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[Araph]

Long boring backstory:
I enjoy watching people play video games on YouTube. A while back, I discovered something rather unpleasant, though: one of my favorite YouTubers, Markiplier, is partnered with a group called Polaris.

Which is a branch of Maker Studios.

Which is a subsidiary of Disney.

Which means part of Markiplier's ad revenue, some creative control, and most likely a significant part of the rights to his videos and channel belong to Disney by proxy.

Does this change anything? Not really, no. Markiplier still makes a good living, living the YouTube dream no less. But it really irrationally bugged me.

I began poking around a bit more. Turns out a lot of the famous YouTubers (Markiplier, PewDiePie, Game Grumps, Dodger, The Yogscast, and CaptainSparklez, amongst others) are partnered with Polaris. Looking into alternatives, I saw the most obvious competitor: Machinima. Turns out they have a history of trapping people into neverending contracts and legally forcing their partners into submission. Not exactly a good choice (I don't actually have any interest in becoming a partner, but I was curious about what the rewards and consequences were).

'Well, why would anybody sign up for that?' I asked after the initial burst of 'wat' subsided. From what I can tell, it seems partners (not all of them, but the more well-known ones (who are also presumably treated better, contract-wise)) get a platform to stand on, monetary compensation based on the number of views they bring in, and (maybe, I'm not sure on this one) assistance in hosting panels and stuff at cons (I saw somewhere that Markiplier at least had a panel at PAX or something through Polaris). I'm sure there are others, and if anybody can point them out I'd greatly appreciate it.

I like the concepts of Kickstarter, Patreon, and Bandcamp. Sure, the people that run them profit off of them, but they're a means of directly supporting creators without going through a more corporate middle-man. I think that sort of idea can be applied to this.

Here's where the actual idea comes in:
What if there was a site that provided a platform similar to Polaris' or Machinima's, but was free to join, didn't claim rights to partners' videos, and didn't require a percentage of add revenue?

Channels (or independent websites) could be submitted and voted on by viewers. Once a channel has reached a certain number of upvotes, they enter a 'hall of fame' of sorts, where they're entitled to a more permanent position on the site (a specific set of pages for the hall of fame members, which would be more prominently displayed and promoted) and (this is more of a maybe, I haven't entirely thought it through) eligible for help in arranging stuff at cons and financial aid for transportation, which would be paid for from a war chest of donations (relying on goodwill of the community instead of leeching ad revenue).

For channels that haven't made it to the hall of fame (i.e. the vast majority of them) they can be found via searching (which obviously wouldn't be useful for bringing in new viewers) or from a variety of prominently displayed sections on the front page (like Kickstarter's Staff Picks and Popular things; a channel that had a sudden burst of upvotes might get on the 'What's Hot' section, a channel with a very high upvote:downvote ratio might get on the 'Cult Favorites' section; things like that). For each channel's page, the creator could describe the channel, put their best videos on display, link to all their social stuff, and so on.

To join, you wouldn't have to sign away any creative control or anything; the only limitations would be that you can't simultaneously be a partner with another site (like Machinima) and <whatever this site's name would be here> and that you can't post, like, a channel full of porn or something. Basic stuff like that.

Then I realized:
Wait a minute, I'm a web developer. That's literally my job. I could make this site.

So I'm just running this idea by all of you B12ers. I'm probably badly misinterpreting the benefits of being a Machinima partner and overlooking some really obvious stuff, but hopefully you guys can point out any gaping holes in the idea before I shout 'eureka' and charge of into the sunset to go build a half-baked site.

tl;dr:
I'm curious if a non-profit site that automated the process and benefits of partnering with Machinima would be a good idea.

[burningpet]

I toyed with this idea, relying on the site Ads to allow self revenue (you will need to maintain servers) and perhaps even give additional revenue to the youtubers.

Machinima and the likes partnerships also guarantee that youtube doesn't remove your video on every DMC complaint before actually sending a human being to inquire and somewhat protect the youtubers with other legal stuff.

I have interested some youtubers with 300-400K subscribers and they seemed to like this idea. my other suggestion would be that the system could categorize genres and suggest videos a-la netflix/steam system to gamers since i think youtube does a poor job of categorizing sub-genres.

I neglected it because i found very little personal interest in it and i don't have the time to build and maintain such a platform, but form a very shallow inquirie, the mid strength youtubers liked the idea behind it so its very possible there's an unknown demand for this service.

