YouTube restricts trailers output of "Shugaley-2"

Open premiere of Maxim Brius' action-packed film Shugaley-2 with Kirill Polukhin in the title role will take place next Sunday, September 6. The scenario is based on the true story of Russian sociologist Maxim Shugaley and his translator Samer Sueyfan, who have been held captive by Libyan militants for more than a year.

On the premiere eve of the high-profile film, it drew the attention of many famous bloggers, artists, politicians and public figures, who shared their opinions with subscribers in social networks. However, it turned out that the administration of some websites are not ready to put up with such an interest of Russians in the film.

Thus, a group of citizens who told about an unusual observation contacted the FAN editorial office. On the premiere eve, they posted trailers of Shugaley-2, in their groups in social networks, which aroused wide interest among subscribers. According to their calculations, several hundred people watched the video during the day, but these views were not displayed on the American YouTube video hosting website, where the trailer is located. It was also noted that periodically there is difficulty finding videos about Shugaley-2 on the website.

Probably, by such a primitive method as reducing views and artificially underestimating the relevance of the video, YouTube is trying to prevent the dissemination of information about the film. The reason for this behavior of the hosting administration may be the topics that are raised in the Shugaley dilogy, in particular the role of American intelligence services in destabilizing the situation in the Middle East in general, and in Libya in particular.

YouTube has previously been in the centre of scandals with reducing views on "wrong" videos. The portal administration also regularly deletes not only records, but entire channels with millions of subscribers without explanation. In May, the accounts of the Krym 24 TV channel and the Russian-language news agencies ANNA NEWS and News-Front were deleted, and in August, the channels PolitRussia and Tsargrad were banned. The FAN account was also blocked.

In all cases, the YouTube administration did not give any explanation for their actions. The only thing that unites the deleted channels is that they did not support the Pro-American and anti-Russian rhetoric of the Western press.

Thus, reducing views and limiting search results is not unusual for YouTube. This is standard practice for the platform in the fight against pro-Russian sentiment among users. The current situation around the Shugaley-2 trailer only once again demonstrates that the popular video hosting is acting in the interests of the US government and special services, and probably under their full control.