GodTube

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GodTube is a Christianity-oriented website where users can share their videos with strangers. The site could be compared the result of YouTube and Facebook breeding to produce a creepy and religious child. GodTube was formerly known as Tangle from 2009 to 2010 and is one of several Christian responses to popular websites, most of which failed miserably.[note 1] GodTube is not related to ChristianMingle, a Christian dating website, or CrossPaths, a Christian version of Tinder.Wikipedia The site is owned by Salem Media Group,Wikipedia a conservative media powerhouse that is most notable for its extensive network of radio stations broadcasting right wing blather and religious programming across the United States.

In April 2008, GodTube received venture capital funding of US $30m, which will presumably be used to build Jesus 2.0.[4]

The site includes often unintentionally amusing videos. Like many specialist Web 2.0 ventures, it uses a lot of content from already established sites. In this case, YouTube does quite a bit of the actual hosting, in a similar way to how wikis copy Wikipedia articles verbatim in order to quickly expand without doing much work.

Terms of use[edit]

GodTube is basically a YouTube knockoff, so it's interesting to compare its terms of use[5] with those published by YouTube.[6] YouTube requires that users grant them a non-exclusive license to reproduce user-generated content, including the right to produce derivative works. This also extends to YouTube users, so any user can download video content posted on the site, and use it to create derivative works. GodTube, being inspired by YouTube, has copied been inspired by these terms, although they've added a few of their own.

Blasphemy[edit]

GodTube forbids the posting of blasphemous material, which is probably why it's nowhere near as entertaining as YouTube. It's unclear how they address the complaint that Christianity is blasphemous from the perspective of some other religions.[note 2]

Content licensing[edit]

GodTube's terms of service formerly required that users sign away an unusually broad range of rights. The User Generated Content License is pretty long, even by Biblical standards, and reproduced below is a particularly troubling excerpt. Parts have been underlined for emphasis:

By Submitting User Content to the site you hereby grant to the Company a non-exclusive, royalty-free, sub-licenseable [sic], transferable and worldwide license to access, use, modify, perform, display, reproduce, copy, prepare derivative works of, transmit, publish and distribute User Content, and all patents, copyrights, trademarks and other proprietary rights therein, in connection with the Service and the Site and the business of the Company, including without limitation for promoting, transmitting and distributing the Site, the Services, or any part or derivative thereof, in and through any media and channels.

These terms went far beyond those needed for the rebroadcasting and repacking of videos for promotional purposes, since they required that users assign permission to use trademarks and patents. The broad phrase "the business of the Company" would mean that any patents demonstrated in a video could then be used in any line of business that they decided to enter. If Amazon were to upload video in which their one click shopping patent[7] was demonstrated, then they'd have to grant GodTube a licence for that patent, in which case GodTube could use it elsewhere on their site. This, combined with the creepiness, is probably why most of their content comes from end users, religious groups, and Christian bands. Yes, GodTube is as much fun as it sounds.

Prayer wall[edit]

GodTube formerly offered a prayer wall, in which users can request prayers from their fellow users. Comments are allowed on these prayers, so users can offer advice or just assure the original poster that they are remembering them when they're talking to the their deity, idol, or when writing a letter to Santa.

See also[edit]

External links[edit]

Notes[edit]

  1. ↑ "MyChurch" was a Christian response to YouTube,[1] which devolved into a spam site[2] and a church directory[3] before giving up the ghost.
  2. ↑ "We are all atheists about most of the gods humanity has imagined. Some of us just go one god further." — Richard Dawkins

References[edit]

  1. ↑ MyChurch, archive snapshot from 2009.
  2. ↑ MyChurch, archive snapshot from 2014.
  3. ↑ MyChurch, archive snapshot from 2019.
  4. ↑ GodTube Raises $30m for Jesus 2.0. Archived from readwriteweb.com, 6 May 2008.
  5. ↑ GodTube Community Guidelines.
  6. ↑ YouTube Terms of Service.
  7. ↑ Amazon's "one click patent"
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