Also, there are plenty of sites that embed youtube videos and try to sort 'em somewhat. the thing is, i am pretty sure most people will simply link the youtube video directly even if they stumbled on it through your/their page, so partnership with the youtubers is essential and that's something not a lot of companies do.

[Orange Wizard]

Alternatively, make a Youtube clone that doesn't update its UI every other day and is much less confusing with regard to partnership and all that. Two big pluses right there.
And as burningpet said, a better categorisation system that doesn't rely on coming up with endless tags.

I'm not sure how many people would actually use it, but if you go through with it, I'd be happy to lend a hand. Or maybe a foot.
Best stick with foot. I need my hands for typing.

[Sappho]

It seems like a solid idea. I'd imagine the biggest issues would be funds and law. It's hard to anticipate how much you'll earn if you rely on donations, and it could easily not be enough for what you need it for, at least until you strike it big. Ads might be necessary to keep it going. Legally, I think it would be necessary to hire a lawyer. Trust me, I worked for lawyers for a lot of years, and these legal issues are very complicated. When you're talking about making money off of videos, most of which contain copyrighted material, you really need someone who knows what they're talking about to sort through any potential complaints and protect the video producers (and your site).

But the idea of a place specifically for YouTubers, particularly for Let's Players, where newcomers can actually have a fighting chance to get some attention, and videos can be rated on how good they are rather than just how popular... I like that idea. I see a lot of the popular Lets Players, people who are making money off of their videos, and while a few are great, many of them are just awful. My humble clips are better by comparison, but I'm lucky to get 15 views on one (fortunately I'm not doing it for profit!). There are just so many, the tag "let's play" isn't enough, and you're right, YouTube's categories are severely lacking in this area. Newcomers don't have a chance, the way it is right now. I'd support you if you decided to go for this.

[Cholek]

Alternatively, make a Youtube clone that doesn't update its UI every other day and is much less confusing with regard to partnership and all that.

This.

Also idea is very interesting. If you start working on it - I will also lend you my hand.

[kytuzian]

I would join, as I would also like a new area to put up my videos, which, as Sappho said, get about no views compared to some major YouTubers that I personally think are rubbish.

Of course, there would have to be an audience on the new site as well, which could take some time and effort to build up.

[Sappho]

I would join, as I would also like a new area to put up my videos, which, as Sappho said, get about no views compared to some major YouTubers that I personally think are rubbish.

Of course, there would have to be an audience on the new site as well, which could take some time and effort to build up.

Just subscribed to your channel for support. : )

It's true, building up an audience could be some work. Although if you could get the word out, I think it would sell itself pretty well. I'm pretty sure people only use YouTube because it's there. Everyone complains about how awful it is. If you could make a better version, targeted at YouTubers, I think there's a build-in audience there, ready to go.

[Parsely]

No one wants to watch poor GUNIN's unfinished walkthroughs un-commentated LPs. :p

[Orange Wizard]

That's easily fixed. Just add commentary.

[Parsely]

Yes let me just download all 300+ minutes of my Castlevania LP and talk over every second of that. :p

[Araph]

Just in response to your comments on YouTube: YouTube does what it does phenomenally. Yes, it's irritating as balls in some ways, but on the other hand, it plays reliably, handles quality settings for streaming, allows users to monetize videos, handles copyright disputes (specifically, if you use copyrighted content it recognizes, it'll intervene instead of letting the copyright owners release the hounds on you), has awesome analysis tools for content creators, and handles partnerships with organizations like Machinima, which, as much as I dislike them, are useful for a whole lotta people. That's not even counting the littler things, like allowing inexperienced uploaders to do basic editing after uploading, allowing links and comments to be embedded in videos, having a decent (not the people using it, but the system itself) comment system, and many, many other things.

That said, it's nowhere near perfect.

Google really screwed up with foisting Google+ on everyone, repeatedly changing layouts, and a bunch of other things. If there was a good alternative, a lot of people would use it.

Personally, though, I prefer a more independent approach. If there was a set of tools you could set up on a personal website (a la Wordpress) that allowed streaming and tracking videos, the entire idea of watching videos online could be decentralized, which would prevent there from being the whole problem of one company ever creating a monetizable monopoly on online videos.

Just my two cents on the matter of YouTube.




Anyways, I can't make an alternative to YouTube. Too much skill and time required, too little interest on my part. What I would like to do is have this website allow for any video creator to join whether they're on YouTube or their own site, which might help a slight transition towards personal sites for video hosting.