If you spend a lot of time posting video content to YouTube, the latest changes made by the video-sharing service might just bring a little smile to your face. To a large degree, the updates it announced at Vidcon are about giving people more control over their content but it’s also included a couple of new ways of making money.
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In the case of the former, you can now check out your analytics on the go, thanks to the YouTube Creator Studio app, which is available now on Android and is set to arrive on iOS in the next couple of weeks. It should also now be easier to add sound effects to your videos thanks to an expanded audio library.
Given the proliferation of gaming videos on YouTube, creators should also find it pretty pleasing that you can now upload your videos in 60 and 48fps. As our sister site Gearburn points out though, you have to have an HD-capable screen to experience these kinds of video.
Something that’s likely to get less attention, but which is probably more practical in the short term, is the feature that lets people watching your videos provide subtitle. “In the coming months,” YouTube says in a blog post announcing the new features, “your fans will be able to submit translations in any language based on the subtitles or captions you’ve created, helping you reach even more viewers”.
Perhaps the most interesting new feature though is Fan Funding. “Your fans aren’t just watching your videos,” YouTube says, “they’re also helping support your channel through services like KickStarter, IndieGogo, Patreon and more”.
“We’ll be adding another option for you, where fans will be able to contribute money to support your channel at any time, for any reason”, it adds.
It’s this feature that’s really got us talking in the office. In effect, it’s a contemporary version of the patronage system, whereby artists and poets are supported by wealthy benefactors. Rather than an individual keeping a creator out a garrote though, it’s the mass wealth of all their fans — especially if they don’t get anything back in return.
While we have to respect everyone’s right to spend their money on what they damn well please, we hope this funding mechanism works out well for people creating amazing pieces of visual art and not some dude showcasing all the ways he can injure himself on a daily basis.
