for it to try & save face (these details were published to WonderGamer.net in a review detailing the FCC complaint against them).  However I am finding that this credit may be a part of a federal affordability plan that may be getting killed this year, so this may kill any plans I have on going back to Xfinity if that is the case...

Unfortunately I just don't have access to a decent upload rate in my area that doesn't cost a fortune, I have to deal with what I have & this meant I was limited to uploads to YouTube for online games, which unsurprisingly is being attacked yet again (with a possible new publication regarding the attack to my personal site if it doesn't get reversed, making sure to take screenshots of each screen for it's publication if needed).

I believe it's time I contact Scripps news & ask them why gaming sites such as Steam (as well as PSN, I'll get into details about this at a later date) have not been getting the attention it should be regarding dangerous online environments for children (if it's this bad for me, you can only expect how detrimental this would be for a child).  This was previously stated in the ticket I filed with staff on Steam (apparently the only way anything that would get them to step in on it, using the report functions on Steam was getting very little done, if anything) & they were already aware of my intentions if the attacks didn't stop; while they may have been limited on Steam, it hasn't ended there, so it's time to make this a matter for the news to cover & hopefully start extending laws against social platforms to gaming platforms that also have these issues.

Pre-publication update

Before I managed to get this update published, I received an email from YouTube giving a decision on the appeal & this was that they were not going to reverse the decision against the video they decided to remove.  After spending roughly 2 hours typing all the information above, I wasn't simply going to remove it, so it's going to stay.  I will attempt to reupload the video with a different title & description.  If that fails, I will link over the video from Twitch to the Steam description since the video is still there & find another site to upload the backup to (probably adding another link to my YouTube channel to another media platform for videos that were moved after YouTube chose to allow the manipulation of their system).  There will also be another publication to WonderGamer.net regarding the allow manipulation of the report function by YouTube staff (aka Google staff).

EDIT:  Perhaps I should consider bringing up YouTube to Scripps also in regards to dangerous social platforms...

Possible aid from doctors to file police report against Steam trolls

After speaking with my doctor today & apparently being able to convey the seriousness of the attacks from Steam, as well as my intentions to contact the police about the attacks (but only after I get the new articles published about the revictimization from Steam), she took concern about this & stated that I should get that police report filed as soon as possible, even offering to get me in contact with a Case Manager to aid in contacting the police & filing the report.  I told her I would like to attempt to file the report myself, but she said she was going to have a Case Manager contact me about it regardless & she wanted me to speak with the individuals in that office that I do speak with (Doctor, Therapist & Case Manager) every week (rather than once every month).  My next doctor appointment was scheduled to be in 2 weeks rather than the normal month later (give or take a week).

I will point out that this hasn't been discussed with only my Doctor & Therapist, but also friends, friends of friends, family, neighbors & so on.  The discussion has gotten some of them extremely concerned that I might take my own life in response to the continuing attacks from Steam (and Steam Management's decision to support it when they issued restrictions against my own Steam account rather than doing anything about the organized attacks from Steam aggressors).

I'm not going to lie, the thought had crossed my mind, but there are 2 reasons why I don't see myself going through with what concerns those I've talked to about this:

• I haven't been pushed far enough yet (not yet anyways, but I don't expect we're far off).
• From a troll's perspective, if their attacks push somebody to take their own life, this is the BIGGEST victory for them; I'm not ready to give them that victory.
  

Ultimately, now that my Doctor is getting involved in this & getting an individual involved that may have some contacts to get this taken care of quicker, I expect the police report will be filed by the end of next week (if not sooner, considering I intend on doing so myself as soon as the new Steam revictimization article & boycott is published, but I'll ultimately need to discuss this with the Case Manager if I haven't done so before they contact me & that may push it getting filed before the new publications are up).

What was to be expected (why comments were disabled)

Putting things into perspective on what was to be expected when I did publish new videos to YouTube & this is in continuation to the harassment, internet stalking & doxing from Steam users (what Steam wouldn't deal with themselves & instead chose to revictimize by issues restrictions against a victim of mass-harassment starting on their platform), you can see in under an hour after these were published, they were already getting downvoted.  The YouTube channel gained 6 new subscribers since this harassment on Steam started & it was expected that most (if not all) of those new subscriptions were likely Steam trolls from that thread utilizing new video alerts to quickly cause more problems.  Even some of the comments from the trolls on that Steam thread stating they were waiting for me to upload new videos (which already gave me indication this would happen).

Click for full-sized image

Ultimately, I expected the rating to drop much quicker (likely slower because of the time they were published, roughly 7 AM in the morning), but this is EXACTLY why comments were disabled on my YouTube channel (as well as I've stopped linking them to my Steam profile after being personally revictimized by Steam management).  Unfortunately this affects other options that were offered through comments (like higher quality downloadable versions on request or allowing users to respond when they were being called out for poor behavior, which had resulted in removing evidence videos in the past when a civil response is left), but in order to deal with the actions of the aggression from toxic Steam stalkers, this was a necessary step that now affects all viewers of the channel because of the illegal actions of those stalkers, and furthermore, Steam management's inactions to do anything notable to protect their users from it.

