Connected TV App Manual Review under COPPA Rule: ‘People Are Awesome’

Welcome to Pixalate’s CTV & Mobile App Manual Reviews According to COPPA, a series containing the detailed factors the Trust & Safety Advisory Board educators used to assess an app’s child-directedness.

The educators manually review thousands of mobile apps available in the Google Play & Apple App Stores as well as connected TV (CTV) apps from the Roku Channel Store and Amazon Fire TV App Store using the COPPA Rule factors shown below & make those results available to the public at ratings.pixalate.com.

This post takes a look at a CTV app from both the Amazon Fire TV Store and the Roku Channel Store. Our reviewer discusses how the subjective factors set forth in the COPPA Rule apply to the app and factor into the reviewer's determination as to whether the app is child-directed or general audience (i.e., it is not targeting children).

Manually reviewed in this post

• People Are Awesome (Fire TV) People Are Awesome (Roku)

This Week’s Reviewer: Emma Burdis

The 10 COPPA Rule factors

The teacher will indicate the factors they relied upon in their assessment using the 10 factors shown below that reflect the 10 child-directed factors in the COPPA Rule.

Manual Review: People Are Awesome

Likely audience after manual review

• Developer: Jukin Media
• Roku App Store ID: 121447
• Fire App ID: B078J22BRX
• Privacy Policy
• Emma’s take: A channel providing inspiring and interesting content that will appeal to a range of viewers across different age groups. A tricky one to classify, but the content that would be appealing to children moves it into Mixed Audience, rather than General.
  
  

COPPA factors used to determine audience

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This channel showcases different feats of human endeavor, often displaying the incredible things humans are capable of. The videos would likely appeal to both adults and children: for example, “Best Pets of the Year” and “Awesome and Talented Kid Prodigies of the Year 2021” would appeal to younger viewers, as well as the ‘People Are Awesome vs FailArmy’ content on the channel. The sub-channels of ‘Pets Are Awesome’ and ‘Awesome Fams’ provide family-friendly content. The extreme sports and workout videos are more directed towards older viewers. There is a variety of content to choose from here, for viewers of all ages.

 

 

Many of the action-based videos are accompanied by contemporary music, usually upbeat pop songs. This wouldn’t particularly appeal to one age range more than another. There are also several shows available on the channel. For example, ‘The Theory of Awesome’ features cheery presenters who explain the science behind extreme stunts in a simple and educational manner. These would be likely to appeal to both children and adults.

Privacy 

Screenshots of People Are Awesome:

About Pixalate’s Trust & Safety Advisory Board

Pixalate’s Trust and Safety Advisory Board was created to bring in individuals with experience using child-directed apps in the classroom to review and assess which apps are child-directed. This manual review process serves to quality check Pixalate’s automated review process. See our full methodology for more information.

Disclaimer

This blog post published by Pixalate is available for informational purposes only and is not considered legal advice. By viewing this blog post, the reader understands and agrees that there is no attorney-client relationship between the reader and the blog publisher. The blog should not be used as a substitute for legal advice from a licensed professional attorney in the applicable jurisdiction(s), and readers are urged to consult their own legal counsel on any specific legal questions concerning any specific situation. The content of this blog post reflects Pixalate's opinions with respect to factors that Pixalate believes may be useful to the digital media industry. Pixalate's opinions are just that, opinions, which means that they are neither facts nor guarantees; and this blog post is not intended to impugn the standing or reputation of any entity, person or app, but instead, to report findings pertaining to mobile and Connected TV (CTV) apps.