4 ms·

Do we know that bandwidth costs YouTube a lot?

londons_explore 3y ago
Bandwidth costs all video sites a lot. Thats why cloudflare won't host sites with lots of video. It's why twitter doesn't do HD video. Thats why there are no startups trying to make video hosting sites. If you hosted a youtube clone on AWS with their cloudfront CDN, you'd be paying $0.085 per GB out to the internet. A youtube ad view earns perhaps $0.004. HD video is ~6GB/hour, so a 3 minute video costs $0.0255 to host (before compute and storage costs, profit and engineer time). Earning $0.004 for something that costs you $0.025 is never going to work out...
- vetinari 3y ago
  Not to distract from your point, but > It's why twitter doesn't do HD video. Twitter does HD video. I don't know whether it is generally available or not, but for example, Tucker Carlson's videos are 1080p.
  - fomine3 3y ago
    Interesting description: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FpAOeoZWAAM-iHV?format=png&name=900x900 https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FpAOeoZWAAM-iHV?format=png&name=...
- psnehanshu 3y ago
  This looks to me like a sane comment. No idea why this was downvoted.
  - wpietri 3y ago
    Because it doesn't answer the question. I was asking about YouTube, which, being part of Google, occupies a radically different position. They aren't using AWS to host their video, so the numbers are irrelevant.
- dijit 3y ago
  I don't like this reasoning because I've seen the inside of google. Their bandwidth is very cheap. What costs is having a CDN, a bunch of very fast servers that exist in every point-of-presence, given the load they endure CDN cache servers fail quickly when compared to others. -- along with the upkeep of their networking equipment, which is cheap but not free. But Google itself has invested wisely in how it connects to the internet, they are dark fibre all the way with many hundreds of gigabits between sites and pops. It's a huge upfront investment (the kind SV startups seem to hate) but the long tail makes bandwidth essentially free. The only cost they have is hardware and peering, and given their size I can't convince myself if they are or are not being shafted financially by big ISPs for peering - even if they are though, it's marginal compared to what GCP/AWS/etc; charge us, even Colo datacenters will charge significantly more than what it costs Google.
  - wpietri 3y ago
    Thanks, this is exactly what I was wondering about. I would expect Google's marginal cost of bandwidth to be approximately zero. What are networks going to do, not connect to Google?
    - michaelt 3y ago
      > What are networks going to do, not connect to Google? Throttle the connection so its slow enough users get 480p video at peak viewing times. Ask google for $$$$ to stop doing that.
      - tinus_hn 3y ago
        Google can just say ‘if you’re on this network, you only get poor quality video. Come to one of the networks that support YouTube properly!’. Remember that for a while they were just about the only site that could load Flash. YouTube is that important.
        gymbeaux 3y ago
        Most places in the US at least have two ISPs at most so it would probably not pan out so well if they tried to do that
- kbutler 3y ago
  Key words are "would cost _you_". The providers get much better cost per GB at scale, then sell to you at a profit. For example, transfer out from S3 gets down to $0.05 at just 150TB, including the AWS markup. (Note that CloudFront data out is not directly comparable to S3 data out!)
- wpietri 3y ago
  Yes, I get that I have to pay a lot for bandwidth. And that you have to pay a lot for bandwidth. My question is specifically about YouTube.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- no_wizard 3y ago
  Though Cloudflare does have a separate product for streaming Video, it definitely doesn’t fall under the generic CDN serving files model
- bsder 3y ago
  > Thats why there are no startups trying to make video hosting sites. No, there are no startups in video for the same reason there were no startups in office apps or operating systems in the 2000s, a subsidized 500lb gorilla in the space. The problem with a video startup is that you have to charge for your content. And some jerk will download your video, post it to YouTube, and distribute it for free. If YouTube were forced to stand on its own instead of being subsidized by the Google advertising maw, we'd see innovation in the space. Until YouTube gets broken out from Google by anti-trust action, the video startup space will continue to remain dead.
- Dylan16807 3y ago
  The big cloud providers all charge ridiculous amounts for their bandwidth. It makes your numbers completely invalid for any bandwidth-focused operation. Also youtube's bitrate usually far below that amount.

