[Entinel]

> And, that being able to compensate someone for their work is such a complex process that it requires either a bunch of unknown middlemen, or an overengineered ponzi scheme.

Being able to compensate someone for their work is a complex process. Most Youtubers and or media publications would not exist if they asked for a fee upfront.

[wussboy]

Agreed. But would this be so bad? Would your life and mine be demonstrably worse with fewer Mr Beast videos?

Whole generations have existed without YouTube videos. Perhaps we could exist as well?

I’m not trying to be “get of my lawn”. I’m saying much of the content we have now could not exist and humanity would be no worse off.

[Entinel]

I'm going to flip this question around. Would we be worse off if fewer people were unable to start businesses out of Youtube channels? I'd think so. A lot of novel art and education has come out of realizing Youtube could be a full-time job. You jump to MrBeast as the junk food of Youtube but I can honestly say I have never seen a MrBeast video but I frequently look at things like FreeCodeCamp or even the more educational end of entertainment like Tom Scott or extensive product review channels like Project Farm. I'm glad they exist and I'd happily watch a sponsor spot for them.

[rpastuszak]

100% agree with you but there are different levels of complexity and the one I'm talking about is truly ridiculous.

Example:

OpenRTB + VAST chain (standards used for targeted advertising) required to display an ad on the site involve dozens of parties the user has no knowledge about. In fact before an ad is displayed on the page, there's no way of knowing who and how will be involved in processing your data. The consent is implied and opt-out is enforced poorly to put it mildly. That's the complexity I'm talking about.

[Entinel]

What you are doing and what you are saying don't match. Let's be clear here, I think this project is great and I don't want this to come off as a criticism of the project. It's a really fun idea and novel use of machine learning. That being said, the sponsored Youtube content you are targeting avoids all of the issues you are talking about. There is no fingerprinting, shadow profiles, or tracking. Youtuber says "video sponsored by NordVPN use code xXx360NoScopexXx for 50 cents off" and then the sponsor spot is done.

[rpastuszak]

Correct, it is more simple than the OpenRTB auction chain, but not in terms of the logistics of creating this type of content. See the sibling comment for @falcolas for more details.

I should've used more examples but tried to keep it terse. Thanks for pointing this out.

[falcolas]

Ironically enough, sponsored content quite cleanly omits all this complexity and lets content makers earn money.

[rpastuszak]

The complexity here is to have to: 1) write, 2) present, and 3) edit a video segment selling a product you probably wouldn't bother mentioning to people if you had other options. It's not technical.

The alternative (for instance) would be an automatic system distributing the $$ I pay YT among the creators I watch. That's significantly less complexity for the end-user and the content creator.

[falcolas]

> an automatic system distributing the $$ I pay YT

So youtube red instead? They split the creator portion of your subscription between the creators you watch (assuming they've setup the ability to get paid by YT). Worth quite a bit more than ad views too, last I heard.

[Entinel]

This still requires you to pay which brings us back to step 1. You are also implying that the content creator does not use the product and would not mention it otherwise which is not always true.