YouTube Now Requires Channels To Have More Than 10K Views To Make Money Off Ads (cnet.com)

YouTube is getting a little pickier about who can make money there. From a report on CNET: Google's massive video site said Thursday that channels must reach 10,000 total views before they qualify to run ads, the most direct way to make money there. The logic, essentially, is to remove one of the main incentives that spur bad actors to set up bogus accounts with somebody else's content -- the easy money. It also comes two weeks after YouTube suffered big advertiser pull-outs after a rash of news reports about brands' commercials running next to objectionable videos, like those with racist language.

Comments

Potentially a good thing

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe this will cut down a little on spam and clickbait?

Re:Potentially a good thing

[vux984]

Maybe this will cut down a little on spam and clickbait?

Or maybe it will ramp it up, since now they have to get 10,000 views... and the best way to do that is with spam, clickbait, and maybe even some outright clickfraud.

Re:Potentially a good thing

[edx93]

Hopefully. Call me cynical, but question: of all the $$ they dish out for ad revenue, what fraction goes to small-time videos? Could be a good way to cut down on costs. Any google-ites care to chime in?

Re:Potentially a good thing

[sodul]

Hopefully. Call me cynical, but question: of all the $$ they dish out for ad revenue, what fraction goes to small-time videos? Could be a good way to cut down on costs. Any google-ites care to chime in?

The way I read it is that it would cut down on incoming revenue to YouTube: ads are entirely disabled until 10k views on a given video. It is not 'no revenue sharing until 10k', it is 'no ads until 10k'. Quite different. This count is on the channel's view not per video so this should have limited impact for the content producers that have lot of videos with niche viewership. Unfortunately it will probably have the side effect of forcing small channels to split their videos in a 2, 3 4 part video to help bump the views count to 10k faster.

Re:Potentially a good thing

[MBGMorden]

The 10k views threshhold is for the CHANNEL - not individual videos. Realistically this won't affect anyone who has made more than $20 off of Youtube before.

Re:Potentially a good thing

[radarskiy]

"The way I read it is that it would cut down on incoming revenue to YouTube: "

It also cuts down the overhead of accounting for the money streams on small channels, so they're probably doing it because it's a net win.

Re:Potentially a good thing

[Lord Kano]

It's more than likely just push it to other sites.

In the past few weeks, I have noticed that more meme pages on social media are posting videos that play on weird, ad laden domains.

LK

Re:Potentially a good thing

[swillden]

"The way I read it is that it would cut down on incoming revenue to YouTube: "

It also cuts down the overhead of accounting for the money streams on small channels, so they're probably doing it because it's a net win.

I don't see how it's more difficult to account for money streams on small channels anyway, but that's clearly not what's going on here because small channels (less than 10K views) will have no revenue to account, not for the channel owner or for YouTube, because ads will simply be disabled.

I suspect this may also be part of a larger plan to make it easier for YouTube to tag channels with content labels, so they can allow advertisers to pick what kinds of videos they want their ads shown next to. That's a dramatically tougher problem if they have to try to categorize the long tail. By simply not showing ads on the long tail, I'd guess they reduce the number of channels they have to tag correctly by 99% or so. It also means that YouTube doesn't need to tag channels when they first get created.

Re:Potentially a good thing

[radarskiy]

"I don't see how it's more difficult to account for money streams on small channels anyway"

I will thank you to note that I didn't say that it was.

My point was that the overhead is probably fixed but the revenue stream is not, so there need to be a minimum view rate for YouTube to cover their own costs. Less than that, it's cheaper just to show the video with no ad at all.

Re:Potentially a good thing

[apoc.famine]

Several years ago my wife made a series of DIY crafty things involving cute animals. Probably 30-50 videos, 5-15 minutes each, and i'm guessing it was 2012-2014 or so. I don't know that she topped 1k subscribers, and she hasn't added a thing since.
 
She made $1k last year on ad revenue. That blows my mind.

Re:Potentially a good thing

[swillden]

"I don't see how it's more difficult to account for money streams on small channels anyway"

I will thank you to note that I didn't say that it was.

