YouTube’s First Public Statement About Earning Potential for Creators
YouTube is expanding the once-selective* “Partners” program so that more video contributors can monetize their work. We’ve already seen the “requirements”* drop so that amateurs with fewer views have been invited to join in recent weeks. YouTube released this in a press release (and its blog), and the most interesting statement concerned the potential revenue possible for creators that have wildly popular videos (see last bullet).
- These original content creators will now have the chance to reap rewards from their work and receive the same promotional benefits afforded to YouTube’s other professional content partners. Is that to imply that Nalts is not just an original content creator but a “professional content partner”? Because I object to that label.
- Earlier this year, the YouTube Partner Program began rewarding our most popular and prolific original content creators within the YouTube community by allowing them to earn money from their videos. Users eligible for the partner program have built a significant audience on YouTube (as measured by video views, subscribers, etc.) and consistently complied with the YouTube Terms of Use.
- Now, anyone living in the US or Canada can apply to become a partner at youtube.com/partners. Partners decide which of their videos they would like to generate revenue on YouTube, and in turn, receive a portion of the revenue generated from ads that run next to those videos.
- The YouTube Partner Program also benefits marketers. By building out our partner program, we are expanding both the quality and scope of video content available to marketers. As more and more individual content creators enroll in the program, advertisers are now capable of reaching more qualified consumers by targeting their campaigns to user-generated partner videos tailored to the unique interests and tastes of their target audiences.
- This program will continue to grow in the coming months to several hundred user partners, and will encourage marketers to include YouTube as part of their marketing mix.
- Those partners who are regularly producing videos with over 1M views are earning several thousand dollars per month.
Note: I’m confused about this last one, and it’s the first time YouTube has posted any public number on the earnings. Does this mean a total of one million views per month, or several videos a month that EACH total to one million (the latter excludes most of us). I post almost a video per day with an average of about 20-30K views per video. So that’s close to a million views a month. Does that mean I’ll some day get “several thousand dollars per month”?
* Putting asterics around these disputable statements- see first comment from Marquis for some interesting criticism of this program, which appears to many as arbitrary. Certainly I wouldn’t want to be part of a club with such poor judgement as to have ME as a member.
Words are funny. Some of them have definitions, meanings. Others do not. The Youtube editors have proven over and over and over again that they either don’t know the meanings of words or ignore them altogether. In the olden days, we called such people “liars.” But we have become a nation that cannot call a spade a spade, so let’s be content to refer to them as mere purveyors of non-truths.
But first, let’s look at YOUR words.
“Once-selective Partners program”? Am I supposed to be amused by this description? Am I supposed to believe that the “program” is not highly subjective and selective any more? Wait, what is the definition of the word “program”? Does it mean a highly fluid and intuitive process where some are subjected to rules that others are not?
I think not.
“We’ve already seen the requirements drop.” Oh we have, have we? Really? And those previous requirements were what, exactly? Does anyone know? How can anybody possibly know that requirements have dropped if the original requirements were never divulged?
Keep it vague. Define the word “prolific” as someone who won the viewership lottery after uploading 30 videos. Keep the unwashed masses away by inferring they are not “professional” enough, that their “production quality” does not meet the standards of a grainy dance video or some commercially viable drivel from a self-proclaimed thug who denigrates women and elevates fornication to the highest aspiration of man?
It’s all about the numbers, baby. Don’t let the techno-babble fool ya. You got the numbers Kevin? Then you’re a professional and you’re making thousands upon thousands of dollars on YT. Youtube says so.
Marquis- fair criticism!
Right about now I hate youtube.
Haha! Well, fair or not, Kevin, I GUARANTEE you that I will pay for these criticisms with technical problems on my Youtube account. My ability to receive video responses there has been broken since my last “I Smell Bullshit” critique 9 months ago. Damned anal-petty techno-creeps.
The nondisclosure requirement at Youtube is the “tell”, folks. It SCREAMS back room deal shucksterism. Screams it.
I can’t stop here. Lord help me in the face of so much bullshit, I can’t. This new “Everbody can apply now” bullcrap is SO disingenuous I can’t help but shout “BULLCORN!”
