YouTube Will Run Ads on Some Creator Videos Without Paying Them
Google’s popular video streaming platform, YouTube, has recently rolled out new Terms of Service, which will be made effective by the end of the next year in all regions. As of now, the platform is rolling out the update on a limited number of channels starting with the US.
According to the new update, the platform won’t be paying some creators even after running advertisements on some of their videos as they are not eligible to become a part of YouTube’s Partner Programme (YPP).
Under normal circumstances, creators used to receive a fraction of the total revenue when YouTube ran ads on their videos as part of its Partner Programme.
However, with the new Terms of Service, a creator who isn’t in the YPP might still see ads on some of their videos. With this update, the company will be able to run more advertisements across the platform without having to pay a portion of their revenue to a number of creators. However, the company still won’t run ads on videos from non-partnered creators focusing on sensitive topics such as alcohol, gambling, politics, and religion.
This new update will mainly impact small creators who don’t have a vast viewership.
To be in YouTube’s Partner Programme, creators need to have accumulated 4000 total watch time hours over the past 12-month duration and have more than a thousand subscribers at least.
From today onwards, the platform will start rolling out ads slowly on a limited number of videos from a handful of YouTube channels that are not in their partner program. Meaning creators who aren’t in YouTube’s Partner Program might see advertisements running on some of their videos without receiving any payment for the same.
While it is not clear how many creators will see ads on their videos, the platform did confirm that the ads might appear on some channels regardless of their size. YouTube will also track how this update is affecting the creators.
Conclusion
No doubt that the YouTube creator community is not really delighted with this new update, and it is pretty understandable why. Even more so because the relationship between creators and the platform has been quite stressed over the last few years. Just a couple of years ago, creators who were a part of YPP experienced a significant drop in advertising revenue due to several reasons.
With this update, this relationship might tense up a bit more. However, YouTube did say that they will monitor the impact on creators. Only time will tell how this update works with the creator community.