My point was that the overhead is probably fixed but the revenue stream is not, so there need to be a minimum view rate for YouTube to cover their own costs. Less than that, it's cheaper just to show the video with no ad at all.

Meh. And I say that as a Google engineer who used to work on the accounting and payment-distribution systems, though I think I'd come to the same conclusion even without inside knowledge. You have to store a bunch of data about each account anyway, and you have to have regular map/reduce jobs over accounts to gather data and send it to the payment systems. It would be more work to distinguish channels based on viewer volume and decide whether to include them.

Come to think of it, part of the reason for this decision may have been analysis of engineering effort, precisely because you don't have to bother with those distinctions in the payment process. The ad-choosing software has to make a bunch of channel-specific (and user-specific) decisions anyway, so it's likely trivial to ad "if (total_views < 10000) return NO_AD;". That done, the accounting and payment systems can continue to operate completely unaffected; they'll still scan over all YouTube channels looking for ad views to revenue-share, but the little channels just won't have any. Easy peasy.

Google engineers typically don't think too much about the server-side cost of scanning a few million (or billion) extra records. Given the infrastructure, the cost of doing so is trivial. It would be easy to insert a little logic in the scanning process to check view counts, assuming that data is easily available at that point, but you've already done all of the I/O at that point, so it would gain nothing. To actually gain, you'd have to somehow identify beforehand which records to avoid scanning. I suppose you could create an additional table, populated by a pre-processing map/reduce, that tells you which ones to scan, but that (a) still wouldn't save any overall I/O or CPU and (b) could be error-prone in various ways. You could also update that table as views occur, but that would add latency and complexity to the up-front processes.

No... from both a user fairness perspective and an engineering effort perspective, it's much better to simply not show ads on those channels. Plus all of the other reasons I mentioned in my previous comment.

Re:Potentially a good thing

[radarskiy]

"it's much better to simply not show ads on those channels"

This is what they are doing.

Re:Potentially a good thing

[swillden]

"it's much better to simply not show ads on those channels"

This is what they are doing.

Yes, that's what I said. You said "It also cuts down the overhead of accounting for the money streams on small channels", and I said (at perhaps excessive length) that that doesn't make sense.

Great.

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm a piano and guitar player trying to improve. There are some incredibly talented professional jazz, folk, blues (and other non-pop) musicians who create teaching videos to supplement their income. Many only have a few thousand viewers.

With streaming music services paying a fraction of a cent per song to the artist, well folks, if this keeps up we will only have Bubble gum pop and classic rock to listen to.

We need a co-op video/music streaming service where the profits go to the artists.

Re:Great.

[Rukia]

They say the threshold is "lifetime views," what you're probably referring to is called "subscribers."

https://youtube-creators.googl...

For example here is a specific video on a channel with around 52K subscribers, but the video itself only has a few thousand "views" explicitly.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

There are many other videos with "views" on that channel though and it should be possible for a smaller channel with very few subscribers to have a much higher view total across all videos on that channel.

Re:Great.

[Gavagai80]

If their entire channel has less than 10K views, they're probably losing $10 or less from this. I doubt the loss of $10 is going to kill entire genres of music.

Re:Original Content?

[viperidaenz]

They're not. They never said they would. As the text you quoted says, they're removing an incentive for someone to re-post someone else's content.
RTFTYQ - Read the Fucking Text You Quoted

Re:Original Content?

[sexconker]

They don't need to.

The original owner can file a takedown claim once they see it copied to other channels.
The copiers need to see the video, know that it's going viral, upload it to an account they have monetized (10,000 views or more), and wait for the money to come in.

In the time it takes the copiers (and there will be multiple competing with each other), the original video is still "going viral". By the time the copier channels get 10,000 views they'll be buried in the search results or have their shit taken down.

I suggested a similar approach when this shit was blowing up, but I suggested it on a per-video basis. Unless Google adds additional policing of accounts, this move won't help much. They'll have prepped 10,000 view accounts ready to go, or they'll farm up 10,000 views on new accounts with bots.

