5 ms·

It’s not that expensive at YouTube scale. We are talking fractions of a penny per GiB transferred.

by bushbaba 2y ago

superb_dev 2y ago
Yeah, YouTube is big enough to put their own cache nodes directly in ISP datacenters
- WookieRushing 2y ago
  Yup! This is the reason why its so cheap for them. Other companies in similar positions have cache nodes in the ISPs and this dramatically lowers the cost
- mikepurvis 2y ago
  Which would help for the crazy popular meme videos, but I bet the long tail on YouTube is insanely big, even if you did have the “watch next” engine getting in on the game steering you toward content already present in your nearby caches.
  - selcuka 2y ago
    YouTube is estimated to have 1 exabyte [1] of data. Petabyte level storage is not unheard of [2], and a gateway server with 5PB storage would cover ~0.5% of all YouTube videos, which should be sufficient to serve a very high percentage of the most popular videos. They can still afford to serve the occasional obscure video from the origin servers. [1] https://www.qqtube.com/blog/how-much-storage-does-youtube-have https://www.qqtube.com/blog/how-much-storage-does-youtube-ha... [2] https://www.qnap.com/solution/petabyte-storage/en/ https://www.qnap.com/solution/petabyte-storage/en/
- bobmcnamara 2y ago
  Bingo, and also in Internet Exchanges - every ISP at KCIX the exchange has direct handoff to YouTube, Google, NetFlix, Cloudflare, ...
Ferret7446 2y ago
"not that expensive" is relative; it's still a lot of money. Sure, it's not trillions of dollars, but it's still billions of dollars. YouTube has historically not returned a net profit (and I haven't heard of that situation changing).
- Retric 2y ago
  Do you have a public source for that? From what I’ve heard YouTube has been profitable year years at this point.
  - AlbertCory 2y ago
    > Do you have a public source for that? YT financials and P&L were not broken out in audited financial statements back in the day.
    - rreichman 2y ago
      Still aren’t. Alphabet only publishes YouTube revenue.
      - AlbertCory 2y ago
        ... and therefore, saying they're "profitable" is meaningless. Allocating costs for things from Google that they use (e.g. the Ads system) is difficult. The problem with any subsidiary.
- Delmololo 2y ago
  Yt basically got unusable without premium though. I have premium, my wife accepts all of those ads
  - 7bit 2y ago
    Still on Ublck Origin and I don't see any ads and all the videos.
  - 2y ago
pavelstoev 2y ago
Next iteration of this will be video generated on demand with GenAI running closer to the request, ideally at the request.
ZiiS 2y ago
The important question is how much can an ISP charge for a broadband without YouTube and Netflix service. They do not pay even the fractions of a penny everyone else has to.

It’s not that expensive at YouTube scale. We are talking fractions of a penny per GiB transferred.

superb_dev 2y ago

Yeah, YouTube is big enough to put their own cache nodes directly in ISP datacenters

WookieRushing 2y ago
Yup! This is the reason why its so cheap for them. Other companies in similar positions have cache nodes in the ISPs and this dramatically lowers the cost
mikepurvis 2y ago
Which would help for the crazy popular meme videos, but I bet the long tail on YouTube is insanely big, even if you did have the “watch next” engine getting in on the game steering you toward content already present in your nearby caches.
- selcuka 2y ago
  YouTube is estimated to have 1 exabyte [1] of data. Petabyte level storage is not unheard of [2], and a gateway server with 5PB storage would cover ~0.5% of all YouTube videos, which should be sufficient to serve a very high percentage of the most popular videos. They can still afford to serve the occasional obscure video from the origin servers. [1] https://www.qqtube.com/blog/how-much-storage-does-youtube-have https://www.qqtube.com/blog/how-much-storage-does-youtube-ha... [2] https://www.qnap.com/solution/petabyte-storage/en/ https://www.qnap.com/solution/petabyte-storage/en/
bobmcnamara 2y ago
Bingo, and also in Internet Exchanges - every ISP at KCIX the exchange has direct handoff to YouTube, Google, NetFlix, Cloudflare, ...

Ferret7446 2y ago

"not that expensive" is relative; it's still a lot of money. Sure, it's not trillions of dollars, but it's still billions of dollars. YouTube has historically not returned a net profit (and I haven't heard of that situation changing).

Retric 2y ago
Do you have a public source for that? From what I’ve heard YouTube has been profitable year years at this point.
- AlbertCory 2y ago
  > Do you have a public source for that? YT financials and P&L were not broken out in audited financial statements back in the day.
  - rreichman 2y ago
    Still aren’t. Alphabet only publishes YouTube revenue.
    - AlbertCory 2y ago
      ... and therefore, saying they're "profitable" is meaningless. Allocating costs for things from Google that they use (e.g. the Ads system) is difficult. The problem with any subsidiary.
Delmololo 2y ago
Yt basically got unusable without premium though. I have premium, my wife accepts all of those ads
- 7bit 2y ago
  Still on Ublck Origin and I don't see any ads and all the videos.
- 2y ago

pavelstoev 2y ago

Next iteration of this will be video generated on demand with GenAI running closer to the request, ideally at the request.

ZiiS 2y ago

The important question is how much can an ISP charge for a broadband without YouTube and Netflix service. They do not pay even the fractions of a penny everyone else has to.