The YouTube Kids app on smart TVs will no longer work in July, and that is worrying
One of the most parent-friendly things YouTube ever did was create YouTube Kids, a standalone app for parents on the best smart TVs and mobile devices. But now it’s being disabled on TVs, according to a Google support page (via FlatpanelsHD).
Starting in July, you’ll need to give your kids access to YouTube’s main app and set up child profiles. Mobile platforms aren’t affected yet, but it seems likely that the writing is on the wall, even if it’s written in chalk.
The move makes me happy that my children are older now, because it is an extra worry. YouTube Kids wasn’t perfect and didn’t filter out all inappropriate content β ββthere was a period when some pretty gruesome Peppa Pig and Spider-Man videos were uploaded by some of the worst people in the world β but it had one crucial feature: it did not. don’t let the kids onto YouTube. For all its flaws, and there were a few, it created a walled garden away from the rest of YouTube, allowing you to be reasonably confident that your kids didn’t see anything they shouldn’t see: not just offensive or gruesome content , but also horrible people who say horrible things in a polite way.
I’m afraid YouTube won’t do that as effectively now.
Why the end of YouTube kids is worrying
As YouTube says about its kids app, “YouTube Kids has a much smaller amount of content available than YouTube’s main app and website.” And that is very important. The content is pre-filtered to make it as child-safe as possible. And the separate app means that on tablets and other mobile devices you can allow the kids app but not the main YouTube app, adding an extra layer of parental controls.
What that meant was that YouTube Kids was essentially the kiddie pool at your local leisure centre, a place where it was of course still your responsibility to make sure they were safe, but where the water was shallower and not as steep. YouTube, on the other hand, is the adult pool and someone keeps putting sharks in it.
To torture that metaphor a little further, this means child profiles are a bit like giving your kids buoyancy aids before throwing them into shark-infested waters.
I can’t imagine Google will change its mind on this, and I think it’s very likely that it will end the kids app on mobile platforms sooner or later. And for parents, I think you need to do three things: become much more familiar with the family safety features in YouTube profiles; consider additional content filtering in your operating system and/or third-party solutions; and expect to keep a closer eye on your children’s viewing habits than before.