Unintended consequences?

[Anonymous Coward]

Does this mean that ContentID won't scan videos on channels with under 10K views? Considering YouTube only care about copyright for purposes of advertising (who gets to monetize, etc.), these channels are no longer 'taking away money' from the Cartel, and so can be ignored.

Re:Unintended consequences?

[PhantomHarlock]

Currently you have to sign up for ContentID manually anyway. They don't give it to everyone by default. You have to show that you're hosting all original content.

I'm for this change as I spend a lot of time filing takedowns for people who re-up my videos, and it's only thanks to alert viewers who take the time to send me messages that I find out about them. I don't have time to do routine searches. I will likely be signing up for contentID fairly soon.

Re:Original Content?

[Anonymous Coward]

It takes time to hit 10K views. The more time and the more views the more opportunity there is for infringing videos to get caught and locked before ad revenue kicks in. In theory, this reduces the incentive to try to upload multiple infringing videos and make a quick buck from the collective ad revenue from before they get locked.

Reaction videos

[thesjaakspoiler]

are probably the worst case of preying other people honest efforts to publish something.

RIAA is going to throw a fit

[Anonymous Coward]

Pop-up channels with music will make no money off of ads, and thus, no royalties.

The 15-minute limit

[tepples]

I thought small channels already had to split a video into several parts under the 15-minute limit in order to earn enough views to qualify for lifting the 15-minute limit.

Re:The 15-minute limit

[sodul]

I would guess that this one is to force youtubers to learn basic video editing before posting raw footage of 'My bedroom remodeling, look at the paint dry'.

Why did I look? Of course it is a thing!

Re:The 15-minute limit

[ninthbit]

Videos should only be 8-15 minutes long anyways :) ... after that, my ass starts to get sore from sitting on the crapper. The longer 20+ minute videos just seem to sit in my Watch Later queue and never get watched. If I have that much time, then I'll fire up Netflix/Hulu and catchup on my actual TV shows.

Kill two birds with one stone?

[NewtonsLaw]

I blogged about a similar proposal earlier in the week but I suggest that they go even further.

They should also come up with two content pools -- one (the premium pool) containing YouTube channel partners who meet a much tighter criteria -- such as 10 million views and 100K subs -- and another that contains all the others. These "premium" content creators would be vetted for the nature of their content (ie: ad-friendly) and offered to the J&J, Verizon, UK Government advertisers who are presently not advertising because of the hate/racist/extremist vids their ads were appearing against.

If they properly vetted these premium channels then they could offer big-dollar advertisers placements which they know would not be on offensive content -- and attract a premium ad-rate at the same time.

I recall back when the YT Channel Partner program kicked off, earnings were good for content creators because the entire ad-revenue pie was divided amongst a much smaller number of content creators. Viewers also got a much better experience because we didn't have every man and his dog monetizing 30 second "cute cat" videos with a 30 second unskippable preroll. Advertisers also got a good deal because their ads were only being placed on channels that had proven their worth and the quality of their content by having been chosen for the program.

Once they opened the doors so that everyone could monentize, the existing channel partners saw a huge drop in earnings. Now, with the big-dollar advertisers fleeing in droves, they're probably going to see yet another drop. This is further aggravated by the bugs in YT's new system for automatically detecting and demonetizing potentially "unfriendly" vids. Lots of YT's biggest channels have had significant numbers of their vids automatically demonetized by this lame system -- so are seeing an even greater drop in revenue as a result.

Unfortunately it's YT's greed that has created the current situation so I doubt they'll wind the clock back enough to solve it.

Re:Kill two birds with one stone?

[clonehappy]

I'd say your system would be a start.

But there should also be a "second tier". Where content that doesn't meet the mommy-government-happy-shiny standard of acceptability, and your second-tier advertisers, the ones who can't afford to advertise on the sanitized channels, can still get their advertising out there (albeit at a lower cost).

Considering all of these systems are automated anyway, Google doesn't have anything to lose and it can be a win for free speech as well as small business, as people with a message the government or Verizon or whoever doesn't like can still monetize their content and the little guy still gets his ads out.

