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Would You Pay For YouTube Videos?
Posted by
Soulskill
on Sun May 03, 2009 09:33 AM
from the i-would-pay-to-unsee-youtube-comments dept.
from the i-would-pay-to-unsee-youtube-comments dept.
secmartin writes "A couple of weeks ago, Google's CEO mentioned to investors that they might start charging YouTube's users for viewing content: 'With respect to how it will get monetized, our first priority, as you pointed out, is on the advertising side. We do expect over time to see micro payments and other forms of subscription models coming as well. But our initial focus is on advertising. We will be announcing additional things in that area literally very, very soon.' With the recent Disney-Hulu deal, Google is under increasing pressure to generate more revenue and at the same time attract more premium content. That means we might see payment options coming even sooner than expected, with control over the pricing models being handed over to the studios providing that content, like the way Apple caved in over variable pricing on iTunes. This raises an important question: would you actually pay for premium content on YouTube and other sites, or will this draw viewers away to other video sites?"
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News: Disney-Hulu Deal Is Ominous For YouTube 133 comments
Hugh Pickens writes "Dow Jones reports that Hulu scored a big victory when Disney agreed to take a nearly 30% stake in Hulu and put full episodes of its ABC TV shows on the site, enabling users to see shows like Lost, Scrubs, Ugly Betty and Desperate Housewives for free. Disney views the move as a way to reach a new audience that isn't coming to the network's own website. Although the ABC.com website has attracted regular viewers of its shows, Hulu offers the opportunity to tap into a new group of viewers. Now Google is under mounting pressure to add more professional content to YouTube in order to attract more advertisers. According to Dow Jones' Scott Morrisson, the equity structure of the Disney-Hulu deal suggests that content creators want greater involvement in online distribution than Google has offered with YouTube. 'Content providers don't want to give (YouTube) content because the advertisers aren't there yet,' said Edward Jones analyst Andy Miedler."
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No (Score:4, Informative)
Re:No (Score:4, Insightful)
I can't help but agree that I wouldn't pay for YouTube access. It's not THAT good or cool to validate it.
Parent
Never. (Score:5, Insightful)
No is too mild a word.
I have better things to do with my time ... erm ... like post on slashdot.
Seriously, never, no, nada, nein, nyet, or as we say in Soviet Kanuckistan, "No fucking way, eh!"
Not everything can be monetized - and not everything that you can extract a revenue stream from will generate a profit. "First we get the eyeballs, then we figure out how to make money from it" is dead, Jim.
Parent
Re:No (Score:4, Insightful)
I agree. I would never pay for normal access to user created content. But if there was a pay-for section of premium commercial free content then I could see that being acceptable. It would be great If we had access to many classic TV shows which are no longer aired today. I am 29 but it would be fun to watch a classic Disney or WB cartoon. Who wouldn't want to see bugs bunny screw with Elmer Fud or watch Donald Duck have a violent temper tantrum? Even the more recent cartoons from the 80's/90's that aired during the afternoon would be fun to see again. I would pay upward of 8-15 a month for unlimited access to a whole archive.
But the pricing and terms of use have to be fair:
-Unlimited views of any show when ever and where ever.
-Ability to use PC, STB, or wireless device such as a phone or PDA with same account
-No hidden anything, just a fair flat rate.
-Cross platform PC player that will run on Windows, Linux and MacOS. In a web browser is fine.
-Ability to download shows for viewing on other portable media players like iPod/iPhone or Archos jukebox when off the wireless grid.
I would pay for commercial content but I would never pay to access user content. The only you tube videos I watch are some user made live recordings of a few musicians (Bucketnead, Les Claypool etc.), tech and science videos. Other then that youtube is a cesspool of attention starved people.
Parent
Re:No (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
I would pay (Score:5, Interesting)
The question is not "IF", but "HOW MUCH".