Yeah, everybody can APPLY. Apply all you like. Everyone can apply to be a Playboy bunny, but Hef ain’t gonna grant ugly girls access. C’mon, this new “Everbody can APPLY” is so transparently crap, I can’t believe anybody would fall for it. Yet you Partners are tacitly bobbing your heads up and down like some Snakeoil church choir humming “Yes, Lord, yes Lord” as the minister tries to hypnotize the fleeced….well, maybe not you, Kevin. You’re not bobbing, are you? Say it ain’t so. Say you won’t do the Chickenhead for more corporate tricks.
To add insult to injury, Renetto just ran a video that implies application = acceptance. HOO BOY! We’re all gonna be rich now! Bull bull bull bull bull. Bullcrap. Same old carrot and stick bullcrap! I call FOUL! This is the same “we’re opening the opportunity up to everyone” lies told 4 months ago.
Liars, liars, pants on fires.
P.S.
Must have thousands of views per video excludes me and most of the people I know on ScrewTube.
wtf?
yea the 1000s of views per video is confusing too,did they mean every video & did they mean daily,weekly,monthly, or just exactly wtf did they mean? i think they meant “we’re rich,youre not,go F yourselves”,On another note,i left a link to a kid flushing her little brothers head in the toilet,sort of where our video views are going huh?
ScrewTube won’t say EXACTLY, Steve. Remember the rule of used car salesmen: guarantee everything vaguely. This car will get you to work (if someone pushes it). You can be a ScrewTube Partner (if you have thousands of views per video–definitely a quantity, not quality issue). Same carnival barker bait and switch shysterism. I will never believe a word ScrewTube says until they eliminate the nondisclosure agreement requirement for Partnership.
And BTW, the weird technical problems on my ScrewTube account arrived as predicted.
yup marquis,sounds like it works the same as google adsense,a few pennies a day,but not enough to ever actually get paid.kevin even said he hasnt recieved payment,and hes been a partner for how many months? ive been having major tech problems too,i cant even access the youtube homepage most of the time! im constantly getting error messages,with a list of millions of characters,which it says to report to google,not youtube! P.S. i left a link to a video called” when moose attack”…….its not actually a moose,just a girl who looks like one 😉
SNORTING SWEETARTS(see link)
Hmm… Metacafe is looking really nice right about now. At least they’re straightforward about their program. Revver, from what I hear, is up for sale and going down, so it looks like it’s Metacafe for us now…
hmm…. and my most popular video, which has 1000’s upon 1000’s of you tube hits has copy written junk in it- $h!te!
Kevin you and the partners know what you have to do now. Feature tubers you like on your channel page and give them a kick upstairs. It’s tax deductible too!
I’m going to join in the choir here, ok a quartet, I want google/youtube to disclose the whole thing, everything! Non-disclosure in this case is just wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong!
There is no reason for YT to withhold their pay tier system other than to stop current partners from negotiating for more revenue or to keep them in the dark so they do not put their energies elsewhere.
This relationship with google/youtube is about power. ‘Don’t be Evil’ also means ‘Do No Evil’ Google!
You Tube stood on the backs of the but-hey-it’s-better-than-nothing-partners and earned
Oprah.
Think of the dollars and cents it would have taken to conjure that deal? And based on whatever they paid the partners was worth an Incomeptech song!
Now they want to open the flood gates to the advrt-river-of-money to the 1000-or-better-tuber-masses. Partners will now see that income scattered, and youtube will have a good excuse not to pay them more for their efforts.
But youtube got what they were after and what they needed most, now what they want are the many new we’ll-be-loyal-paid-in-copper-partnered-viewers who
will stick around cheer and support Oprah, her ilk and anything youtube does so we can keep earning the pennies.
Ah yes, business as usual.
I was accepted into the program last week. Apparently I was one of the testers for the new partner application procedure. We’ll see if it pays off.
People who use the word “disingenuous” – and use it correctly – make me moist.
(see comment #6 above)
Okay, I just read through the crap youtube has on their site about the application process. Obviously there’s no point in me even applying since I regularly get dozens of views, not thousands (which they say is one of the criteria). But they’re also talking about having full rights to the video and music that you’re using, and it’s just now occurring to me – what about those thousands of creative commons music pieces that people have used on their videos? Does that mean those videos are not eligible for monetization? After all, one of the requirements of most creative commons stuff is that it’s not used for commercial purposes, at least not without the creator’s consent, right? Do you then have to get the creator’s written consent, which means you’re gonna have to split the 25 cents you make on each video with him? Or nalts – do you not even consider those videos for monetization for the reasons I stated above?
