The War On Fake News

Finally, the major social media tech players have taken conspiracy theorist and lunatic asshole Alex Jones off the air for good, and are permanently banning him from their platforms after all.

YouTube has removed Alex Jones' page, following bans earlier Monday from Apple and Facebook. 

The Alex Jones Channel, which counts 2.4 million subscribers, still appeared in YouTube search results by midday Monday, but presented only a take-down notice when users clicked in. 

"This account has been terminated for violating YouTube's Community Guidelines," the notice says. 

Google had previously declined to comment on the InfoWars host's standing, but said in a statement to CNBC in response to the removal of the page: "All users agree to comply with our Terms of Service and Community Guidelines when they sign up to use YouTube. When users violate these policies repeatedly, like our policies against hate speech and harassment or our terms prohibiting circumvention of our enforcement measures, we terminate their accounts." 

YouTube counts "strikes" against pages for posts that violate the company's policies. Jones received a strike in July when he posted four videos that violated YouTube policies against child endangerment and hate speech, the company said in a statement to CNBC.
A page with one strike against it is suspended from live streaming for 90 days, YouTube said, but Jones attempted to circumvent the suspension by live streaming on other channels. As a result, his page was terminated, the company said. 

The InfoWars YouTube page, which has significantly fewer subscribers, was still live as of noon ET. 

Jones and his controversial radio show have for several weeks been at the center of a debate around fake news and misinformation on digital platforms. Facebook and CEO Mark Zuckerberg drew criticism last month for declining to remove the InfoWars page.
Music streaming service Spotify removed InfoWars podcasts last week, and Apple and Facebook each cited violations of company policies regarding hate speech in banning Jones on Monday.

And it's that 2.4 million subscribers figure that YouTube and Twitter and Facebook didn't want to antagonize.  Like it or no, that is a big chunk of ad revenue to lose, not to mention the backlash from Jones's followers.

But Jones was the guy yelling fire in a crowded theater every day.  He is one of the major reasons why Russian attacks on democracy in 2016 worked, because of the pervasive rot that Jones brought to our democracy.  He is the fake news we need to get rid of.

And it looks like he's taken a major hit.  It's something that should have happened years ago, frankly.  Looking the other way on their own terms of service violations is what tech companies specialize in when you get enough followers.

See ya, Alex.