YouLubed

It appears as if Big Media is finally ready to play ball with all of those pesky internet sites. Unfortunately, it also means a new set of rules. Several industry magazines are reporting that a giant collective of studios has reached an agreement with internet giant YouTube in order to bring official content to the video sharing site. Of course, this is somewhat exciting. YouTube is easily the best web invention of the last ten years - yes, better than Twitter - and it has retained and enlarged its audience despite direct threats from sites like Hulu, Vimeo, and others. It would be nice to have easy (and, for you anti-pirates out there, legal) access to a wide variety of professionally-produced entertainment. Its hard to pinpoint why YouTube has remained so successful. The video quality is still akin to watching a movie made on a pinhole camera. Every other video features someone farting into a HandyCam. Yet millions and millions of people go to the site every day, gazing at the latest freak of nature humiliating themselves and their family tree. Probably the secret to YouTube's bounty is the underground nature of the site. Even now, the site retains a mostly "no holds barred" aesthetic that encourages uploads. Also, I think the site feels much like going to a garage sale, whereby, in picking through the junk, you find pieces of treasure. And, in comparison to the competition, YouTube has a healthy and thriving social network that drives the community. Of course, it's this community that advertisers desperately want to turn into cash. And that's the unfortunate part of this little tale. You see, this multimedia merger will now give advertisers the opportunity to plug their products before or during the videos. The money goes to YouTube and its partners - not necessarily the content creators. And get a load of this lovely little statement stuck discreetly in the article:

Although the service remains free to YouTube users, Google CEO Eric Schmidt said during a conference call that eventually the service envisions securing "micropayments and other forms of subscription models."

YEAH RIGHT! Isn't it amazing how Mr. Schmidt - who made millions off of giving people a free service - has forgotten that basic tenet of the internet now that he has made it big??? Rather than worry about how to get money from users, Mr. Schmidt should try figuring out how to finally get video quality on the site that can rival a shadow puppet show as seen by a cataract patient. Besides, I'm not sure what advertisement would go with this: But I can tell you one thing: I WANT MY FRED TO BE FREE!!!! The unfortunate victims of this restructuring will, as always, be the average internet users. YouTube has been a monumental device for the fostering of creativity among people who would ordinarily not have a chance to express themselves to a large audience. It would be a shame to see this locked up and charged just so that the boys in Hollywood can get their percentage and attempt to control the uncontrollable.