 

Steam supports harassment, additional permissions locked up

On January 14, 2024, I woke up to find that Steam had apparently put restrictions on my primary Steam account, which showed they supported the harassment coming from their users on their platform:

These actions from Steam made it clear that they were no longer a trustworthy source for purchasing video games anymore.  I had already been holding off on new purchases from Steam due to the cutoff of Windows 7 becoming known half-way through 2023 (the exception being a couple of Platinum purchases in Warframe), but this makes the decision set in stone, there won't be any more purchases being made through Steam anymore (I don't even feel I can trust them to have access to my payment information, so any F2P purchases that would have been made using the Steam API will be done directly through the company, no longer through Steam because Steam benefits on those purchases are no longer a bonus when I can't trust the company).

Once I found out about these restrictions, a number of things started happening to start negating information from my Steam profile, in addition to cutting ties from Steam over other sites:

• All other voluntary information, showcases & optional information was removed from my Steam profiles.
• A slew of comments were posted to my profile regarding this matter & additional steps that were being taken in response to it.
• All self-posted comments in the thread where these attacks that have been happening since October of 2023 were self-deleted.
• My Steam wishlist was cleared out, given it was clear I wouldn't be putting any more money into Steam after the revictimization. 
• My Steam profiles were stripped down to basic display options, no longer showing additional profile display options I had earned or purchased using account points.
  
• The Steam Facebook page was blocked.
• Referral traffic from Steam domains to my personal site are now blocked, resulting in a ban message.
  
• My Twitch channel was updated to disclose details about the revictimization & why streams of Steam-exclusive games won't be done on that channel anymore.  Streaming of Steam games may still happen, but links that would lead to purchases of Steam versions will no longer be provided when streaming those games.
• Chat restrictions on my Twitch channel now prohibit links to Steam domains.
• Chat restrictions for Twitch accounts that don't have a phone number on them now have the highest restriction available before they can participate in chat:
• Chatters without a verified phone number must have accounts older than 6 months (previously 1 week).
• Chatters without a verified phone number must have followed for more than 3 months (previously 10 minutes).
  
• A new command was added to the StreamElements bot that responds to mentions of Steam with details of why it's no longer a trustworthy gaming platform I'm willing to purchase from anymore.
• Giveaways were discontinued on my Twitch channel (given they only included Steam activation keys or giftable guest passes anyways)
• All Steam activation keys were disabled in the StreamElements store for my Twitch channel.
  
• Comments were FULLY disabled on my YouTube channel, along with a post in the Community section of the channel explaining why this happened.  This hid any existing comments that were on the channel, as well as negates any option of a user disputing a video calling them out for poor behavior in games.
  
• Open joining of my Discord channel was disabled, now only being allowed through private invitation using expiring invitation links.
  

Additional articles are expected to be published to WonderGamer.net giving details about the ongoing harassment, internet stalking, doxing by Steam users & revictimization from Steam management, but will have to come later when I have managed to catch up on some other tasks that have been getting put off for a few days already.

Despite removing the original comments from that thread where the targetted harssement started, that thread is still be monitored & I will continue to document the harassment, given that harassment is going to be evidence when this matter is reported to police seeking action against the criminal actions of Steam's users & potentional fines against the platforms that refused to do anything when reports were filed.

Discord access currently private invite only

After getting past messages fixed on my Discord server, I noticed that the one individual that was still on the server (joining when these attacks were active) had apparently passed around links to other Twitch channels that aided me in getting affiliate status (following me to a Discord server through one of those channels, attempting to add & message me, at which point I contacted the owner of that server, which resulted in them being banned from it because they had also attempted to do the same with them).  That individual was booted from my server & permanent invite links were revoked.  Until the attacks have died down, invites to my Discord server will be private invite only using expiring links.

Video ratings now a factor on visible comments

As of today, I am putting a new policy in place on what comments will be considered for publication after they are made on videos on my channel.  This change in policy come from the following factors:

• Continuing harassment over 3 months.
• Most comments left being abusive anyways.
• Any comments being accepted sparking more negative attention & retaliation.
• People following the channel only for the purpose of downvoting videos as soon as they are published (without even viewing them).
• Nearly ALL recent videos getting downvoted in a short time (one exception to this appears to be self-flagged age-restrictive videos getting hit less, which indicates these are mostly kids with nothing better to do with their time than being a problem & causing issues for others).
• A mis-information video being published on another channel (which I expect I will be publishing a review against if the report against it goes ignored by YouTube).
  

It may have been noticed that the public can not see ratings on videos on my channel other than their own vote, this was done intentionally because of expected harassment in retaliation to videos calling out others (or being used as evidence in violation reports) when running into griefers.  While the public can't see the calculative ratings, I can.  The abuse of the rating system doesn't hurt the channel because they aren't public, but after years of this type of abuse & extensive harassment that neither Steam, Twitch or YouTube management will do anything about it (without legal action taken), those ratings are now going to play a part on whether comments will go public or not (ultimately coming down to the only comments that will be going public will be by whitelisted individuals on the channel, everything else will just time out because they were never processed through moderation).