But I'm sure that will never happen. In 2017, opinions different from yours are "hate/racist/extremist" and don't deserve to be seen by anyone, let alone monetized, and that's what all this hubbub is really about: Google and Big Tech quashing free speech as usual. Same shit, different day.

Re:Kill two birds with one stone?

[Opportunist]

Why do you not want to advertise on a channel that I very obviously like to watch, or I would not watch it?

That's the question I'd have to ask. I don't know about you, but I don't watch stuff I don't want to watch. Why? Because I fucking can, duh. It's not like I have to sit through the stupid sitcom because my favorite show comes right after and the channel is notorious for not heeding its schedule enough that I could rely on the times being accurate. I, and only I, decide what I see and what I don't.

And yes, some of the content I watch is "controversial". As in "could get some religious weenie's panties in a knot when he hears that his imaginary buddy gets insulted". By the way, YouTube, do you think it's "topical" to show me ads for Muslim dating pages when I watch a video of a guy who shows that the koran holds at least as much bullshit as the bible in even less content?

But yes, I'd actually watch an ad before that. I'd want to know what company is actually rooted enough in reality to support someone speaking out against the bullshit religion is. Hell, I'd even buy something from a company like that, provided I can actually use their goods, because I think they're supporting someone who I like.

In a nutshell, people watch videos they enjoy. You, advertisers, DO want to be associated with that. You DO want to be associated with something the watcher enjoys, considers pleasurable and maybe even wholesome. That's what you DO want to be associated with!

Re:Kill two birds with one stone?

[Kkloe]

They are not quashing free speech as the content creators have others sites to get whatever they want that allow their content, quashing free speech would be if youtube was the only place to put up content and then forbid "haters that gona hate"

Re:Kill two birds with one stone?

[matbury6017]

Nice idea in principle, but isn't the problem with hate speech and fake news that it's so very very popular? In fact, anything that's sensational, extreme, and provocative, which in turn is caused by Google's business model of rewarding links that get the biggest reactions. Google are simply reaping what they've sown.

Re:Original Content?

[NewtonsLaw]

YT has no real incentive to take down re-uploaded videos that have been monetized by someone else in a timely fashion -- in fact it's very much in their favor not to take them down quickly.

Why?

Well think about what happens to the ad-revenues generated by these re-uploaded videos before they're removed?

Where does it go?

I don't think it goes to the actual original video owner and they're sure as hell not going to refund the advertisers -- so it's a nice little earner for YT because I'd bet the money goes straight into their own vaults.

I've lost track of how many hundreds of copyright claims I've filed against folk who have re-uploaded many of my more popular vids and it's a hugely time-consuming task -- time that I'd rather spend making new vids. I suggested to YT some time ago that they really ought to do something like this, especially when new channels pop up and have hundreds of videos added overnight. In such cases you can be almost 100% certain that they're running a script that downloads and re-uploads other people's vids.

Re:Original Content?

[rtb61]

So what you are saying limiting by number of views does not really do anything other than reduce accounting costs. So 1,000 views should be a more reasonable limit and to kerb cheats, payments should be delayed to allow the content to be contested prior to payment, say between 30 and 90 days. If youtube was serious about better control of up loaders they should allow end users to block you tubers they do not want to see or bother to try to remember not to see and keep statistics of the blocked youtubers ie make it worth while to register. There is a whole bunch of crappy up loaders I want to block, fake thumbnails, bullshit titles, scraped content, photos as videos, machine voices, crap reviewers, propagandists, government agents, corporate junk, ads masquerading as content, VEVO (heh heh, although I can quite readily remember to avoid that one). Allow blocking of uploaders you bloody fucknuckles, grrr!

Better Proposal

[n329619]

Videos can only get Ads after it received 100 ratings with at least 50% likes.

It's not a lot of ratings, but if the video clearly has terrible content, the youtube community will vote it out quickly. It will also encourage the uploader to submit quality videos instead of bad/ fake contents.

