Smosh Suspended

After nearly 3 years of making sketches for YouTube; most subscribed channel, Smosh, was suspended on July 30. The above video was posted on Smosh's alternate account, IanH. Their channel is back now, as of August 2, but there is still no explanation as to why their account was suspended. I visited the Smosh forum to see if I could find anything out. While sifting through pages of childish comments written by teenagers, I found that the suspicions among Smosh fans generally have to do with either the old Pokeman music video, or a shot of the Toy Story movie case in the latest video, raising hairs with Viacom.

YouTube drama-stirrer, Renetto, has a different theory. Renetto's latest drama battle has to do with the DMCA (digital media copyright act), and with YouTube's paranoid gestures to comply with the DMCA, often at the expense of content providers. Renetto attributes Smosh's DMCA complaint to the ease which one can file a complaint, and to YouTube's "shoot first ask questions later" attitude. He believes that some random person filed a DMCA complaint on Smosh, intitiating the suspension by trigger-happy YouTube. Renetto also seems to imply that he was the person who made the complaint, in an attempt to bring the problem to YouTube's attention. He states that it would be a perfect move due to the fact that Smosh is highly visible, even outside the YouTube community, and a false claim resulting in their suspension is sure to draw the eyes of YouTube.

Smosh still has yet to post the official explanation as to why their account was suspended on any of their YouTube channels, Smosh.com, or on their Myspace page. They might not even know at this point.