The Same Things That Make YouTube Great Might End Up Destroying It
For 15 years now, YouTube has been the hub of video hosting on the internet. During its rise from obscurity to second most trafficked site in the world, YouTube has evolved from a simple video hosting platform to one of the most culturally influential and revolutionary mediums of idea delivery since the television.
Twice as many kids want to be Youtubers as want to be astronauts which, as if any more proof was needed, solidifies the notion that YouTube Star is the new Movie Star.
Despite the platform’s incredible success in penetrating the very cultural fabric of the western world, controversy around its practices has grown steadily over the last few years. This controversy has mainly grown out of the one central fact that threatens the website’s place as the king of internet content — YouTube is big business now.
As somewhat of a YouTube connoisseur (read: addict), I’ve decided to outlay what I see as the main keys to its success, and how those keys might be its ultimate downfall.
YouTube is Great!
It is! Here’s a few reasons why:
No Gatekeepers
No-one gets to tell YouTube users what they can and cannot post. There are no industry gatekeepers, no studio execs trying to figure out what’s ‘hip,’ and almost no concern for what would be traditionally commercially viable. People can blast out into the world whatever they like, with no interference. This has allowed people who would otherwise have no access to a platform (or an audience) get their messages out.
This means that LGBT creators can speak their minds, that Hong Kongers can expose police abuse, and that we get to see the original artistic vision of all creators, without studio notes.
It’s Super Niche
The huge number of users, huge number of creators and lack of necessity to fit everything into a 24-hour TV schedule means that we get to see content on YouTube that would never see the light of day on network television.
In what world, given the option to choose The Big Bang Theory instead, would a television executive greenlight:
- A musical-egg-sketch-comedy-based cooking show?
- A movie review show from the perspective of a future alien civilization, who attempt to analyse cinema given terrible assumed information about the human race?
- An imagined UK political reporter going on frustrated rants at his cameraman during commercial breaks?
It’s All in One Place
If you’re an online video creator, you live on YouTube. This means that essentially all online video content worth watching is centralised into one place — a one stop shop where creators can connect with an audience of billions, network with similar creators and take advantage of incredibly stable and sophisticated video hosting and analytics infrastructure.
YouTube is Garbage!
It is! Here’s a few reasons why:
No Gatekeepers
Any idiot can post whatever they like — there’s basically no moderation, 95% of the content is garbage, and it’s allowed white supremacists and other terrible people to spread their ideas.
You might not be able to see alien movie reviews on TV, but I bet you’ve never seen an ISIS beheading video on TV either. Those studio execs are there for a reason.
It’s Super Niche
There are 10,000 tiny YouTube channels with some measure of success — how on earth do you police it all?
On network TV, there are a staple of vetted shows, and we can make sure that all of these shows are free from violations of paid promotion disclosure, minimum wage legislation and other exploitative practices.
You know that network TV show that exploits abused animals for cheap emotional points? No, you don’t.
It’s All in One Place
If you’re an online video creator, you live on YouTube. If YouTube mistreats you, or decides it won’t allow you to make money, too bad. Good luck finding an audience anywhere else.
YouTube is becoming the same kind of techno-monopoly as Facebook. And people are leaving Facebook in droves.
Why YouTube Might Be In Danger
YouTube has been pushing its luck with its creators over the last couple of years. Most of the outrage stems from the fact that YouTube is now not only a place for funny cat videos and weird ideas — it’s a place to make a living off of funny cat videos and weird ideas.
Ever since the introduction of its revenue sharing partner program in 2007, YouTube has been pitching itself as a way for niche creators to make themselves (and also YouTube, of course) money. Now, YouTube’s largest creators rake in millions of dollars a year through pre-roll ads among other things.
This has produced problems for YouTube: If you’re the sole source income for thousands of people, the stakes are raised if you mess up. And since the entire revenue-generating relationship depends on the willingness of advertisers to spend money on YouTube, the platform has now encountered the age old media industry conflict between the interests of advertisers and the editorial whims of creators. Except instead of a small staff or writers, YouTube has hundreds of thousands of independent creators, most of whom started with the idea that they would be allowed to monetise their weird ideas, whether they had direct connections to willing advertisers or not.
Demonetisation
In response to pressure from advertisers (some of whom had their ads run against ISIS videos, implicitly gifting the group their ad dollars), YouTube has cracked down hard on adult or ‘advertiser unfriendly’ content, having their algorithm scan every upload for such content and assess videos’ eligibility for monetisation accordingly.
The decreased monetisability of advertiser unfriendly content (or videos that the algorithm incorrectly identifies as advertiser unfriendly) has led to incredible frustration among YouTubers.
One of my friends saw a drop — literally — of 80% [in YouTube ad revenue]
- Casey Neistat
Merch Link in Bio
This demonstisation has led to successful YouTubers having to depend on external sources of income to ensure that a single uncensored ‘fuck’ in a video doesn’t decimate their income for the week.
Thus, we now have YouTubers starting dubiously necessary podcasts, merchandise lines and Patreon accounts. The danger for YouTube isn’t that their creators’ podcasts do badly — it’s that they do well.
Take educational YouTuber CGP Grey. After starting two popular podcasts (Hello Internet and Cortex) while on the hunt for ways to diversify his revenue, his YouTube output has plummeted. He also cofounded Standard, a sort of agency that, in part, helps thoughtful online creators diversify in the same ways.
Competitors are Licking Their Lips
With creators and audiences both getting fed up with YouTubers, potential competitors are beginning to take notice of the chinks appearing in the platform’s armor.
To be clear, YouTube’s huge audience is not going to be threatened by an up-and-coming platform any time soon (RIP Vidme), but I think that tremendous scope exists for platforms with already large audiences to expand into video. Facebook and its subsidiary Instagram apparently agree, pushing Facebook Video and IGTV hard over the last two years.
Conclusion
YouTube’s position as top dog in the online video industry isn’t in danger of being lost in the next couple of years. The trend of YouTube being the go-to service for online creators, though, is hanging in the balance.
If the platform can’t manage to find a middle ground between satisfying its creators, its audiences and its advertisers, the creators will jump ship to the first viable competitor that comes along. If the creators leave, so will the audience, and if the audiences leave, so will the advertisers.
This is the way YouTube ends,
Not with a bang, but with a whimper.
