YouTube has started testing a feature similar to X’s “community notes” for videos uploaded to the platform. With the new feature called “Notes” YouTube, allows viewers to prove that a song is a parody and not an original, or that videos shared as a current event are actually old footage. Initially, this feature will only be available on mobile devices in the US and in English.

The new feature is crucial as the 2024 US elections approach, with a lot of disinformation content being shared. Misinformation was a major problem in the 2020 presidential election With the rise of artificial intelligence This problem is expected to become even worse in the 2024 elections. With this feature, YouTube wants to minimize the spread of misinformation on its platform.

This is what YouTube’s Notes feature will look like:

During the testing phase, a limited number of users are invited to annotate misleading videos. To be invited to the test, the user must be active on YouTube and have a YouTube channel with a good track record for copyright infringement and compliance with the Community Guidelines. Viewers in the US will start seeing the annotations in the videos in the coming weeks and months. During testing, external users also evaluate the usefulness and accuracy of the annotations. YouTube, this feedback will use it to train their systems.

If third parties find the comments useful, they will appear below the videos. Viewers will then indicate whether the note is ‘helpful’, ‘somewhat helpful’ or ‘not helpful’. They will also explain why they found it useful or not useful. YouTube decides which notes to publish based on the scores received. will train the algorithm. This system will continually improve as more notes are submitted and different types of videos are evaluated. As YouTube develops the feature, it will determine whether it makes sense to roll it out officially.