If youtube offered full-length feature films with good quality, then I'd be ready to pay a reasonable amount. Let's say about the same price I pay to rent a DVD for a 700 MB download. The DVD has a better quality, but downloading is more convenient.
It's about time the media industry learned about this thing they call a "market" [wikipedia.org]. It's up to the seller to set a price but it's the buyer who accepts to pay the price or not.
Parent
Re:I would pay (Score:4, Insightful)
With youtube's 720p(*) videos, the quality is actually better than dvd's.
And yes, I would pay if I could easily watch streaming movies from YouTube, which is obviously the case. No one is gonna pay for the user submitted videos.
(*) Now someone comes argue its not as good quality as 720p could be, but its still good looking and definitely better than dvds.
Parent
Re:I would pay (Score:5, Insightful)
I agree - but only if "We're sorry, this video is not available in your country" is never, ever, ever shown again.
Parent
longer answer... (Score:5, Funny)
Long answer: Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo.
Parent
Re:No (Score:5, Insightful)
Why not? If the price was right, I'd pay. For example, if I could pay $0.50 to get unlimited and permanent watching rights to a TV show episode, or $1 for a movie, I'd certainly consider that. I already pay $10/mo for Netflix, so if they can offer similarly good content, I'd be willing to spend a similar amount of money.
Note that they're talking about "premium content". You're never going to be charged to watch a prairie dog turn around to dramatic sounding music.
Parent
Re:Why not just use Bittorrent instead? (Score:4, Insightful)
Because us grown-ups realize that this stuff isn't gonna get made for free. Thousands of actual people feed their with this money. Pretending it's alright to take the fruits of their labor and give them nothing in return is simply criminal.
Parent
Re:No (Score:4, Funny)
5 cents a rickroll. I'll be ruined.
Parent
Re:No (Score:5, Insightful)
And yet people happily pay $3.99 for a five second crappy quality clip of a pop song to use as their ring tone.
Parent
Re:No (Score:4, Insightful)
And yet people happily pay $3.99 for a five second crappy quality clip of a pop song to use as their ring tone.
It's more like they're paying $3.99 to pay someone to find the right song, edit it to the appropriate part and length of the song, put it in the right file format and size, and make it available to your phone without having to mess with wires and memory cards, and put it in the right directory.
The standard cell phone user isn't going to bother with P2P networks, Audacity, USB cables, and phone connectivity software when someone else is offering to do all the work for them in a fraction of the time.
Parent
Ringtones are a different market... vanity! (Score:5, Insightful)
As far as I can tell, nobody buys ringtones for content, they buy it for "branding" themselves. They use the ringtone to announce something about themselves to everybody they are with.
Some people are willing to pay $4 in an attempt to announce "look at me, gosh I'm hip" every time their phone rings... It is not about quality or work that went into the creation!
Parent
No (Score:5, Insightful)
The simple answer is no. I think people will go to pages were the video is prefaced with a short commercial before paying for Youtube. That's my humble opinion though.
Re:No (Score:5, Interesting)
Yup, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't pay for YouTube. Now, if they set up some sort of system where you could tip the people who put up particularly neat stuff and skimmed a percentage off of that, I could see doing that.
Parent
Re:No (Score:5, Insightful)
I would consider paying, but there would be several hurdles. I'd prefer optional tipping, provided there was a dead simple way to tip a tiny amount, but I might consider paying even if it was a more traditional model.
First, I would only be willing to pay for higher-quality versions. If there isn't a low-quality (ie current normal youtube quality) free, I'm not interested in paying sight unseen.
Second, it needs to be a true micropayment, and they need to somehow make it really trivial to use. I'm not particularly interested in giving them blanket access to my bank account, and I'm not particularly interested in worrying about how much is left in my special youtube account and periodically transferring money. Yes, I realize that doing both of those is probably impossible right now. Their problem, not mine.
Third, they need to provide a download option, at least on larger things. I'm not interested in watching a TV show in my browser, or in having it stop halfway through because my Internet connection hiccuped and it couldn't keep streaming.
