
YouTube is preparing to launch two subscription services - MarkTee
http://www.theverge.com/2015/8/28/9220377/youtube-as-you-know-it-is-about-to-change-dramatically
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tcdent
> _YouTube is still the largest music streaming platform in the world ... and
> still the place where teens get the majority of their music._

Why hasn't anyone jumped on this yet?

These kids aren't watching "music videos", they're listening to music which is
only accompanied by video content because the platform is unapologetically
focused on it.

Free, selectable music with a simple interface and all the ads you want,
available on any PC. Still not solved in 2015...

~~~
kuyan
Spotify addresses this really well. It has both desktop and mobile apps.

~~~
tcdent
The app requirement alone kills this demographic. Login nails the coffin.

These kids aren't going to install an application on a friends device and log
in with their own credentials when they can search a .com instantly.

The household computer, the one with the bundled multimedia speakers, that's
where you'll find them hovering, socially selecting and blasting main stream
pop.

Teen parties are being DJed with YouTube! YouuuTube!

~~~
erikpukinskis
People keep underestimating this about the web. Sometimes people don't care
how awesome your app is, they just want something that they can do that works
every time. Something passable that runs on ever platform everywhere. That's
HTML, and for music, that's YouTube

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dingaling
It will be interesting to see whether they enable filtering of search results
to exclude or include the new subscription categories.

One frustrating aspect of YouTube today is the flat namespace, so if one's
search terms coincide with the title of a popular song the results are a mess.
Being able to exclude Music Key channel would be advantageous.

~~~
keeperofdakeys
I've found using "site:youtube.com" on google can often improve the searching
experience of youtube.

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PhasmaFelis
Am I wrong in thinking that paywalling videos is going to cut viewership for
those videos by several orders of magnitude? Not good for, say, a band trying
to build a fanbase.

~~~
raldi
So don't put the music videos behind the paywall. Wait till you're already
popular, and then do a pay-per-view concert.

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iMark
I would happily pay a monthly fee to never see another advert.

~~~
teddyh
“ _It’s a gigantic social phenomenon. People find ways of getting money by
impeding society. Once they can impede society, they can be paid to leave
people alone._ ”

— Richard Stallman, 1986 ([http://www.gnu.org/gnu/byte-
interview](http://www.gnu.org/gnu/byte-interview))

~~~
Buge
It's a form of price discrimination: charging rich people more than poor
people.

~~~
teddyh
The poor still pay, in the form of their attention, thus guaranteeing that
they are distracted and consequently still poor.

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mythz
Have been using MusicKey for the last few months with my Google Play
subscription, it's changed how I listen to music where it's now almost
exclusively through YouTube.

When music videos had ads I couldn't make it through to 2 music videos without
being annoyed by intrusive ads which kills the music listening experience, ad-
free music is now the most valued part of my Google Play subscription.

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vonklaus
It seems like the move would be to try and spin off a netflix like service for
videos > 15 minutes. Curate and invest in quality content and then charge for
it. Google is the search engine of choice for most of the world and the lowest
common denomenator when you type yourfav.newartist into your search bar
because it is direct, frictionless and free. When Chris Sacca tried to
monetize sports/content at youtube/google video they spent millions on a ~$200
dollar return.

Tough to charge for what has already been free. Interesting move.

~~~
IAntipatternI
It seems likely people would just divide their long videos up into shorter
segments just as they do now. I think it's probably got more to do with how
content creators monetize their work-you let them put it behind the premium
service and pay them more per view or something similar. Then your content
creators start pushing your subscription service for you, I'd expect putting
most of it free and a section of it behind paywall.

~~~
vonklaus
Hmmm. Maybe I am an edgecase, but I only like watching videos > 20mins. I
watch a lot of Kevin Rose's foundation series, interviews with entrepreneurs,
how to videos, etc. I see the value prop in having longer well done, high
production value material and that is what I would pay for. They could
basically be television and curate google endorsed channels for entertainment,
news, education etc. seems like they want to compete with twitch and pandora
when they really should just help netflix kill cable.

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91edec
The problem with Youtube as a music platform is the mobile app. Minimizing the
app to do another task (like replying to a text) stops the video from playing
and in turn stops the audio from playing. If they allow it to play in the
background then a lot more people would use it as their music source.

~~~
mcintyre1994
To add to what the others have said - this is part of YouTube Music Key,
included with a Play Music subscription.

~~~
Pyrodogg
I've gotten so used to this it's actually quite jarring when I want to
background a video and I get the "rightsholder doesn't allow this" notice.

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kybernetyk
Great. I hope they offer the option to turn off both annotations and comments
by default.

~~~
Ironlink
Annotations can already be disabled by default:
[https://www.youtube.com/account_playback](https://www.youtube.com/account_playback)

~~~
Flow
Those settings are reset at random. I don't know what triggers it. Really
irritating with those bad defaults anyway.

~~~
RGamma
I found that deleting cookies resets that setting (just like turned off
autoplay, "worldwide" region settings and the like are reset).

They don't seem to be tied to your account (so they'd be reinstated when you
log in)... :/

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e_send
Interesting move on YouTube's part to launch the "unnamed service" with
premium content creators on-board before releasing information to the users.

I feel fans trust and support creators more often than the providers.

~~~
rasz_pl
This is how they launched gaming.

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ilaksh
Interesting.

Just out of totally idle speculation, what's the Popcorn Time of Youtube?

~~~
anonbanker
The best we have is kodi and youtube-dl. If you want to slay giants, those are
some good tools to start with.

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anonbanker
YouTube is ripe for disruption. They added annoying commercials so they could
charge you to take them away again.

Nowadays, I use youtube-dl and kodi more than the actual site. It'd be a few
night's work to create a pulsar provider for at least the most popular videos
on the site, and ads could be completely avoided.

~~~
lern_too_spel
Whether to show ads or not is the content creators' choice. My YouTube
channels are ad-free. I don't get paid for my videos, but I don't care because
I don't rely on YouTube as a source of income. On the other hand, I invest
little time and no money in my channels, unlike the YouTubers who create
content professionally.

How would you like it if you weren't paid for your work? At least now, YouTube
is giving you a choice in how to compensate the creators.

~~~
tyho
There is no inherent reason why a person should be paid for work. In the tech
sector if you can't effectively monetize the work you do then the attitude is
very much "well do something else then", but for some reason media people seem
to think that when they cannot monetize their work it is the fault of the
consumer, not themselves. Some business models were just never meant to be,
politely asking random people to download large adverts and watch them for
example.

~~~
lern_too_spel
The two ways these "media people" on YouTube get money are exactly the same
two ways that most "tech sector" people get money -- advertising or direct
payment. In this case, the customer gets to choose which they prefer. What
you're suggesting is exactly equivalent to software piracy or unauthorized
access to computer services.

~~~
tyho
Yes, just because you can make a website that people view does not mean you
deserve money for that, the days where eyes on screens == $$$ are rapidly
ending.

~~~
anonbanker
People that cling to outdated business models are usually disrupted by someone
that doesn't.

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jetskindo
Does it mean, no more free music on YouTube ?

