The internet is mostly an uncensored place, and this can either be a blessing or a curse depending on the person, situation, and content. If you've been noticing a little "Not Yet Rated" or "All Audiences" next to the name on videos you've been watching on Vimeo, you might be feeling a bit out of the loop. Vimeo is extremely lenient on the type of content allowed on the site, and for good reason: art is very subjective. That doesn't mean, however, that all art is appropriate for all audiences at all times of the day, and as a way to help you identify the type of content you're about to watch, Vimeo is introducing Content Ratings for its videos.
Here is a portion of the post from the Vimeo Staff Blog:
There are sometimes boobs, blood, and curse words on Vimeo. And other stuff.
Though often essential to artistic expression, so-called “mature content” can be decidedly less essential for certain audiences, such as children, office workers with their computer speakers turned up too loud, and people who’d rather not encounter particular things. To make sure Vimeo remains accessible to all audiences, we’re introducing content ratings, which let viewers know what’s in the video they’re about to watch. All videos on Vimeo will now have a little badge next to their title: “All Audiences,” “Mature,” or “Not Yet Rated.”
This means we’ll ask creators to tell us if there’s nudity, violence, or illegal substances (e.g., plutonium) in their videos, which can still be uploaded to Vimeo as long as they comply with our Guidelines. For those who never upload videos with mature content, it’s easy to mark everything as appropriate for all audiences in your global video settings.
Censorship is always a very sensitive subject, but that's certainly not what is happening here. I think it's definitely a positive step for Vimeo, as they generally have a much more open policy on what kinds of videos are allowed as opposed to YouTube. I think this is the way things should be, as users should have a chance to be able to decide what they think is appropriate for themselves given their particular situation. For example, many workplaces have strict policies regarding the types of content that are considered appropriate, and in those cases it helps to know ahead of time whether something might not be work safe.
The thing that makes a policy like this work in my opinion -- though I haven't uploaded a video since they've enabled this feature -- is that you could just leave all of your videos "Not Yet Rated" and thus not take part in the process. I think that's the best compromise for those who feel there might be a stigma attached to their video if they label it as "Mature."
We'll just have to wait and see how this is received by the community, and whether it becomes a permanent part of the Vimeo platform.
What do you think about all of this? Are you OK with the labeling, or do you believe it makes videos stand out in a particularly negative way? Do you think Vimeo should introduce a wider range of ratings for the videos? Let us know in the comments.
Link: Introducing Content Ratings for Videos [SFW] -- Vimeo Staff Blog
