For those treating youtube as a business - you are right that you trade upfront risk ( the only thing you lose is your time ), a promotion platform and the abi

For those treating youtube as a business - you are right that you trade upfront risk ( the only thing you lose is your time ), a promotion platform and the ability to scale, for reduced slice of any revenue and loss of control. However people making money on youtube are a significant minority. Most uses are not that use. So in terms of non-commercial sharing - I already pay for my internet connection and fibre 'upload' speeds ( from home-out ) are very under-utilized. Also usage isn't metered - the limit is maxbandwidth X time. So the only risk here is being too popular - which is frankly unlikely! If you wanted to scale - p2p is an option - the issues around illegal content etc - that can be fixed if you have identity and permissions built in - the people who share are identifiable and you only choose to peer people/content you approve. Imagine it being like a retweet - with just the same legal consequences, but with just the same potential to reach millions - but without a single company in control...