By Shea Donovan

[1] 

Youtube LLC
901 Cherry Ave
San Bruno, CA
94066
(650) 253-0000
[2]

Founders and Senior Vice President:

                                                          Steve Chen [3]

 Chad Hurley [4]

 

   Jawed Karim [5]

Senior Vice President – Salar Kamangar [6][7]

Youtube History:

Eight years ago Youtube was created by three former Paypal employees, and since 2006 has been owned by Google.  From the first Youtube video, uploaded on April 23, 2005 by founder Jawed Karim, Youtube has come a long way and has been hugely successful.  Youtube was originally a video-sharing website, but today, even though video-sharing continues to be the main source of content, Youtube users can now get access to full length movies and other high-quality content such as short films that members of the Youtube Partnership Program upload. [8][9]

Revenue:

Youtube’s revenue comes primarily from advertising that takes place before a viewer can view a video.  If the video has been uploaded by an uploader that is a member of the Youtube Partnership Program, 55% of the advertising commission for that video goes to the uploader, and 45% of the commission goes to Youtube.[10]

 

Current Projects:

Youtube has been working on expansion and integration.  They are rumored to have a pay radio service similar to Spotify in the works and in addition, Youtube recently streamed the first “Youtube Music Awards” online at Youtube.com.  Changes to Youtube.com include an integration with Google Plus.

Youtube Radio

Youtube is rumored to have a new radio service called Youtube Radio in the works.  It is due to be released at the end of this year.  This radio service would be similar to Spotify where it would be a paid subscription service and listeners would be able to listen to full albums of music.  This radio service is targeted at mobile users, largely due to the 40% increase of Youtube use on mobile phones, since the release of the Youtube app.  The new options that Youtube Radio would offer, different from Spotify, are that you can watch music videos through this service and you can also keep certain songs on your device for a short period of time.

This new radio service would help out the struggling music industry and also many problems Youtube has with copyrighted music.  Within this new service, record companies would be able to work with Youtube to fix the problem of low per-stream payouts.  Youtube will have to acquire the legal licenses  from record labels and artists in order to stream music for Youtube Radio.  This move for Youtube Radio will help resolve copyright issues that Youtube.com currently has, where Youtube users use copyrighted songs in their videos without permission. [11][12]

Youtube Music Awards

On November 3rd, 2013, Youtube aired their first ever Youtube Music Awards (YTMA).  The award show was 90-minutes long and was held at Pier 36 in NYC.  It was only streamed online on Youtube.com.  There was chaos, awkwardness, and, unfortunately for Youtube, no more than 200,000 people tuned in to watch.  Lady Gaga, Arcade Fire, M.I.A. and Eminem performed, as well as other artists, throughout the show.
Six music-related awards were given out: Breakthrough of the Year, Response of the Year, Innovation of the Year, Youtube Phenomenon, Video of the Year, and Artist of the Year.  The award titles reflect other awards given at broadcast award shows on television, like the American Music Awards or Video Music Awards, but the recipient of each Youtube award was decided by video-sharing activity on Youtube.com from fans two weeks before the airing of the show.
Unfortunately, the show wasn’t as successful as Youtube has expected, due largely to the production ideas that creative director, Spike Joneze, came up with for the show. Jonze, a successful music video and film director, was the creative director for the show and he admitted that he had never “done anything live before or an awards show.” Jonze decided to have no rehearsal for the show because “the objective was to create an awards show unlike any other, where the audience gathered in a non-stuffy space and the production moved organically throughout the room.” Jonze also decided to have the hosts, Jason Schwartzman and Reggie Watts, find the winning artists in the crowd of people, “similar to a scavenger hunt.” [13][14]
The YTMA’s was another way Youtube was trying to branch out into new forms of entertainment.  The amazing performances from talented, famous and non-famous, artists and the creative producing techniques definitely ended up making the YTMA’s stand out from the crowd of other award shows.  Hopefully Youtube is planning on having the YTMA’s again next year and they can only get better.  Click the image below to watch the full Youtube Music Awards: [15][16]

