I've waited a few weeks before talking about this myself to see if anyone in the YouTube, or video creating community at all would see what's happening and point it out. Surprisingly, they haven't. So, what is YouTube up to? Are they really that concerned about their advertisers' image? Do they have a sinister agenda to push censorship?
No.
Well, probably not. The YouTube platform has a huge advantage on advertising. Audience and powerful analytics. With visitors watching approximately 2 billion videos daily, YouTube doesn't really have much to worry about when it comes to finding the right demographic for their advertisers. Not to mention the magnitude of outreach a company gets, even in the face of ad-blocking software.
I can understand a company not wanting their product associated to something not-so-great...but I'm pretty sure they also have no clue about what's good or bad to begin with. I mean...Pepsi...anyway...The shift in how YouTube treats advertisers has little to do with ethics, if at all. It has a lot to do with a transition that has been occurring very slowly since 2006. In 2007, the next phase trickled in. And then the plans advanced a bit more rapidly in 2008. These baby steps kept going until about 2009. Beginning in 2010, YouTube began to polish the concept to a mirror shine.
Now, in 2017, the time has come for the last and final push...and that's to push creators right out and escort the networks in. Why? So that YouTube transforms from "Broadcast Yourself" to...more along the lines of "Your Broadcasts". What I'm getting at is YouTube becoming the first cherry-picking television streaming service. I know, that's unclear, so I'll elaborate.
As it goes right now, one typically pays the cable/satellite service provider X per month, and you get X bundle of channels/features. One doesn't really get too much control over what channels and/or networks are made available. What YouTube is doing is bringing in all the networks to sit at the table and directly pitch their network's content to the YouTube audience. If someone only wants ABC and CBS....well, that's what they'll pay for and have 24/7 access to...eventually. And (probably) this will advance into super-customized subscriptions; a per-show subscription, by regional availability. C'mon...you didn't think a regional/copyright recognition system was developed because they felt like it....right?
Now while it may sound as though I'm fine with this, I am not. Most certainly not. The very reasons YouTube and other online video platforms gained ground is because the general population became disenchanted with network television's endless garbage. Sure, there's plenty of garbage to be found on YouTube and the like. But there's also a multitude of outstanding content creators out there that produce genuinely interesting and entertaining content. And at a fraction of what these networks put into their rubbish "shows", if you can even call them that anymore.
I plan on going into this more later, and how it ties into a huge picture. But for now, life calls.