And fourth, it needs to be per-video, not per-viewing. I don't want to count the times I've seen something cool on youtube and then later pulled it up to play it for a friend on my computer. I don't mind paying a couple pennies for the good quality version of a neat video, but I mind paying it repeatedly.
Parent
GPay (Score:4, Interesting)
This system has been around for a while, it's especially common here in Europe, but so far Google hasn't followed through on the implementation. Maybe that will change very soon (I was sure it would be included in the Android phone).
With a system like this in place it becomes very easy for someone to tip a person for an enjoyable YouTube video. There's been times where I would gladly have given the creator a dollar or two for his video (the John Freeman adventures for example), but there's just no easy way to do it. Give me a number to text that will automatically give the creator a dollar and I'd be all over it, and I wouldn't have a problem with Google skimming a percentage for themselves (as long as it's reasonable). The first John Freeman video has 1.7 million views, if 0.1% of those viewers like it enough to give a dollar that's $1700 for the creator, not a bad hobby, and not a bad source of revenue for Google when you expand it to the millions of videos on YouTube.
The beauty of this system is there's no need for credit cards or accounts at third party websites, just text a number and the transaction is done. Anywhere, anytime. Whether it's technically and financially feasible I don't know, but it would certainly be a step ahead of a Paypal like service.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Agreed. I have found hulu's ad content to be quite tolerable. I am surprised all the TV networks aren't jumping on the bandwagon. The advertisers get better exposure than the typical commercial hopping performed by tivo users.
I use beyondtv and have the added benefit if blowing through a whole block of commercials in one swell foop (when the smartskip algorithm works).
Re:No (Score:5, Interesting)
I think it depends on exactly how much you're paying for what content. paying for user-generated content? No. Paying for content available for free (ad supported) on Hulu? Probably not.
But if there were a site where I could pay a small fee (either subscription or per-episode) to watch virtually any show I want, then I'm game. The iTunes model works well enough for me, but the prices are too high. I generally don't want to "buy" TV shows for $2/episode, but if it were something closer to maybe $0.50 for a TV episode "rental", I'd be more interested.
But for me, at least, paying for TV shows online has to pretty much get to the point where I can replace my cable TV for cheaper than the price of cable TV, and it's at least as convenient. Of course, I don't expect that the content owners will go for that, because they have lots of profitable arrangements with the cable companies.
Parent
Re:No (Score:5, Interesting)
I work in a media corp that is currently in a long-term transition to all ad-supported, and, from experience, I'll tell you it's not going to work.
The problem with ad supported on the internet is that you can't charge what you charge for a TV spot or a newspaper ad...There are too many people vying for a slice of the internet ad revenue pie. But the majority of the costs for producing your high-end product remain.
So what's the alternative to charging for it? I mean, I've been thinking about this for (literally) a decade, and I really used to think that we could be self-supporting by ad revenue, and it's just not happening.
We've been riding the "free" gravy train for a long time. Lot of companies have been using their web presence as a loss leader, or justifying their losses on the potential for future monitization. This is going to end. It simply has to.
I can very easily see YouTube transitioning to what is effectively an a la carte cable TV provider...You pay a buck a month to the ESPN channel on YouTube, or whatever. The current configuration becomes effectively a massive public access cable channel, supported by subscription-based premium channels.
And, when it comes down to it, I see nothing wrong with that. I'd cancel my cable service in favor of something like that, in a heartbeat. It'd kill Tivo, and traditional cable.
Parent
Re:skype (Score:4, Informative)
I think also, that TV ads are...habit...in some ways, left over from the 3 channels and the "have to get up to change the channel" days.
Certainly their numbers are falling due to the proliferation of channels. I mean, the TV show watched by the most simultaneous viewers in history, was the M.A.S.H final episode in 1983...It had 106 million viewers. Imagine what an ad during that show cost.