Bandwidth costs all video sites a lot. Thats why cloudflare won't host sites with lots of video. It's why twitter doesn't do HD video. Thats why there are no startups trying to make video hosting sites. If you hosted a youtube clone on AWS with their cloudfront CDN, you'd be paying $0.085 per GB out to the internet. A youtube ad view earns perhaps $0.004. HD video is ~6GB/hour, so a 3 minute video costs $0.0255 to host (before compute and storage costs, profit and engineer time). Earning $0.004 for something that costs you $0.025 is never going to work out...

vetinari 3y ago
Not to distract from your point, but > It's why twitter doesn't do HD video. Twitter does HD video. I don't know whether it is generally available or not, but for example, Tucker Carlson's videos are 1080p.
- fomine3 3y ago
  Interesting description: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FpAOeoZWAAM-iHV?format=png&name=900x900 https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FpAOeoZWAAM-iHV?format=png&name=...
psnehanshu 3y ago
This looks to me like a sane comment. No idea why this was downvoted.
- wpietri 3y ago
  Because it doesn't answer the question. I was asking about YouTube, which, being part of Google, occupies a radically different position. They aren't using AWS to host their video, so the numbers are irrelevant.
dijit 3y ago
I don't like this reasoning because I've seen the inside of google. Their bandwidth is very cheap. What costs is having a CDN, a bunch of very fast servers that exist in every point-of-presence, given the load they endure CDN cache servers fail quickly when compared to others. -- along with the upkeep of their networking equipment, which is cheap but not free. But Google itself has invested wisely in how it connects to the internet, they are dark fibre all the way with many hundreds of gigabits between sites and pops. It's a huge upfront investment (the kind SV startups seem to hate) but the long tail makes bandwidth essentially free. The only cost they have is hardware and peering, and given their size I can't convince myself if they are or are not being shafted financially by big ISPs for peering - even if they are though, it's marginal compared to what GCP/AWS/etc; charge us, even Colo datacenters will charge significantly more than what it costs Google.
- wpietri 3y ago
  Thanks, this is exactly what I was wondering about. I would expect Google's marginal cost of bandwidth to be approximately zero. What are networks going to do, not connect to Google?
  - michaelt 3y ago
    > What are networks going to do, not connect to Google? Throttle the connection so its slow enough users get 480p video at peak viewing times. Ask google for $$$$ to stop doing that.
    - tinus_hn 3y ago
      Google can just say ‘if you’re on this network, you only get poor quality video. Come to one of the networks that support YouTube properly!’. Remember that for a while they were just about the only site that could load Flash. YouTube is that important.
      - gymbeaux 3y ago
        Most places in the US at least have two ISPs at most so it would probably not pan out so well if they tried to do that
kbutler 3y ago
Key words are "would cost _you_". The providers get much better cost per GB at scale, then sell to you at a profit. For example, transfer out from S3 gets down to $0.05 at just 150TB, including the AWS markup. (Note that CloudFront data out is not directly comparable to S3 data out!)
wpietri 3y ago
Yes, I get that I have to pay a lot for bandwidth. And that you have to pay a lot for bandwidth. My question is specifically about YouTube.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
no_wizard 3y ago
Though Cloudflare does have a separate product for streaming Video, it definitely doesn’t fall under the generic CDN serving files model
bsder 3y ago
> Thats why there are no startups trying to make video hosting sites. No, there are no startups in video for the same reason there were no startups in office apps or operating systems in the 2000s, a subsidized 500lb gorilla in the space. The problem with a video startup is that you have to charge for your content. And some jerk will download your video, post it to YouTube, and distribute it for free. If YouTube were forced to stand on its own instead of being subsidized by the Google advertising maw, we'd see innovation in the space. Until YouTube gets broken out from Google by anti-trust action, the video startup space will continue to remain dead.
Dylan16807 3y ago
The big cloud providers all charge ridiculous amounts for their bandwidth. It makes your numbers completely invalid for any bandwidth-focused operation. Also youtube's bitrate usually far below that amount.