There have been a lot of changes to Youtube over the years.  Early users of Youtube may remember that, for a time, Youtube was all but free of advertisements.  It was a place of sharing content (both legitimate content and illegitimate content alike).

And then the great copyright wall fell.  Ads became prevalent on almost every video.  People started to get takedown notices and copyright ‘marks’ resulting in videos and channels being shut down.

Surely, the commercialization of Youtube has had a marvelous effect for people who spend their time making content available to the masses.  People now make channels dedicated to gaming and get to monetize their hard work.  This is a good thing!  I review games too.  I review technology in general.  But there’s big changes happening recently, and it’s killing the very core of Youtube.

Angry Joe rants about this here (a little over 18 minutes long; NSFW — LOTS OF CURSING – this is Angry Joe’s style):

The problem in a nutshell is this: If I review a game, who is entitled to whatever monetary gains are generated by this review?  Me, as the author of the review?  <Game Developer House>, as the big name behind the game itself?

It seems that the answer is now <Game Developer House>.  Youtube is placing copyright claim marks against users who place reviews of video games, movies, and music online – and then monetizing the content for the original artists instead of the people who have put in the effort to make the reviews.

Forbes has an interesting article about it here as well. Forbes Article

It’s kind of disheartening to see what Google is turning Youtube into.  It’s not at all encouraging.  There was a spectacular backlash during their ‘enhancement’ of Youtube by forcing linkage to your Google+ profile:

Violet Blue via ZDNet wrote an awesome piece about this.

Cory Doctorow via Boing Boing had a bit of a response – but it wasn’t helpful at all (though they have since ‘rectified’ the spam issue).

Paul Tassi via Forbes notes this uproar as well.

So, is Google trying to kill off Youtube with tons of ‘bad’ changes to the site?  Possibly.  Likely? No.  They make a shit ton of money from it.

Are the changes lately for the better?  Only for big wigs and big execs at companies.

“You can make money without doing evil.” || “Don’t be evil.”

Hah.