Re:Better Proposal

[AHuxley]

Political, cults, communist parties, monarchies, theocracies and faith based groups would just list links in their forums and sites to urge votes on content.
Freedom of speech and after speech would be lost.
Is blasphemy in a nation with freedom of speech bad content?

Re:Original Content?

[LesFerg]

I would also like them to cull out the poor quality rips of movies, the movies with changed speed and a comment to replay at half speed, and those mirrored backward movie rips which are supposedly hidden from search engines.
You still can't report a video for being an illegal copy of somebody elses property.

Attention Google you piece of shit

[Anonymous Coward]

How come you have cut off a patriot in Alex Jones yet you were caught ad money sponsoring violent jihadist videos, you lying dirty motherfuckers?

* "Don't be evil", remember THAT you pieces of shit? You were always evil assholes & pieces of HEROIN JUNKIE shit motherfuckers!

APK

P.S.=> Makes me PROUD to CUT YOUR ASSES OFF money-wise fuckers, via (playing YOUR GAME better than YOU do losers, lol (750 million in 1 DAY loss for you due to the above, lol & adblockers like mine CUT YOU TO SHREDS, 62++% & climbing adclick loss for you, JUNKIES) APK Hosts File Engine 9.0++ SR-7 32/64-bit https://www.google.com/search?hl=en&source=hp&biw=&bih=&q=%22APK+Hosts+File+Engine%22+and+%22start64%22&btnG=Google+Search&gbv=1/ ... apk

Re:Original Content?

[sexconker]

Youtube is required to automatically respond to DMCA notices from small kids just like the do for the big boy MAFIAA types. Of course they don't, because Joe Schmoe can't inject his content into the audio/video matching bots which are the main anevue of blocking shit on Youtube now.

And when corps block videos the unpaid ad revenue can get redirected to them. I don't know if it always happens or if you have to be a large enough fish to get such a result in your favor, but it does happen. Youtube doesn't pay out ad revenue immediately.

I just post videos

[Z00L00K]

I just post videos because I want to share something, I have never signed up for ad revenue. And I suspect that there are quite a number of people around that do the same thing.

I probably could have made some money on this video ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?... ) but I don't really see it as worth the effort.

Won't stop demonetization for other "reasons".

[Chas]

With their regressive attitudes and their willingness to demonetize ANYTHING at the drop of a hat...I don't think this will make any real difference to people already being butt-fucked by YouTube, simply for not conforming to the YouTube censors' own political ideals.

Re:Won't stop demonetization for other "reasons".

[Chas]

Holy shit, my personal little "nothing" channel is like 700 views short of being able to monetize!

How the fuck did THAT happen?

I have 481,000 views but disabled all ads

[bobjr94]

I have nearly a half million views on my channel but have not monetized any of the videos. Sure I could make a few dollars but I don't like watching ads but Im sure most other people don't like them either.

Re:I have 481,000 views but disabled all ads

[Wulf2k]

Everybody should be using adblock anyway.

And if they're not using adblock, why should you be the only one not getting a few bucks out of their browsing?

Can't be so bad

[ReneR]

if even my small channel is apparently not affected: https://www.youtube.com/renere...

Re:Attention Google you piece of shit

[Opportunist]

If we're talking about this Alex Jones: Are you really asking or just trolling?

LOL

[p51d007]

Well, google has to make it's money somehow. If some are making a quick buck, google will tweak it until they make more than someone else. It's called business.

Embedded tags

[Tvingo]

Can Youtube embed tags in the videos, so that if someone downloads it off one channel then tries to upload it elsewhere that this information is automatically detected as a fraudulent video? Either that or have watermarks on every video with the channel name, so the same issue would apply, youtube could detect any existing watermark in the video being uploaded and know to automatically nix the upload? There has to be a technical solution that would prevent duplication by bots or spammers.

No More Ads on YouTube!

[LeftCoastThinker]

My forays into Youtube have been facilitated by my PS4 and Xbone. I end up posting bugs like this one https://www.youtube.com/watch?... or cool moments like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

My friends get to take a look and I think that it is great that now they don't have to put up with ads when checking out my latest video.