After YouTube banned right-wing consipiracy theorist Alex Jones from broadcasting live for 90 days, you’d think that Alex Jones wouldn’t be broadcasting live to YouTube the very next day… right?
Wrong. His show Infowars is currently broadcasting live to YouTube, even as I write this sentence — because as AdAge reports, his livestreams are now being hosted by Ron Gibson, who describes his channel as part of Alex Jones’ Free Speech Systems network.
CNET understands that YouTube is removing these streams and revoking livestreaming access to channels that host them, but it hasn’t stopped Infowars yet. Though YouTube shut down a livestream at Ron Gibson’s primary YouTube channel, he merely set up a second YouTube channel and is pointing people there. (CNET won’t link directly to the Infowars stream.)
It’s not clear if YouTube will impose any further penalties — currently, Infowars has only one “strike” at YouTube, and it takes three strikes for a ban. Facebook, meanwhile, has given Jones a platform by saying his videos don’t violate its standards.
President Trump tweeted this morning to accuse Twitter of “shadow banning” prominent Republicans by demoting them in Twitter’s search box. That’s something Twitter characterized as a bug and quickly fixed, but it’s made supposed censorship by Silicon Valley platforms a hot topic for far-right personalities like Jones, who’s calling the topic “Big Tech’s Murder of Free Speech” today.
Now, as before, Infowars gets to be at the center of its own controversy.
Infowars didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment. Google didn’t immediately comment.
Update, 5:59 p.m. PT: YouTube appears to have shut down Gibson’s second livestream, shortly after CNET sent YouTube the link. The YouTube page now reads “This video has been removed for violating YouTube’s Terms of Service.”
