I don't understand the distinction between creators and publishers. When you create a video for youtube don't you publish it yourself?
Edit: After looking at other articles, I assume the pie chart refers to situations where a copyright claim has been filed for a video. In that case, it seems the filer is the "publisher" and the video uploader is the "creator"
We tried keeping the issue to only publishers, but basically MCNs and other cuts were just grouped into publisher for simplicity sake -- oftentimes YouTubers join networks (kind of like a music label) where the rights of their works are managed for a cut. As to your point, YES, definitely YouTubers can and do publish entirely original work, but oftentimes still need to publish covers, or video game gameplay, etc. that they don't have the rights to -- this is usually the only way to grow their audience and channel, as these are the only works that garner any real SEO when people are searching for videos.
Also, I think the mods changed the title -- my original submission title was "Just released an infographic on how YouTubers don't make that much $$ from ads" -- I'm not going for linkbait here :)
Cover songs are not fair use. Of course you can't get rich off of those without permission which normally involves a huge license fee. If you don't get permission and you get hit by YouTube's content id system yes you don't get anything. Create original content and use creative commons music or music you have a free/cheap license for and you will be able to get rich.
Source: actual data on tens of thousands of channels actual earnings. I'm the creator of http://SocialBlade.com the #1 YouTube stats site. Successful YouTubers also aren't getting a million hits total, they're getting that every day.. or at least every week.
I am very sorry, but making a creator $0.0001 on average ($100/10^6) is literally not worth turning adblock off and having 20% chance to get a 30 seconds of commercial.
Ah, definitely not advocating any change in audience behavior with regards to watching content -- just trying to justify why Kickstarter and other donation methods are meaningful!
Edit: After looking at other articles, I assume the pie chart refers to situations where a copyright claim has been filed for a video. In that case, it seems the filer is the "publisher" and the video uploader is the "creator"