Apparently, in the YouTube scene, we’re going through another “Adpocalypse” — a situation on YouTube where advertising revenue takes a dive because advertisers got pissed about something some big YouTube content creator did and YouTube decides to be more strict on what content can actually be monetized on the site.
For those keeping track, this is the second.. third.. or possibly fourth one in the past few years and, quite honestly, I can’t give a damn or have any sympathy.
Now, this current Adpocalypse event is supposed to have been triggered by conspiracy theory type channels and content — apparently this time advertisers are pissed about their ads being shown alongside such insanity and as a result YouTube is (finally) suppressing views on such content as well as cutting ad revenue on channels of such a nature.
This, however, seems to be spreading all around, as it does, to any content that could be remotely controversial, and it coming at the same time as a current “family friendly” phase in the life of YouTube (a phase the site keeps going in and out of constantly) where so much as saying “fuck” once in a video will risk it being demonetized.
At least, this is my understanding of this, based on what I’ve seen in passing and I’ve heard a few major content creators I do follow say.
Now, were this a few years ago I’d be upset as well, as it would impact my channel at least to a degree, but things are different – for the past few years I’ve barely produced any content for the platform at all, so I’m not really invested as far as recent work goes, but that’s not all.
Early in 2018 YouTube changed the requirements for channel monetization, requiring, if memory serves, 4000 hours of view time a year for your channel, and 1000 subscribers.
The claim was that this would ensure “quality” of content on the site, which is funny considering how garbage the “popular” content on the site is (more on that later) but when small time content creators spoke up against this, the larger YouTube creators cried that the requirements weren’t anything crazy — that someone who “takes it seriously” could reach that in no time, and that we were otherwise “entitled” and that the small amount of money we made per year on ads wasn’t deserved; especially given that many of them seemed to blame small time channels for the issues!
If you recall the first “Adpocalypse” happened when the YouTube poster child PewDiePie made some racist comment in a video and for some reason, out of all the times this happened from other major figures on the site, this one time multiple companies got scared and either threatened to pulled ads or actually did such. Of course doing that meant Google wouldn’t lose out income since they get a good chunk of the total money actually paid for each view of an ad and, given that YouTube operates at mostly a loss( at best breaking generally even) that’s not something they can afford to let happen.
That’s when YouTube got a little more tight on demonetizing videos and channels, and then all the big timers got mad. I find it pretty damned hilarious, too, since many of their comments a few years later to us small timers, like “get real jobs” or “don’t make it your main focus” can apply to them as well.
Beyond that though, do these people who in some cases get millions of views and thousands of dollars for, well, idiotic crap, expect me to be upset that they lost a few thousand? Sorry, not sorry, it doesn’t hurt me and given the way many of these top tier creators live, I won’t ever feel bad for them. That’s ignoring other money making outlets they tend to have, such as merchandise.
Yep. Still making thousands regardless. Tons of loyal fans who will follow you anywhere, watch damn near most any content you make (which you could continue to make money off of, certainly) and even if you’re whole damn channel is demonetized if you’re that major I’m sure you can figure something out. You’re smart enough to get thousands or millions of subscribers, right? You can figure out more ways to earn money.
I know I’m just kind of going off on a bit of a rant here but I truly cannot have any empathy for most of the the big YouTube content creators crying about losing money when, at the same time, many of them had zero empathy for the little guys earlier last year when we lost any chance at all to make money until we meet some arbitrary criteria which, for some channel types, just won’t happen.
I can say one relatively major YouTube content creator is doings something productive about this — Jesse Ridgway, better known as “McJuggerNuggets” and his business partner Brian Spitz worked together with a team of developers to create a site and service which they hope and feel could, quite possibly, take down YouTube.
Grand goals, certainly, but not impossible given how the internet is over time. If you’re curious, the site is StoryFire — primarily a site for sharing original stories and creative works it’s now being slowly pushed as a content site for those who like to tell stories via video formats — like Jesse himself does.
That right there is something you have to have respect for — instead of whining about YouTube cutting his ad revenue, he keeps on telling his story on the platform while at the same time working on his own to rival it — to earn money, and at the same time give his fan base a chance to join in on the ground floor.
Too bad, so sad. Don’t get me wrong, I certainly hate that so many quality smaller channels and creators are affected by this, but for the other channels and creators who produce same old “flavor of the week” trending content who have millions of subs and have been whining about this for the past few years? Might I suggest getting a “real job” as you did to so many others a year and a half ago?