[ubernostrum]

I don't really understand why so many people seem to see an entitlement issue here (other than knowing from other contexts how many people really strongly dislike this woman, and so might be looking for ways to blame the situation on her).

YouTube is a free video hosting service whose use does not require you to sign up with or disclose your real identity. It is not "entitlement" to expect it to be what it is.

[drcube]

The problem isn't entitlement, but ignorance. Everyone should know by now that when you post content on a web service, you're saying "Take this, it's yours. No really, take it, do what you want with it. If you want to delete it without explanation because you're afraid of a threatening email, that's your prerogative. I voluntarily give up all recourse."

If you don't realize that's what you're doing when you post content on a web site you don't own, you should. The web was designed specifically so that crap like this wouldn't be a problem. But people want to give up ownership for convenience every single time.

It's easier to be an audience or a user than to take 20 dollars and 20 minutes to learn HTML, buy a domain and become a peer with equal standing on the internet. Take your website, email links to your friends, set up RSS, and you've replaced Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram, Tumbler, Youtube and Flicker with something you actually own and control. And it really isn't that hard.

Case in point, the OP loses her videos for no reason, but the Pirate Bay is still online. Guess who owns their house and who is still renting?

[aeturnum]

So, because they're a free video hosting service, they have the right to handle DMCA takedown notices any way they want. They can just ban you right away, offer no appeals process, and decide they want to have nothing to do with you.

Being upset that the free service that you use is refusing to do stuff for you for nothing is entitlement.

[ubernostrum]

Several problems with your views here.

One is conflating "I have a right to do this thing" with "It is right for me to do this thing". There is no such equivalence, and much of the argument seems to come from people who believe there is. There are many things we all have a right to do which are not right to do.

Second, and much more frightening, is the assumption that abuse of a person is acceptable or excusable on the grounds that a person using a free service somehow deserves such abuse for not being a paying customer, or that not being abused is some sort of special privilege of which not all people are deserving. Perhaps you'd like to step back and think a bit about your own ethical framework before continuing this discussion?