Another Good Business Move
"Conquer, but don't triumph"Youtube used to say that they streamed more than 100 million videos a day. That is unreal, don’t you think?
~ Marie Ebner von Eschenbach, Austrian Author, 1830-1916
However, they don't put that in their press releases' any more. I'd guess it's not because the number went down, but the masterminds at Google just don't want us to know anymore. Perhaps, it might get in the way of our guessing what they are up to next.
Like paying video creators for their content on youtube.
What... you didn't know that?
Yep, without fanfare Google announced that it's youtube property will pay it's "most popular and prolific" up loaders. A select group of popular posters will be offered a cut of ad revenues.
Have I peaked your interest?
Don't get too excited because Google giving away advertising revenue, will just make more money for Google.
Don't believe me? See this CVoD post called Take Control Of Your Index. All Google ideas are about more profits for Google disguised as benefits to its users.
The Google/Youtube traffic machine hasn't fully explained how its revenue sharing will work, in fact they don’t list any details about how to get your video featured nor even how to be revenue share "partner."
Id’s suspect it’s probably something like the model at Revver.com. Revver is a video sharing website that like youtube.com hosts user-generated content, but Revver shares all ad revenue 50/50 with the creators from pay-per-click ads appended at the end of each video.
Revver claims to have “hundreds of regular creators, some are making as much as $10,000 in a month, some make $1,000 a week, some make lunch money."
Very cool.
Lunch money for doing something you’d do anyway. Wow... what a great way to create loyalty from the posters, eh?
So Google sees an opportunity to start creating loyalty and jumps on the revenue sharing bandwagon. This should keep the current loyal youtubers happy AND yet I know Google at the same time also hopes that it pulls some business away from its competitors.
It would bring me in. Seriously.
If the goal is to monetize content, why wouldn't you go to the site with the most traffic?
And youtube has the traffic. Heck... I think you'd have a better chance to monetize your video with them then on your own small site, eh? (depending on your traffic and page views)
Now I see why Google investors are still optimistic. Think about the big picture here...
This revenue share is a further way for Google to sell advertising on the thousands of independently produced videos uploaded to its site each day, which besides the AdSense compontant, will help it make good on its $1.65 billion acquisition.
It also smells of goodwill and good public relations. The big bad, "I want to dominate the World" Google-Monster, won't be seen as unfairly making money from youtube and its video creators hard work. On the contrary, Google will be giving back to the community with a revenue share program.
It's pure evil genius.
But that is not all.
Paying video creators will encourage more people to create quality content that people want to watch — instead of simply posting home videos and all that other crap you see constantly.
Waiting for the other Prada shoe to drop?
Here it comes... generating more high quality content, will attract big time advertisers with big budgets to spend. Major brands with more major dollars going to Google. Google looks good; Google makes money; Another good business move.
Sigh...
People mainly upload content to Youtube because of ego. I see it like waving when you know a TV camera is near by, or those people that stand out in the snow to get seen on the Today show. It's kinda sad but we all know people who do it.
Now in the summer of 2007, it's not TV but the Internet, and it's not morning network programming but it's youtube. That's the prime vehicle used to get airtime. And people are crazed for it - they crave the attention. Be it good, bad, or self-deprecating, they all want to be on youtube. (Companies too!)
And now with money on the line, they will probably like it a whole lot more. Video postings should rise and traffic should go up.
Poor Google.
Oh, and if you are thinking of grabbing a camera to start posting & hoping to cash in... Please remember again, that Google has not made it clear what is takes to get a featured video which will get you tremendous page views nor will the explain any ground rules of how to become a revenue share "partner."
This keeps posters in the dark... guessing. Do you think most of them will wait for instructions or start posting more immediately?
I told you... evil.
AP
