this post was submitted on 20 Aug 2024
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They definitely couldn't add a hard paywall. It would collapse the system overnight.
Collapse what exactly? It would actually reduce strain on their servers and provide a better experience for paying users. Obviously they won't do it because there's a ton of users who watch ads (think of the average guy who plays YouTube on their phone or TV, with zero adblocking).
Just the revenue of paid subscribers will not pay the bills of any content creator that actually has employees or spends money creating content.
They won't do it because all of their content would have no alternative but to disappear.
It would be a huge gamble, but it could pay off. Seriously, how many people are watching YouTube every day? Hours of their favorite content creators.
Imagine a rug pull, YouTube is now a pay only service. No ads, but everyone has to pay $5 a month to access. I'd bet with you that a surprising amount of people would just pay that to continue using it.
How many? Nobody knows, but it would certainly be 30% or higher. Now imagine 30% of users paying just $5 a month how much money that would be.
It can be done, YouTube just doesn't do it right now as they still earn plenty with ads. If suddenly everyone started to use an ad blocker then things would change very quickly.
This is an insane pipe dream.
You underestimate how addicted people are to YouTube. There is no alternative to it.
Twitch is streaming focused, the vods absolutely suck. Kick? Same.
What else is there? TikTok? Instagram? Neither of which provide long high quality videos.
After all we are talking about YouTube literally blocking everyone and putting up a banner: $5 a month or you're out of luck. If someone already happily pays $18 a month for Netflix, what is 5 bucks?
30% conversion rate of people already not paying to paid subscriptions is astronomical.
Expecting 10% would be delusionally optimistic.
Amazon has around 310 million active users. Amazon has 230 million Prime subscribers, even though it costs up to $15 a month. Yes, those include cheaper student subscriptions of course, but still.
Of course 30% is optimistic, but the average people I know happily watch those fucking ads. And don't even complain about unskipable double ads. They don't like them, they're still too lazy to install an ad blocker as long as they get their content. Each one of them would absolutely shell out 5 bucks to continue watching (it's less than a single beer when you go out).
The comparison would be Amazon just removing non-prime purchases. It's not possible they'd convert 8 million of those 80, let alone 24mil. The people who aren't members have already decided Prime isn't worth buying.
30% isn't optimistic. It's impossible. 10% is "optimistic". They'd be more likely to net a drop in subscriptions when some creators announced that they were going to be forced to stop making content than they would to somehow convert 30% of people who aren't willing to pay for YouTube.
Amazon includes a bunch of services with that price, I don't see Google matching that
It already reduced the services severely. The included Amazon Music sucks if you don't pay extra. The included Amazon Video has ads now. And Prime gaming has reduced the offers.
While YouTube premium gives you full access to YouTube music and 1080p Enhanced Bitrate video quality. I only got it for the music, no ads on TVs is a bonus (Already had an adblocker for phone/PC).