The platform is made to appeal to a family-friendly audience, and has been described as a massively multiplayer online game (MMO). By 2020, over 5,000 games on Roblox had been played over a million times, and over 20 had been played over one billion times. The platform has also been used to host virtual concerts and events, as well as advergames. While Roblox is free-to-play, it features in-game purchases done through its virtual currency known as "Robux", and game developers on the platform are able to create items that cost Robux.
Ice Scream: Horror Game
It was determined early on in development that the two would design Roblox to rely entirely on user-generated content, only providing the tools necessary for people to develop games, as well as the server hosting later in development. Starting in December 2025 in certain territories and January 2026 worldwide, age verification will be required for all forms of communication on Roblox, including in-game chat (text and voice), direct messages, and joining communities. To verify their age, users can either use an ID or have a video of themselves analyzed by age estimation software. Messages that are sent on the platform are subject to a chat filtering system that automatically censors inappropriate language. The engine and all games made on Roblox predominantly uses Luau, a dialect of the Lua 5.1 programming language.
YouTube's $3M fund for creative professionals in L.A.
On August 5, 2015, YouTube patched the formerly notorious behavior which caused a wettzo casino review video's view count to freeze at "301" (later "301+") until the actual count was verified to prevent view count fraud. In 2017, viewers on average watched YouTube on mobile devices for more than an hour every day. In January 2012, it was estimated that visitors to YouTube spent an average of 15 minutes a day on the site, in contrast to the four or five hours a day spent by a typical US citizen watching television.
new features to help YouTube content shine on TV screens
Also announced in 2022 were age ratings for games, a system created by the company to increase the platform's appeal to the young adult audience, which was the fastest growing demographic on Roblox, by allowing for more mature experiences. In May 2013, Nintendo began enforcing its copyright ownership and claiming the advertising revenue from video creators who posted screenshots of its games. While some users praised the move as a way to discourage trolls, others felt that hiding dislikes would make it harder for viewers to recognize clickbait or unhelpful videos and that other features already existed for creators to limit bullying.
Revenue to copyright holders
- On August 5, 2015, YouTube patched the formerly notorious behavior which caused a video’s view count to freeze at “301” (later “301+”) until the actual count was verified to prevent view count fraud.
- Senate introduced a resolution condemning Joseph Kony 16 days after the “Kony 2012” video was posted to YouTube, with resolution co-sponsor Senator Lindsey Graham remarking that the video “will do more to lead to (Kony’s) demise than all other action combined.”
- As with games, avatar items on Roblox are mainly user-generated, though most items on the platform were made by Roblox themselves for most of the platform’s history.
- YouTube had $29.2 billion ads revenue in 2022, up by $398 million from the prior year.
- After Knowledge Revolution was acquired by MSC Software, the two left the company and Baszucki began investing in earlier social media sites like Friendster.
In late October 2023, YouTube began cracking down on the use of ad blockers on the platform. On February 16, 2023, Wojcicki announced that she would step down as CEO, with Neal Mohan named as her successor. In October, YouTube announced that they would be rolling out customizable user handles in addition to channel names, which would also become channel URLs.
Roblox
It also offers YouTube Premium, a paid subscription option for watching content without ads. Meanwhile, joining KPop Demon Hunters on the top songs list are two appearances by Kendrick Lamar ("Luther" with SZA, and "tv off") and two Bruno Mars collaborations – one with Lady Gaga ("Die With A Smile") and another with Rosé ("APT"). The lists highlight how very popular conservative political views are online, with Shawn Ryan, Joe Rogan and Theo Von among the top 10 podcasts, and the late influencer Charlie Kirk making both the top U.S creators list and the top U.S. trending topics list. YouTube Recap enables users to see and share a summary of their individual viewing and listening habits throughout the year. Connie Francis' "Pretty Little Baby" was relegated to the B-side of a single when the American singer originally released the song in 1962. We believe a more effective approach is one that empowers parents, rather than stripping away their choices, and allows kids to continue to derive the immense benefits of digital environments while protecting them from harm.
- In 2023, YouTube’s advertising revenue totaled $31.7 billion, a 2% increase from the $31.1 billion reported in 2022.
- They also criticized the platform’s virtual economy, comparing the limited collectibles market to gambling.
- In the United States as of November 2020, and June 2021 worldwide, YouTube reserves the right to monetize any video on the platform, even if their uploader is not a member of the YouTube Partner Program.
- In response to EU officials requesting that such services reduce bandwidth to make sure medical entities had sufficient bandwidth to share information, YouTube and Netflix said they would reduce streaming quality for at least thirty days as to cut bandwidth use of their services by 25% to comply with the EU’s request.
- In May 2015, Roblox released an update that adjusted its physics engine to be more smooth and realistic, rather than being oriented around blocks.
- The Netherlands and Belgium have restricted certain games on the platform due to their regulations on in-game “lootboxes”, which give out items based on random or unknown chances, to reduce children’s exposure to gambling.
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In 2010, YouTube temporarily released a "TEXTp" mode which rendered video imagery into ASCII art letters "in order to reduce bandwidth costs by $1 per second." YouTube has cited the effectiveness of Content ID as one of the reasons why the site's rules were modified in December 2010 to allow some users to upload videos of unlimited length. On November 1, 2016, the dispute with GEMA was resolved, with Google content ID being used to allow advertisements to be added to videos with content protected by GEMA. On November 11, 2021, after testing out this change in March of the same year, YouTube announced it would start hiding dislike counts on videos, making them invisible to viewers. On September 23, 2025, YouTube parent company Alphabet announced that it would reinstate creators that were banned for spreading misinformation about COVID-19 and the 2020 U.S. presidential election.
In July 2020, Baszucki formally announced plans and goals for Roblox developers and users to build a "metaverse", a concept that refers to several interconnected virtual worlds. Around this time, Roblox began further working towards a vision that Baszucki described as a 30-year long plan where in which users have a "fully-fledged digital identity" in an environment such as Roblox. Between March and April, Roblox reported having over 120 million monthly active players, which by that point the company said included over half of all kids in the United States that were under the age of 16. The platform's growth was further accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic beginning in 2020, where lockdowns led tens of millions of children to use Roblox as a means of communication. By December 2016, the platform had about 30 million monthly active users, a number that had increased to 90 million by April 2019. From 2013 to 2014, Roblox released several updates to their development tools, adding new features.
This version initially only released with selection of 15 games chosen by Roblox staff, due to concerns regarding Entertainment Software Rating Board standards. In 2008, the Roblox Corporation stopped actively creating their own games to demonstrate the platform's capabilities, becoming entirely reliant on user-created games. Games that were made by the community early in the platform's history included paintball games, haunted houses and model trains that players could ride. Baszucki and Cassel worked alone while making the earlier versions of Roblox, and created their own games on the platform before the creation tools were completed.
Although critic reviews for Roblox have been positive, it has faced heavy criticism for its content moderation, which in turn has led to a large amount of sexual or politically extremist material on the platform. Using the platform's "Developer Exchange" program, creators on the platform are able to exchange their earned Robux for real-world currency. In April 2017, YouTube set an eligibility requirement of 10,000 lifetime views for a paid subscription.