YouTube to Share Revenue With Users

I don’t normally follow the World Economic Forum, but YouTube co-founder Chad Hurley made an exciting announcement there yesterday.

YouTube to Share Revenue With Site’s Users

By Paul Haven
Associated Press
Sunday, January 28, 2007

DAVOS, Switzerland — Chad Hurley, co-founder of YouTube, said Saturday that his site will start sharing revenue with its millions of users.

Hurley said one major proposed innovation is a way to let users be paid for content. About 70 million videos are viewed daily on YouTube, which was sold to Google for $1.65 billion last year.

“We are getting an audience large enough where we have an opportunity to support creativity, to foster creativity through sharing revenue with our users,” Hurley said. “So in the coming months we are going to be opening that up.”

Hurley, 30, gave no details of how much users might receive or what mechanism would be used.

In October 2005, Revver — which like YouTube offers video clips online — announced plans to attach advertising to user-submitted videos and give their creators a cut of the profit.

YouTube is huge in the Philippines. Online ad revenue shares that seem meager in the US can go a long way in the Philippines. Revver pays through PayPal, but PayPal doesn’t send money to the Philippines. Google, on the other hand, sends AdSense checks to the Philippines.

That’s why I think YouTube revenue sharing will create a whole new video cottage industry in the Philippines, one that will further speed the fall of Philippine TV. After all, why should video talents deal with TV networks’ bullshit when they can make money with a webcam?

(Via Joey Alarilla.)