I’m not legal background at all, so take everything I say with a grain of salt. But overall their is NO grey lines anymore when it comes to promotional content, IF they are paid. I recall TotalBiscut doing a talk for about an hour on how he does promotional content and making sure everyone understands if he’s been paid ect. I’m not to interested, but the link I gave you should answer most things.
Edit: FTC only applies to U.S. Not so sure about other nations. But as a general rule of thumb most people would follow something close to this if they wanted to appear in good standing.
About other nations, well, the fun thing with US law is that the US considers it applies if any involved party is from the US. Which means if one of the parties is a US citizen, an US organization (including a foreign organization bought by a US one) and even, I kid you not, if the transaction was in dollars.
So until FN Hestral buy Youtube and move it to South Africa while switching it to Yuan, US tribunals will consider they can charge you. If you live somewhere without legal agreements with the US (like, say, North Korea), possesses no asset in US reach and don’t plan to go there, it won’t concern you as much - but Google will have to comply and probably take the video down.
Which is why some people in other nations would like to vote in US elections, though the movement doesn’t seem to really take on so far.
And it doesn’t protect you when local legislation (like, say, in North Korea) is harsher than the US one.
US dollars are actually owned and regulated by the US Federal Government, so there’s no “even” there. If you’re doing financial transactions with US dollars, you kinda have to play by their rules.
That gives people outside of the US as much cause to vote in US Presidential elections as doing transactions in GB pounds gives one cause to choose the reigning monarch.
Most video streaming and hosting services are also headquartered in the US, to boot, so you’re dealing with companies that are beholden to US law, and so have every right and reason to hold their users to US laws.
And that’s without even getting into regional broadcasting laws and how they apply here.
We’re talking about a cottage industry that has suddenly become popular enough to be considered mainstream and full fledged. Expect things to get messy sooner rather than later.