Now? American Idol has been topping the charts in the last few years with numbers under 40 million on the final episodes...Way under in most cases: their best episode ever only had 36.4 million viewers.
Ad revenue is nice, but too many people making too much content, and a widely fractured audience, make it less and less profitable.
Parent
problem with ad supported videos (Score:5, Funny)
I'll handle this thread (Score:5, Funny)
$x = number_of_slashdot_readers;
while($x--)
{
print 'NO LOL!'
}
Why? (Score:5, Insightful)
That content's already free, and much of its public.
The media companies already have other venues, namely their websites and the channels they own. And bittorrent covers the rest.
So, why pay, when its free?
no way (Score:5, Insightful)
Point me to the bittorrent client that I can embed into any webpage, click "play", and with little to no wait, watch a video. Make sure it can work with 95% of all browsers on the market without installing a plugin*.
If you think bittorrent competes with Youtube, you dont understand what Youtube does.
* flash is a plugin, but since you already have it installed, it doesn't count.
Parent
Why not? (Score:5, Interesting)
As most things in life, it all depends on the value you get in return for your money.
Depends... what's my cut? (Score:5, Interesting)
How much of the revenue would be going to the people who produce the videos?
Here's the meat. (Score:5, Insightful)
Does it? (Score:5, Interesting)
That idea only works if you take the accountant view to running a business. But accounts don't run businesses. Entrepeneurs do.
What would be the cost to google of NOT having youtube. Shareholders make lousy businessmen even worse then accountants. At least accountants care about the bottom line at the end of the year, not the next quarter.
Shell recently said it would no longer concetrate on alternative energy. Smart short term move. VERY short term. The world is changing and you never know when you need to be ready to diversify. When Shell invested in alternative energy it cost them money but it was considered to be worth it because IF alternative energies became more important it would stop Shell from becoming UN-important.
Google didn't buy youtube because it thought youtube made money, it bought it because it saw a future there and wanted to be part of it. What better way to search through online video then to be the one hosting it. You may not like youtube searching but compare it to googles image search. Why do you think the first is more reliable? IF youtube had remained a 3rd party or even worse, had become MULTIPLE small time third parties, might another search engine take over if it became more capable of vinding the vids people wanted?
Wether google is right in this logic, or has another reason remains to be seen. Maybe they saw a huge future in ads in front of the vids. That means they need to control the vids. No ads in front of vids they don't control. if the ad market comes back or video ads become better, they are to late if they have no way to get them connected.
So, yes, right now Youtube costs money, but that is called investment. It is what shareholders were supposed to be for.
Parent
Nope (Score:5, Insightful)
Whether I'd pay or not, charging for videos would kill the platform. Why? Because there's a (more than one, actually) free alternative. Why would someone pay money for getting exactly what they get other places? You might get a few people to pay, in general, though, it would mean that people move elsewhere.
No, "what about Windows and Linux" does not count. YouTube doesn't come with your PC, YouTube has nothing you can't get elsewhere (like, say, Windows Games before the advent of Wine, and even with it). There is no "YouTube only" content that is so important to people that they wouldn't move to another video hoster in the blink of an eye.
Of course I'd pay. (Score:4, Funny)
It goes on the list right after
paying for slashdot commentary on my posts.
It worked for them (Score:5, Insightful)
Hey, it worked for Napster, right?
Right.
Yes (Score:4, Insightful)
I can see a system of inexpensive youtube videos tied to google payment. At say $.05 for a 10 minute video I can easily imagine not worrying about it. The problem is that if they are greedy and it is say $1 for a 10 minute video this will kill the model. I can also see that working well for low distribution content. 10k people at say $.25 per yr x 500 shows is not a bad revenue stream.
The standards for a paysite are much higher than for a free site. That means customer service. I do agree that this isn't likely to happen and the result is going to be that content fragments to dozens of sites all indexed ironically enough by google.
