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YouTube ‘mythbusters’ fail to expose myths

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Jul 22, 2009 

Author

Edward Barrera  |

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YouTube ‘mythbusters’ fail to expose myths

ADOTAS — The online video platform’s minions get a bit too cute as they try to change the revenue conversation.

In a blog post yesterday, YouTube, using the show MythBusters as a guide, laid out several falsehoods and tried to dispel them. Unfortunately, they just highlighted the Google asset’s still unanswered questions and shortcomings.

First, they state that claims that YouTube is limited to short-form user-generated content is nonesense. As far as I know, few claim that. Most just say that Hulu has “eaten its lunch” when it comes to long form (and professional video). They also dismiss claims that YouTube videos are grainy and of poor quality and talk about HD videos. CNET might have called it the “best HD video service on the web,” but most of its user-generated videos are of poor quality and grainy. That’s the nature of user content.

Even more interesting is their take about the traffic and growth of YouTube. They say that models using standard industry cost pricing don’t work for the site. (Estimates range from $120 million to $500 million.) The problem, of course, is that they don’t give us a number and just say any number floated is wrong. They also claimed that supposed advertiser adversion to YouTube and the 3 to 5 percent number used on how much the site is monetized are much ado over nothing.

This is all good and nice. But no one is going to believe a word they say until they break out the numbers for YouTube, which Google still hasn’t done. As Peter Kafka says, let’s see what Google tells investors, because so far “YouTube is usually described as a black hole that has yet to generate signficant revenue.”

Tags: finance and youtube

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