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I think this is a bad decision but let's look at Googles options for showing content to users who pay for their service. Option 1: Don't show you videos from c
by bargl 11y ago
I think this is a bad decision but let's look at Googles options for showing content to users who pay for their service.
Option 1: Don't show you videos from creators who don't sign it's deal.
Option 2: Show you videos from creators who don't sign it's deal, but include ads.
Option 3: Show you videos from creators who don't sign it's deal, but eat the loss.
Option 4: Remove videos from creators who don't sign, and you as a paying customer now have access to all videos without ads.
Really, for Google it's a loose loose situation, someone is going to be pissed one way or another, or they loose money. What would you do? Eat the loss? Easy to say, but hard to do. So they picked the one that benefits both them and their paying users (if you ignore the fact that a portion of youtube is going to go dark) at the same time.
Option 5: move ad based content to a new medium that isn't youtube so that content creators aren't tied to a single service for hosting.... But I only mention that because this is Hacker News and it's what I think we'd all want to be done, but Google isn't going to create that service.
Edit:formatting, and if I see another option someone has in a subsequent comment I'll bubble it up.
Edit 2: From JoshTriplett https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10428378 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10428378
Option 6: take advantage of whatever "we can change this agreement at any time" term in the partner agreement to just say "this is our new approach to getting revenue, and we'll give you a cut of that just like we give you a cut of ads".
- lmedinas 11y agoAll of these will probably mean Facebook might have an opportunity in Videos. Recently Youtube screwed up with Gaming which cannot compete even close with Twitch, older attempts to provide a premium service also failed now this is just pissing off everybody.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- eva1984 11y agoI think youtube gaming is decent, why do you think it is screwed up?
- lmedinas 11y agoFirst of all it's only available in US :) second the comment system is weak compared to Twitch not to mention that they will never be able to make a community around it like Twitch did.
- eva1984 11y agoForget about the US only thing...Cann't argue with that really.
- rasz_pl 11y agoyoutube gaming website is all javascript, and was probably only tested on chrome :/ Doesnt work at all in my browser, s in blank page. On the other hand twitch just works, so why bother?
- Bedon292 11y agoNone of the options are good. They could have a modified version of Option 2, which is make the ad supported videos discoverable if the user chooses to allow id. They could also have a button to 'tell the content creator to support ad free mode'. It would essentially spam them into supporting it though.
- JoshTriplett 11y agoOption 6: take advantage of whatever "we can change this agreement at any time" term in the partner agreement to just say "this is our new approach to getting revenue, and we'll give you a cut of that just like we give you a cut of ads".
- rspeer 11y agoI'm guessing that when large corporations sign agreements with each other, they don't include the clause "we can change this agreement at any time". Only powerless end-users are expected to agree to that one.
- nickff 11y agoMost contracts without a specified end date or condition have some variation of that term, to allow for discontinuation of services/products, pricing changes and other issues. These terms often have some guarantee of advance notice before a change is made, but not always. Generally companies believe that their business partners/ suppliers/customers will act ethically; when your counterparty does act unethically, a contract is of little solace anyway. A typical example of this type of contract would be a shipping contract, which usually does not guarantee pricing. Another example would be electronic components, which are well-specified, but whose mask (implementation on silicon) can be changed at any time (and notice may or may not be given).
- ars 11y agoYah, Google did the right thing here. You can't say "this service has no ads, then include ads", and you can't say "if you subscribe you see less videos". They really had no other good choice except force them to sign up, or loose revenue sharing status.
- scrollaway 11y ago> and you can't say "if you subscribe you see less videos" But you do get less videos though. So they really either should say that, or figure out a better way... while the latter may be an unreasonable request, the former not so much.
- simonh 11y agoYou get the same vides everyone else does, which is all that matters when you're considering whether to take out a Red subscription or not.
- scrollaway 11y agoJust because Google is forcing everybody's hand doesn't mean everybody will follow suit. My channel certainly won't, simply because I don't like how they're doing this - to hell if I lose viewership because of it. PS: downvotes for facts without any actual explanation is really lame.
- kidcoach 11y agoNo ads but 240p for anyone not in the program. Or really just no-HD.
- wnevets 11y agoI would also piss me off as a paying customer if that happened.
- deckar01 11y agoHow about show you videos from creators who don't sign the deal, don't show ads, pay the virtual ad revenue, keep the subscription share. I bet the share of subscription revenue is greater than the ad revenue.
- piffey 11y agoJust let me know when and where they loose this money so I can get some of it.