Maybe (Score:3, Interesting)
If the Youtube video would be the movie showing right now in cinema, in 720p @ 3-4mbps, then yes, I would pay up to $1-1.5 to see it.
Without any kind of commercials. Not once. Anytime I want (I would be allowed to view only one of the movies I bought at a time so it wouldn't be abused).
The reality is movies won't be available outside US anyway, because of all the deals movie studios make with local distributors and resellers so I couldn't care less.
It depends (Score:5, Interesting)
I would certainly pay a moderate amount for a High-quality, big pipe site with a wide selection of videos. And I mean wide, none of that "its from this provider, so it's in this other service". Of course with no DRM, I want to see the films at my mom's where there is no broadband. I say "a moderate amount" is a flat rate of about twenty dollars a month, perhaps up to forty if you use really a lot of bandwidth.
In the other corner, rather more likely, seeing what's on offer today, we could have an anemic selection of videos, many of them old, most of them in less-than-optimal quality (meaning you can get them in better quality in bittorrent), with a time lag for new releases, lots of DRM, and lots of service hiccups too.
Well, I can wait.
This is so stupid. (Score:5, Interesting)
Nope (Score:5, Interesting)
Pay to view? Sorry. There isn't much quality content on youtube worth paying for.
Pay to post? That might work. People who pay could have more control over their content. They could keep it from being compressed to hell, do things like swap the youtube logo with their own, have embedded links in their content, etc... I bet there is money in that market. But I'll tell you one thing... there ain't a damn thing on youtube I'd pay for. Cover bands doing cheesy remixes, teenagers getting their 15-minutes, and videos of cute pandas eating bamboo aren't worth paying for.
Re:Nope (Score:4, Funny)
Nah, I have a better idea - make them pay to post comments. And then put up a dedicated forum for complaining about it and charge to post there too.
They'll be rolling in cash within hours.
Parent
Rick Rolled (Score:5, Insightful)
Optional payment for ad-free (Score:3, Interesting)
Ah, micro-payments. They exist yet? (Score:5, Interesting)
How can I pay a small amount for a vid when there is no existing world-wide service to pay a small amount without it costing me a fortune?
1 dollar (iTune cost) for a vid? Like hell. That is way to much and already in that case the costs of the actual transaction makes up an insane part. Imagine if your shopping for a new coat cost 50 bucks to pay with your bank card.
That is the reason micro-payments have not caught on. It is not that people would mind paying a a nickle, it is that paying a nickle costs 25 cents.
Perhaps google should go in the banking business to break through this. The banks sure as hell aren't going to. In the netherlands we got the cheapest pay system (PIN) and that is being replaced in the future because .... well because a working reliable secure cheap system just ain't good enough. We got to get the unreliable, not working expensive system everyone else uses.
This must be a joke (Score:5, Insightful)
They want us to pay for dubious quality, with unknown content videos created by complete amateurs? What are they smoking? Thats a good way to kill it off, even better then the 'IP cops' that now monitor it.
If they cant pay for it via the offensive "commercials" that have been added, then they need to get out of the way to make room for someone else who can.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Starting your post in the subject line is irritating to many readers. Congratulations!
Ongoing debate about Netiquette and Subject lines (Score:5, Informative)
The purpose of the "subject" is self-explanatory. It briefly describes what the post is about, so people can skim the subject lines without reading the whole post. It is not for posting the first half of a sentence (poor netiquette).
Parent
Clearly it exists (Score:5, Funny)
to state the subject of your post.
Parent
Not necessarily. I can use it for other purposes. (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:Only if there were (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
You are correct. I've been watching TV over thirty years for free, with just an antenna. The advent of VCRs and DVDs made it easier for me to collect my favorite shows (like Star Trek), but I still prefer to see my television without a charge because, let's face it, a lot of it is trash and not worth buying.
Youtube falls into the "not worth buying" category. I'll simply boycott the site rather than handover a single dollar, and get my entertainment someplace else for free (like over-the-air television).