Will YouTube Actually Die This TIme?
I have heard a lot of people saying that YouTube is totally screwed right now. Lots of very popular channels that I love to watch are getting little to no ad revenue after the latest ad boycott disaster. Vidme is trying to capitalize on the problem by trying to get more and more big-name content creators on their site but will it work?
YouTube is a place where many people go to get videos for just about anything that you could think of. Not only is it a social media platform but rather a search engine of step by step tutorials for just about anything that you could think of. A visual way of learning even the most complex of subjects. While the name and brand do carry a lot of weight, does it get free passes for all of these screw-ups? From the unsubscriber glitch to the filtering all LGBT+ content from the resitricted mode to artificially promoting certain creators over others in the trending tab, or to the final most severe transgression to date, cutting the ad revenue of many full-time YouTubers that provide their platform with tons of free content. All of these things seem like the final straw for any other video sharing platform but not youtube. This platform seems to be able to survive anything. When will the good will of the audience and creators give in, or will this always be a must have cornerstone of the internet. Let's take a look at its competition to get a better idea of what the field looks like.
VidMe is a platform very similar to YouTube for the viewers. For the creators, it is very different. First of all, there are no ads on VidMe at the time of this writing so no passive monetization. They do offer a tip system but without a large fanbase, it is unlikely to be something that creators can count on for any kind of income at all. The VidMe admins are very very active on social media and have a great reputation for communication with their partners, they still don't have the kind of market share to bring in the views. It still kind of seems like a place where creators parody their youtube channel and there aren't many people looking to the platform as a sense of viewing entertainment. Without people thinking that your platform is a fun place to find videos that are better than the competition, they will just go to youtube 9/10 times.
Facebook was always touted as the next big thing to beat out YT but with a lack of a steady monetization method, the company really does not look to be bringing content creators over anytime soon. As you can see, I'm not exactly rooting for a platform to beat youtube only because there isn't one that can even come close at the moment. So what does that mean for the future of YouTube?
My prediction is that lots of big YouTubers will find a fanbase big enough to support them on patreon and they will continue to make content but with significantly less brand loyalty to youtube. Lots of creators will start moving to twitch for live streams with one-time donation support. Others will make sponsored podcasts (I've seen this one a lot recently), but I don't see them ditching YouTube altogether. I think that in the future, we will be left with that YouTubers that were able to make it big before now without many new personalities coming onto the scene. With the current lineup of popular YouTubers, I expect to see less content and more sponsored deals.
In closing, YouTube is not dead, but its closer to being so than it ever has before and if it wants to stay a place that is bursting at the seams with content and communites, it needs to fix this ad problem and fast. While there may not be a clear front runner to take its place right now, things in the tech industry change in a matter of days. Google needs to fight to keep the crown they have earned this far or else the future might be very very rough for them.
YouTube is a place where many people go to get videos for just about anything that you could think of. Not only is it a social media platform but rather a search engine of step by step tutorials for just about anything that you could think of. A visual way of learning even the most complex of subjects. While the name and brand do carry a lot of weight, does it get free passes for all of these screw-ups? From the unsubscriber glitch to the filtering all LGBT+ content from the resitricted mode to artificially promoting certain creators over others in the trending tab, or to the final most severe transgression to date, cutting the ad revenue of many full-time YouTubers that provide their platform with tons of free content. All of these things seem like the final straw for any other video sharing platform but not youtube. This platform seems to be able to survive anything. When will the good will of the audience and creators give in, or will this always be a must have cornerstone of the internet. Let's take a look at its competition to get a better idea of what the field looks like.
VidMe is a platform very similar to YouTube for the viewers. For the creators, it is very different. First of all, there are no ads on VidMe at the time of this writing so no passive monetization. They do offer a tip system but without a large fanbase, it is unlikely to be something that creators can count on for any kind of income at all. The VidMe admins are very very active on social media and have a great reputation for communication with their partners, they still don't have the kind of market share to bring in the views. It still kind of seems like a place where creators parody their youtube channel and there aren't many people looking to the platform as a sense of viewing entertainment. Without people thinking that your platform is a fun place to find videos that are better than the competition, they will just go to youtube 9/10 times.
Facebook was always touted as the next big thing to beat out YT but with a lack of a steady monetization method, the company really does not look to be bringing content creators over anytime soon. As you can see, I'm not exactly rooting for a platform to beat youtube only because there isn't one that can even come close at the moment. So what does that mean for the future of YouTube?
My prediction is that lots of big YouTubers will find a fanbase big enough to support them on patreon and they will continue to make content but with significantly less brand loyalty to youtube. Lots of creators will start moving to twitch for live streams with one-time donation support. Others will make sponsored podcasts (I've seen this one a lot recently), but I don't see them ditching YouTube altogether. I think that in the future, we will be left with that YouTubers that were able to make it big before now without many new personalities coming onto the scene. With the current lineup of popular YouTubers, I expect to see less content and more sponsored deals.
In closing, YouTube is not dead, but its closer to being so than it ever has before and if it wants to stay a place that is bursting at the seams with content and communites, it needs to fix this ad problem and fast. While there may not be a clear front runner to take its place right now, things in the tech industry change in a matter of days. Google needs to fight to keep the crown they have earned this far or else the future might be very very rough for them.
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