Google-owned YouTube finally seems to be getting serious about AI slop on its platform. A couple of updates don’t seem like a lot, but the changes are actually pretty significant.

Some gestures were made last year, when YouTube terminated two popular channels posting fake AI-generated movie trailers.

The problem didn’t go away, though. There are no official statistics on the number of AI-generated videos on YouTube, but the numbers appear to be rapidly growing.

In fact, a recent study suggested that over 21% of YouTube Shorts videos may be created using AI. A third of these videos could be considered brainrot, a type of AI-generated, low-quality content that creates the effect of corroding the viewer’s intellectual state.

Clearly, more serious and urgent solutions are needed. And this week, YouTube did announce changes to how it would start labeling AI-generated content.

Firstly, the labels will be more prominent. Traditional YouTube videos will show an AI label right below the video player: they won’t just be hidden in the video description.

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Secondly, since the problem is mostly visible on Shorts, an AI label will be displayed as an overlay at the bottom of the video.

“By moving these labels onto the main stage, viewers get the context they need at a glance. This is now the single label format for all photorealistic and meaningfully AI-altered or generated content on YouTube,” the platform said in a blog post.

Skeptics keep saying that, pretty soon, online platforms will have to label original rather than AI-generated content because there will simply be a lot more slop out there.

We’ll see how it goes. Skeptics keep saying that, pretty soon, online platforms will have to label original rather than AI-generated content because there will simply be a lot more slop out there.

More significantly, though, YouTube said it would now also begin scanning for signs of “photorealistic” AI usage so it can automatically label suspected videos. Previously, AI labels were applied only if the uploader chose to disclose them.

If a creator thinks their content was incorrectly identified as AI-generated, they will be able to update the disclosure status in YouTube Studio. However, disclosures will remain permanent in a handful of cases, including:

• Content created using YouTube’s own AI tools, like Veo or Dream Screen.
• Content containing C2PA metadata indicating they were fully generative AI.

“In a world where AI is changing what’s possible, our goal is simple: make it as easy as possible for creators and viewers to have the right information,” said YouTube.

However, the company is not explicitly discouraging AI use. In the same blog post, YouTube notes that a disclosure label – although indeed viewed by some as a mark of shame – doesn’t change how a video is recommended or whether it’s eligible to earn money.

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