- dogma1138 11y agoI have a feeling that this is a "Kinect" moment for Google and they'll reverse the decision in a few days. The potential backlash is just too big, if you don't sign up you do not get revenue from the views that will push pretty much any YT contributor to sign the deal if the amount of YT subscribers gets even to single digits as a percentage of the total YT userbase. Not all views are equal already, views from non-western countries generate little to no revenue as they either do not show ads at all or at a very low rate, the people that do generate ad revenue are people from countries that most likely won't mind getting the subscription and can afford it so even a small percentage of them moving to YTRed can have a drastic effect on the revenue of YT contributors which will force them to sign. So option 7 and the reasonable one will be show videos, there's almost no loss for YT (many ISP's cache YT videos to save money which reduces YT bandwidth costs) but don't give money to contributors, they already don't get money if people use adblock, why would this be any different?
- mmanfrin 11y agoI'm reasonably certain that subscription paying viewers will earn the creators more per user than US-based free/ad customers, as is the case for Spotify. This feels more like a 'we are switching, it will benefit everyone, but everyone needs to be on board or this wont work' move.
- chongli 11y agoOption 7: Full-time Youtube authors with decent-sized subscriber bases should switch to Patreon for their income. The CPM for Youtube ads is not great and tons of Youtube viewers use ad blockers anyway.
- 6d0debc071 11y ago> What would you do? Pay content creators who don't participate and are on monetised accounts as if the Red views had been seeing adverts, show adverts to everyone else. I'd extract money from the red customers for the no advert feature, who would be more invested in the feature because their favourite channels would be on it. The Red customers would extract value from viewing that user's content. I'd still be getting paid for the adverts seen by everyone else. The content creator would still getting paid. I honestly don't see any loser in that besides the content creator maybe not getting as big a cut as they would have if they chose to take the deal. If the Red deal was better than the ad-content deal then I'd be better off treating creators that way and letting them opt-out.
- fpgeek 11y ago> Pay content creators who don't participate and are on monetised accounts as if the Red views had been seeing adverts, show adverts to everyone else. Doesn't Google's ability to do that depend on the details of the old agreement? Does anyone know those details? I could imagine an agreement along the following lines: 1. YouTube will show ads on all of creator's videos. 2. YouTube will pay creator based on some formula (in terms of ad revenue, plays, etc.). Nothing in that would let YouTube (a) not show ads on the creator's videos or (b) pay the creator based on the hypothetical revenue the ad they didn't show would have earned. YouTube could try to get content owners to sign onto a new agreement that included that, but, um...
- 6d0debc071 11y agoI'd imagine that Google has acquired a right, rather than a duty, to serve advertising through their partnership agreement and in trade has given partners a right to some of the money from that. Certainly I wouldn't impose a duty upon myself unless I absolutely had to - and Google is likely to have had the majority of the leverage in any individual negotiation. In any case though, I imagine that the agreement would be far more acceptable given an only slightly modified version of business as usual as the alternative, than it would given an ultimatum between this and death.
- corndoge 11y agoOption 7: Remove all pre-video ads from YouTube and return it to the way it was, dropping the idea of monetizing the world's largest creative platform. Edit: False dichotomy. Monetization does not necessitate ads. But you get what I meant.
- bo1024 11y agoFalse dichotomy. Option 8: consider ways to monetize that don't involve video ads.
- tssva 11y agoLike charging a monthly fee to watch videos and sharing a percentage of that fee with creators of the videos.
- fpgeek 11y agoSince running YouTube isn't cheap and Google isn't a charity, that seems practically equivalent to shutting down YouTube altogether (after some reasonable notice period).
- corndoge 11y agoGoogle runs plenty of other things for free that benefit them by driving traffic to their ad platform in the long run.
- erebus_rex 11y agoCould Google simply say to creators: "if you sign this you won't get any revenue sharing from red users but you'll still get your quota from free users." Gives them a financial incentive to sign up but allows them to opt out without making google eat the loss.
- aiiane 11y agoThat is strictly worse than requiring them to sign up for the contract that includes subscription revenues or forgo revenue entirely.
- TrevorJ 11y agoOr don't roll out a new revenue model that you can't reasonably transition to because it isn't compatible.
- fpgeek 11y agoWell, sure, you could not roll out a new revenue model that millions of users are interested in because of some holdout content creators [1], but, um, somehow I don't think that's how that meeting would go... [1] This comment claims that YouTube said over 98% of content watched is signed up ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10429470 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10429470 ).
- wcummings 11y ago>Really, for Google it's a loose loose situation Is it though? Are you sure its not a lose lose situation?
- askvictor 11y agoHow about: Show videos from creators who don't sign, but without any ads for anyone. I presume this would mean those creators wouldn't get any revenue at all.
- wodenokoto 11y agoI think that's still an option. At least that was an option for the music service.
- serge2k 11y ago> Option 3: Show you videos from creators who don't sign it's deal, but eat the loss. What loss, they get your subscription revenue and don't have to pay out ad revenue to anyone. How is that not a win (and a loss for the creators)? edit: nevermind I got what you mean. Is google under an obligation to show ads to everyone who watches certain videos?
- rasz_pl 11y agoYou forgot about: -KEEP WORKING the way it works NOW. Red subscriber = no ad and no monetisation for the video if no RED specific agreement with google.