One final post on the saga of YouTube suspending my account.
I was willing to just wait out the 6 month suspension and let it go at that. But, I was contacted by YouTube on Dec. 22, 2011 and notified that my account:
“has been found to have violated our Community Guidelines. Your account has now been terminated. Please be aware that you are prohibited from accessing, possessing or creating any other YouTube accounts.”
They again sited the video review of the children’s trike as the offending video.
I replied to their email with this response:
I am absolutely shocked at your decision. This video is a review of a children’s toy. How could it possibly violate community standards? This seems incredibly arbitrary and your links to other YouTube resources give me no more information whatsoever. I bet someone just had a bad day.
Why did my account go from 6 mo. suspension, as stated in the original email about this matter, to termination?
Are you aware there are at least 7 other videos on YouTube right now that are an exact duplicate of the one that you flagged for terminating my account?
I feel very very wronged by your decision. This is unbelievable.
That was that. From everything I had read about suspended/terminated accounts on various forums and blogs, it was pretty clear there was nothing more I could do to get my account reinstated.
Then on Jan. 6, 2012, out of the blue, I received this email from YouTube:
Hi there,
Thank you for your email.
After a review of your account, we have confirmed that your YouTube
account is not in violation of our Terms of Service. As such, we have
unsuspended your account. This means your account is once again active and
operational.If you forgot your password, please visit this link to reset it:
http://www.youtube.com/account_recovery
Regards,
The YouTube Team
Unbelievable. I do feel relieved. The whole thing really bugged me because I hadn’t done anything wrong. I guess I really don’t like unfair, arbitrary decisions with no recourse.
So for all the other folks out there who have had their YouTube accounts terminated for no reason, there is hope. Hopefully you will also receive an email someday announcing the “unsuspension” of your account.