Am I missing something here? How do you handle this as a practical matter? And why am I even asking these questions because I’ll never qualify for the damn program anyway.
There are different levels of Creative Commons licensing, sukatra. I use only “BY” CC licenses, which means they CAN be used for commercial purposes as long as the original creator is credited or attributed. Some CC licenses allow remixing and derivatives. Some don’t. I have linked here to a page that will explain everything in CC licensing.
Comment #12 above illustrates my frustration. That’s the misleading, half-truth headline that will go out (once again), implying we’re ALL eligible now to become “copper-partnered” (love that phrase) ScrewTubians. It’s a headline designed to kill the honest and aboveboard sites like Revver.
Here’s a link to an article which asks: Does Youtube really think we’re THAT stupid or is Youtube THAT stupid?
And another link about the TRUTH of ScrewTube
My youtube videos are on pace for 5 million views per year,as ive mentioned before.I think i should be able to become a partner based on those numbers alone,regardless of whether i upload another video or not! Thats just a bad business decision on gootubes part,to put these vague restrictions on acceptance into the partners program.Marquis,thanks for the info on the CC licenses,but what happens if an artist later decides to change their license,so their works cant be used commercially? I create my own guitar & keyboard music,but i do use sounds effects from http://www.partnersinrhyme.com ,which can be used commercially.*regarding comment #14 above,thats a load of CRAP!!,sure metacafe “discloses” payments and how much the top creators have earned,but its all LIES! They accepted one of my videos into the rewards program,or whatever its called,then cancelled my account the same day! Those lowlife thugs should be in prison! Try vume.com instead,sure its got its bugs,and low traffic,but i hit the refresh button every few minutes,and watch my profits rise!
#17 too much info
sukatra toss in all these mock YT sites that embed YT users names, these site look just like your youtube channel only in bare text and they are full of ads.
Here’s a dumb question, when you embed a video elsewhere do you still get the count and credit?
Now, what does 1000 mean? 1000 in a day, week, all time?
A few things I have noticed on youtube – when a partner or someone who has a good number of viewers links another user’s video or gives them a shout out their numbers leap way up and more people subscribe. So, partners have power to help others users, but I think anyone who gets featured on youtube’s front page will pick up a good number of hits and subscribers no matter what the content is, so grabbing a lot of views is really about exposure and who at YT decides what gets exposed?
Still want full disclosure.
Does this mean I should quit my day job?
If I were you I wouldn’t, NutCheese.
I already quit my day job, but I’m going to buy a monkey (see link) to represent me in my ScrewTube Partners Program Application hearing.
Thanks for the link, Steve! And about the CC licensees (artists) changing their license, I’m not worried. I’ll have no legal liability for stuff I ran under the “by” license and I can easily edit out the music and exchange it for something else for future “commerce.” And one of the main federal copyrights cases courts in the U.S. is five miles from my house. I need to get out more anyway.
I’ve been right all along with my assessment of YouTube. Brand you videos with your own URL and monetize your web site in whatever way you can.
The real money is in products not ad revenue. Unless you run a portal site or successful online community – in which case adsense revenue can be a nice side earner if you know what you’re doing.
Selling products to your niche market is far more lucrative in my opinion.
(and why is this extension of the partner program limited to the USA and Canada when some existing partners from the first round are outside both those regions? wtf!)
marquis take your camera down there and play journalist
I’ve been down there a couple of times, jischinger. So far, no exciting litigants. All suits.
Wow, after reading through some of these threads some of these adults are so immature. Its like blaming some corporation because you didnt get the job. LIKE WAKE UP! Its like blaming the talent scouts because they said you had no talent. LIKE WAKE UP! Its like blaming the folks at the audition because you didnt get the part. LIKE WAKE UP! Youtube is no different then these examples. They will pick whom they think will make money. Some folks just need to grow up or they obviously got everything that they tried out for, every job that they applied for and certainly could be no judge for any talent show. Just think how impossible it would be for them. ALL would get the position and there would be no criteria for whose better.