YouTube Shorts will block links because spammers ruin everything good – 9to5Google

YouTube Shorts has earned its place as one of the best short-form video offerings – aka TikTok clones – partially because it gets a lot of things right. One of the handy parts of YouTube Shorts both for creators and viewers was the ability to share links, but that’s ending because of spam. As announced in a forum post today, YouTube will ban certain placements of links across the platform starting on August 31. This includes, primarily, the removal of clickable links in prominent locations in YouTube Shorts such as comments and descriptions. Why the change? It all boils down to spam. YouTube explains that links in Shorts are being used to drive clicks to “malware, phishing, or scam-related content” and that existing systems to handle this sort of spam don’t seem to be quite enough. Links will start going away on August 31 with a gradual rollout of the removal. Social links on desktop channel banners, a feature that’s been in place for years and years now, will also be going away. Starting on August 31st, 2023, links in Shorts comments, Shorts descriptions, and links in the vertical live feed will no longer be clickable – this change will
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