Youtube, once a beacon of free speech, has declined into a steaming pile of censorship of late.  The time is now for us to do something.  Call them!

Google: 650-253-0000,  Option 5 for Youtube M – F, 8:00 AM - 5:00 PM PDT

The most recent offense they have committed is to nuke the Brownells channel.  If there is a more education oriented gunsmithing channel then I don't know what it would be.  And while my message to them is certainly to restore Brownells channel, I will continue to call them at least once each month until they restore freedom.

The only thing a tolerant society cannot tolerate is intolerance.

This was a big brouhaha over the weekend.  First,  Tom Gresham's radio program had Mr. Brownell on claiming yootoob  had taken their channel down without warning.
Then I got on the 'net and yup,  it was down ---then,oooops,  it was BACK UP ON THE NET AGAIN!

At this point it seems a glitch or IT error did this,  or a hack, maybe?   I don't really know.
Now,  various financial institutions are conniving to deny services of one sort or another to gun companies,  that is absolutly true.
I think Mr. Brownell and Tom Gresham,  et al,   were under an impression that the Brownell channel had been deliberately removed when it was a glitch or hack.

Yes,  yootoob can deny what they choose  .....  but we can scream and yell and whine about it too.

But let's not.  This time.

I give up.

Not "free" as in "natural right".  Free as in uncensored. 

The point of this was motivate some action on our part to make them aware of the threat of damage to their bottom line.

Your most powerful tool as a consumer is hurting their bottom line. It might be more effective to try and figure out a way to do so instead of focusing on calls etc.

I agree that some actions might be more beneficial than others, any action is better than no action.  This is a thing to do if you don't know a more effective action.  Or in addition to more effective actions.

But in the absence of a better action, I will call them and complain from time to time.

The only real long term solution is for there to be multiple other providers of a similar service to provide competition and break YouTube's effective monopoly in this arena, but that requires not only people willing to run said services (D-Tube, b____ute, ect) but also that content providers start migrating there and viewers start searching these alternatives as their primary  site rather than a backup.
Two obvious obstacles to this-
1.- YT, through it's parent G&&gle, has not only the lion's share of the market currently but an unfair advantage when searches on a topic are run.   I think a breakup of this monolith, along the lines of breaking up Ma Bell back in the day, would be a reasonable approach as the Internet is a communication system.
2.- Viewers are lazy and despite their grumbles still go to YT first to search for content. As a result content providers don't appear to want to pivot onto the alternative platforms while they're still in their infancy and risk loosing "views".    I'm reminded of the song, "There's a Hole in the Bucket". 

Arguments have been made that YouTube is the modern towns square for purposes of voicing one's opinion to the public, but I find that argument flawed. The proverbial town square is/was public property (municipal, owned by "the people"), not privately owned.   A better analogy would be that YT is/was along the lines of the most popular pub in which people gathered to voice their opinions on varying topics, but the owners have now decided to exercise their right as property owners to  bar topics of conversation they don't wish to be associated with. 

LowKey,

There actually are "multiple other providers" that specialize in gun content YT won't host, but they are not as polished as YT, and they can include some unusual stuff as well.

https://gunstreamer.com/

https://videos.utahgunexchange.com/

I wasn't aware of those two in particular, but I've known of Full30, D-Tube, b____ute, and a few others.
The problem is that those alternatives are still so very much only a tiny sliver of the content marketplace due to YouTube's early head start over them (not unfair), and the advantages YT gains by being a part of the Alphabet conglomerate which owns G**gle and so many other major lynchpins of the Internet. 

In an ideal world, free market forces would level things out, but we don't actually live in a world with a free market. Alphabet has a deck stacked in their favor through politics and influence gained by campaign contributions. 

From my perspective it seems to be the electronic world repeating the period of the Robber Barons. 

The #1 rule of the internet: people go where the content is.  If a significant chunk of the weapons community makes a concerted effort to pu their content on a different platform, the search results will reflect it.

Right,but because the massively overwhelming majority of content is on YT it seems that people are reluctant to put their stuff up exclusively on a non-YT platform.  As a result, when folks search for a video on any given subject the first result is a YT post, the second an alternative platform, people click on the YT posting.  Until you can't find something on YT, the alternative platform is going to be lagging behind, and as long as it's lagging behind the providers will keep posting on YT so as to avoid loosing exposure. Catch 22.

Not to mention that it would be a bad thing if firearms related content were only available on firearms related platforms...preaching to the choir isn't a way to gain converts.   
Long and short of it, if the concept of Freedom of Speech and Expression is to flourish on the Internet YT has to be defeated as the Goliath that it is. Preferably by a multitude of Davids.

The beauty of yooutube is that I can go from two gun matches to heavy metal covers played on bagpipes to how to fix whatever.

My issue with the taking down of providers is that the terms of service for providers is not real clear. 

Also yoooutube is a hosting site, not a content creator.  They can chose who they host, but if they limit what content they will host, then they need to be clear on that.  I think that it is an issue on how easy it is to find nudity on yooutube even though that also violates the terms of service. 

I have issues with full30 in that it will not load videos on my internet connection while yoooutube will load the exact same video at the same quality level.

Bloke on the Range was also taken down for a few days, and then back.  I heard that no reasons were given either way.  The couple of his videos I watched were European WWI weapons at the range.  Kinda like Forgotten Weapons, but from Switzerland IIRC.

Forgotten Weapons could have been taken down because of his auction house videos.  He links to his website, then to the "sales" site, and so far that seems to meet the ToS.