UPDATE:  Taking this a step further, comments have been disabled on the majority of videos with a less than a 50% positive rating.  Normally this won't affect existing comments, but in rare cases (particularly on videos published since the mass targeted harassment started from Steam & the Warframe community), comments may be hidden if the majority of what was received was abusive (whether they are still there should comments be re-enabled on the video at a later date is unknown).

Of course the hiding comments on videos plays a part in disallowing those that have been called out to clear up any possible miscommunication of their actions.  In most cases the normal response is to retaliate against the video through abusive comments, however there have been rare cases where they may apologize for their actions & I'm willing to work with them in changing the visibility of the video (or at least the listing of it).

The most recent of these situations being with a Warframe player (of who shall remain unnamed) who replied to the video apologizing for killing of a Simaris target when the video went public & used in a report against them; the video was set to unlisted, removed from the Warframe Wall of Shame playlist & I gave additional information so they could educate themselves on what the scanning of Simaris targets was (referring them to the official wiki).  There has also been the rare apology or clear up of comments over both Destiny & Dragonball Xenoverse (both of which I don't play anymore).

Given there are now people that are following the channel for the sole purpose of immediately downvoting a video as soon as it's published, their actions will result in comments getting disabled fairly quickly & if the individual in question does attempt to reach out to clear up their actions with an apology, this venue of contact will be cut off by those that are abusing the comment & rating systems on YouTube (that means the video stays up permanently, even if the player attempts to make civil contact).

Ironically, some of the people mentioned in videos later became whitelisted on the channel after a civil response (once again, not going to mention names), which is going to restrict possibility of new individuals being whitelisted on the channel (which bypasses comment moderation before being published, however comments can still be addressed if out of line later) when the option to leave a comment is revoked through the actions of hostile abusers, the exception being that people I already know ahead of time may still get whitelisted directly without having to leave a comment.

Forced YouTube ads, how I respond to them

YouTube recently started cracking down on people using security protocols on their site, regardless of whether they were being used to block ads or not.  I personally find mid-video ads intrusive & many times I do not finish watching the video once one destroys the experience for me, usually voting down the video for a ruined experience & finding something else to do.  For this reason I usually stuck to watching YouTube videos on my PC & rarely used the Shield TV, game system, mobile or tablet apps.

The recent change now blocks the player from even running, giving you a 3 video grace period, however that gets counted down even if you didn't start the video (refresh the page even if your browser prevented the video from auto-starting & you still get docked on the unstarted video).  This even affects videos that are not monetized & do not have ads on them (as with my own videos, which I will be making a point NEVER to monetize my channel with this type of bullshit being forced on users).

My response to having to disable my security plugins on YouTube lowers my trust rating of YouTube (which is likely going to be updated to state as much in my reviews of the site) & additionally leaves me open to not finishing videos as a result of intrusive mid-video ads (if I even decide to watch videos on YouTube anymore, I know I'll be looking at other sites for videos to watch before considering similar/same videos on YouTube).  If I do decide to continue watching videos on YouTube, I will continue to vote down EVERY video that is interrupted with mid-video ads.  This ultimately means that ALL monetized videos over a few minutes will be getting down-voted as a result of YouTube's insistence that you either pay their premium plan or you have to deal with intrusive ads that don't allow you to finish what you are trying to watch (or just go to another service to watch the same videos; quite frankly there's a reason I have subscriptions to other paid streaming services over YouTube).

I will be attempting to find another service to upload new videos to (as well as I have backups of EVERYTHING I have on YouTube, so I can always move them to that new service once I find something else that has an acceptable platform).  Additionally I will likely be looking to persuade Steam into allowing other video sharing services to be used on user's profile pages (which probably won't go anywhere, I know my attempts to get them to allow Twitch has been a dead end).

I've been waiting for Google Fiber in my neighborhood since I moved here in 2016, being on that notification list of availibility for almost 10 years since I moved into my previous residence.  I have refused to put my payment information on ANY Google service since they allowed the attacks from Bandai/Namco targeting a link on the live streaming page of my channel that never got removed after the first attack (getting hit once again a month later even when the live channel was not even active, this time not allowing an appeal to be processed; I have had live streaming on my YouTube channel disabled ever since & do not mess with any other live channels on YouTube because that function was targeted on my own channel).  I've been saying that if Google Fiber were to become available in my area, this might be the thing that ends my boycott against paying into Google services.  However with what has happened with ads on YouTube, I don't know that I will even be switching to Google Fiber IF it ever becomes available in my area, I am much more likely to just switch back to Xfinity/Comcast or stick with CenturyLink (provided the upload rate is good enough, which has the primary reason why live streams on Twitch ended; I don't really want to stick with the piss-poor customer service of CenturyLink, but right now my mindset is I don't know that I can trust Google-owned services with my payment information.