The new Youtube rules for monetization and The Partner Programme will see the end of 70% of the channels. YES! SEVENTY PER CENT.
71% of youtubers have less than 4000 watch hours in the last year and so won't be eligible for monetization of their videos. Let's put this into perspective:
A channel that gets 1000 watch hours per year is currently earning around $500 per month from advertising revenue on their videos. Youtube, on the other hand are earning around $1000 per month from the same channels videos, for the payments from their clients for allowing advertising on their site.
So currently, there's a lot of people who are earning a small amount of money each month and producing some really good content.
Under the new rules, they will NOT be eligible for monetization BUT Youtube are still going to be allowed to put adverts onto the creators video but they WON'T have to pay them a penny.
I don't know about you but this sucks!
Many of my favourite channels are quite small but have been going a long time and provide me with great content. NotRegMe and OurHalfAcreHomestead are two that immediately spring to mind. These two channels are unlikely to hit the new threshold. I fear that they will be lost to the community along with many others.
This will leave us will the larger, mainstream channels that make thousands of dollars each month but only provide us with 'mainstream' news and views that we could find anywhere on mainstream television.
Thus, our non mainstream commentators who provide us with the news of what is really going on...will be gone.
It seems to me that this is a new tool for censoring people.