It’s clear that there is a move towards streaming video hosting on the internet, and I’m rather interested in where it’s all headed. I have a few predictions and I relate them to television. It’s a very different medium (to television) but the television licensing model is the closest system to base it on.
The following seems likely to me:
- YouTube pays royalties or licensing fees to host content, effectively becoming a world-wide “free-to-air” television station sponsored by advertising. Is this already happening with their pursuit of music video licensing?
- Some other websites operate subscription services or pay-per-view becoming online “cable” television stations. This model didn’t work out so well (before YouTube), and might be restricted to live events (like sports). People won’t pay for something they feel confident of finding for free elsewhere (with little effort).
- Independent media and amateur video makers migrate to profit sharing sites like Revver. Ask a Ninja has already mentioned that this is an easier way to monetize an internet show.
- Sites like VideoSift remain as a sort of online “television guide”. Increasingly important as visiting single sites (like YouTube) can limit the amount of media you might find.
- For people interested in simple free hosting or promotion, YouTube and Google Video remain good options. As Google video automatically (?) grabs videos, it may run into more copyright concerns than YouTube or similar which put the onus of responsibility on the video submitter.
Another prediction that might change the way things progress: a large multi-format media company (like Fox) screws over an amateur video maker by exercising their royalty-free license and profiting from use of a popular internet video in their larger media (television) network.
There is still alot of debate around as to how sites like YouTube are going to make money.
Whenever I hear their company name it is usually followed by some exclamation of how ridiculous their burn rate must be.
They have to try ads or something, i’m not sure how long they can continue.
I don’t think YouTube will have any serious problems monetising their website. Although they have to be really careful with ads. To avoid copyright problems, they’re hiding behind an ISP-style scheme where they claim that they are the “service provider” rather that the “publisher” so they can’t be shown to profit from publishing rather than offering a service.
I wonder if they can pull of a “we’re a service provider for members, but also offer publishing services for our commercial clients”….