Google Plus + Youtube Integration

Youtube has been owned by Google since 2006, but it wasn’t until earlier this fall that there has been a cross-over of a Google app and Youtube.  Google now requires Youtube users to have a Google Plus account, Google’s social network, in order to post comments on all Youtube videos.  Now every time you post a comment, your real name is shown.  This change is a result of the long history of some Youtube comments posted that are inappropriate and spam.  Google hopes that if users are forced to show their real name next to their comments, the comments will be less crude and more substantial towards the videos.
Google has received a lot of backlash from this decision, many Youtube users saying, “anonymity is part of what makes the internet work, and to eliminate it and create a system where there’s a permanent record of anything anyone’s ever done or said on the web can get a bit 1984 rather fast.”  Youtube users are now forced to sign up for a Google Plus account if they wish to comment on a video.  In addition to showing users real names, other small changes that this integration has made on the comment section include not having a character limit on comments, which is causing excessive comments, and responses to users comments being sent to their Google Plus accounts instead of their Youtube accounts.
Google’s decision to integrate Google Plus into Youtube came from good intentions.  It is a fairly new change to Youtube and whether Google will keep Google Plus integrated into the comments of Youtube is unknown.  It is possible that Youtube users will find a way around this change, but in the mean time there are some positive results from this change. Many people are now being introduced to Google Plus, which is a good alternative social network to people who are getting bored with Facebook and Twitter, or just want to try out a new social network.  One new change to the Youtube.com format and one is that there is now a Google Plus bar that allows you to view your ‘Favorites,’ ‘Subscriptions,’ ‘Playlists,’ and more, all in one place.
[17][18]

Sources:

[1] Youtube Logo: http://www.rudyhuyn.com/blog/2013/05/23/how-to-launch-the-official-youtube-app-from-your-app/
Retrieval date: 11/15/13

[2] Youtube Contact Information: http://www.youtube.com/t/contact_us
Retrieval date: 11/15/13

[3] Steve Chen Image: http://www.biography.com/people/steve-chen-201191
Retrieval date: 11/18/13

[4] Chad Hurley Image:
https://plus.google.com/u/0/+ChadHurley/posts
Retrieval date: 11/18/13

[5] Jawed Karim Image: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jawed_Karim
Retrieval date: 11/18/13

[6][7] Salar Kamangar -Image: http://www.google.com/press/images.html
Bio: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salar_Kamangar
Retrieval date: 11/15/13

Youtube Partnership Program: https://www.youtube.com/yt/creators/creator-benefits.html
Retrieval date: 11/15/13

[8][10] Youtube History and Revenue: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Youtube
Retrieval date: 11/16/13

[9] Google Sphere: http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_4S6buKKlhfQ/TPaPhtK-1pI/AAAAAAAAAFU/UjAwDntghJk/app_sphere_youtube.png
Retrieval date: 11/16/13

[11] Youtube Radio Logo: http://iapps.co.il/sites/default/files/mzi.lfufdivu.175×175-75.jpg?1294755731
Retrieval date: 11/16/13

[12] NYTimes Youtube Radio Article: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/25/business/media/youtube-said-to-introduce-paid-music-service.html?ref=youtube&_r=0
Retrieval date: 11/17/13

[13] Yahoo News article on Youtube Music Awards:
http://news.yahoo.com/youtube-debuts-first-ever-music-awards-193440544.html
Retrieval date: 11/17/13

[14] Rolling Stones YTMA Article:
http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/10-weirdest-moments-at-the-youtube-music-awards-20131104
Retrieval date: 11/17/13

[15] YTMA Play Button: http://mashable.com/2013/10/30/youtube-music-awards-putmeintheytmas/
Retrieval date: 11/19/13

[16] Youtube Music Awards: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yXBPbnv1H-U
Retrieval date: 11/20/13

[17] Google Plus Youtube, ‘To be or not to be?’ Image: http://blog.hasneounique.com
Retrieval date: 11/18/13

[18] Forbes Google Plus + Youtube Integration Article and Image: http://www.forbes.com/sites/insertcoin/2013/11/09/google-plus-creates-uproar-over-forced-youtube-integration/
Retrieval date: 11/18/13

Google Plus Youtube bar: Personal Image
Retrieval date: 11/19/13