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Watch Out Google, YouTubers Are Unionizing

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Re: Watch Out Google, YouTubers Are Unionizing

#71

Post by munificent »

vkou wrote: post #48
MrLeap wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you run a business and your solvency depends on the existence of another, larger business, you're not as independent as the title of 'business owner' alludes. How many HN posts have we seen over the years of businesses based on Amazon, Twitter, Apple getting blown the fuck up because the mothership restricted an API, copied their project or changed a ToS? I'm not putting in an opinion on anything else in your post…

> If you run a business and your solvency depends on the existence of another, larger business, you're not as independent as the title of 'business owner' alludes. 99.9% of businesses in the United States depend on the existence of their power utility to operate. I guess they aren't independent businesses, either. But the rest of your point is salient. I too, am baffled by how many of the greatest advocates of democr…

That's one of the reasons power utilities are regulated by the government.

Yes, every organization is dependent on other organizations. That's why it's so important to be thoughtful about how those organizations are structured and what their incentives are. It's not the being dependent on an organization that's a problem, it's being dependent on an organization that has little regulation, whose goal is to make as much money as possible, and who thinks of your organization as a cost sink.

People tend to get into this mindset that businesses and government are fundamentally different, but their both just social institutions with their sometimes different sometimes similar rules and incentives.

> I too, am baffled by how many of the greatest advocates of democracy seem to have been brainwashed into resisting democracy in the workplace.

The owners of those workplaces have spent decades and millions of dollars creating propandanda to do that brainwashing.

Re: Watch Out Google, YouTubers Are Unionizing

#72

Post by 40acres »

Fundamentally I think the problem is that these platforms are not neutral, when YouTube's algorithm hoists your video to the front page they are "manipulating" the system.

Personally, I would not be surprised to see Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act challenged on this notion and it as the basis for other challenges.

Internet providers just serve bits, any effort to "manipulate" those bits based on who is providing them is looked at with great aversion (net neutrality), tech platforms have done a good job so far distancing what they do to other times of platforms but I believe we are all awakening to the power that these obtuse algorithms have on us.

Re: Watch Out Google, YouTubers Are Unionizing

#73

Post by mattmar96 »

throwaway2048 wrote: post #61
asperous wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What they should do is collectively take their content somewhere else. The problem is the economics won't be any better anywhere else. Youtube is the way it is because of all the many stakeholders (viewers responding to clickbait, politicians, copyright holders, bad actors etc). Any other platform would eventually have the same problems and either cave into them, or be sued into oblivion. As for the ad-related issu…

Most large video makers these days get pathetic amounts of ad revenue (less than $100 for a video with a few million views) and instead are making a vast amount more on patreon or similar sites. Its those creators that have the most to gain at an alternate site, the restrictions of youtube are all downsides, and they receive no money directly from it, the only real upside youtube offers is audience reach.

Off by an order of magnitude on ad revenue, more like several thousand $ per million views.

Re: Watch Out Google, YouTubers Are Unionizing

#75

Post by munificent »

anon1m0us wrote: post #9

What they should do is collectively take their content somewhere else. As an aside, I'm seeing the same pattern at Amazon. People thought they were opening a business on amazon selling retail. Then amazon started selling the profitable products themselves, storing the products themselves, ... basically doing more and more of the work and taking more control and taking money from the people who helped them become powe…

> What they should do is collectively take their content somewhere else.

This will have almost no effect. YouTube does not have a quantity problem. They have enough content that every YouTube user could watch YouTube 24 hours a day for the rest of their lives and never see the same video twice. They wouldn't even have to go deep into their back catalog.

Worse, viewers have relatively little attachment to any particular content producer. They obviously love some YouTube celebrities, but if a given artist disappeared, people would get over it quickly. It's not, like, say books where people really want access to the last Harry Potter book.

Re: Watch Out Google, YouTubers Are Unionizing

#76

Post by cobookman »

anon1m0us wrote: post #39
mrec wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The internet has turned to garbage. The ad-supported internet has turned to garbage. The academic and hobbyist internet is fine, and not that much different from the old days. The governmental internet depends a lot on where you are, but .gov.uk is really rather good, and vastly better at what it does than snailmail and Post Offices were in the old days.

I went to a government website the other day. 5 pages of forms I filled out several times. Each time on the final page, "system error, cannot proceed." I called the agency, they said, "You should print out the PDF, fill that out and bring it to our office." Can you believe that?? There aren't enough programmers to make the .gov stuff work right because FAANG is buying them all. So, I'm not sure you are right on that.

It’s due to the government not being able to compete on salary due to federal salary schedule limitations.

The joke is they can easily pay a contractor 150$/hour though. But can’t pay an employee hourly wage of 100$/hour

Re: Watch Out Google, YouTubers Are Unionizing

#77

Post by ryacko »

munificent wrote: post #75
anon1m0us wrote: post #9

What they should do is collectively take their content somewhere else. As an aside, I'm seeing the same pattern at Amazon. People thought they were opening a business on amazon selling retail. Then amazon started selling the profitable products themselves, storing the products themselves, ... basically doing more and more of the work and taking more control and taking money from the people who helped them become powe…

> What they should do is collectively take their content somewhere else. This will have almost no effect. YouTube does not have a quantity problem. They have enough content that every YouTube user could watch YouTube 24 hours a day for the rest of their lives and never see the same video twice. They wouldn't even have to go deep into their back catalog. Worse, viewers have relatively little attachment to any particul…

But the content creators don’t use Youtube for engagement (except for some cases where video comments are used). The problem is that they aren’t sysadmins, and they have no idea if any change would lead to a long-term improvement (which won’t be hard since Google takes 45% (?) of ad revenues).

Re: Watch Out Google, YouTubers Are Unionizing

#78

Post by buboard »

munificent wrote: post #62
perfmode wrote: post #15

what is it about collective action that triggers contempt so quickly and automatically for those attempting to organize? many comments in this thread show contempt for the organizers in a way that is readily visible.

Hacker News in particular has a very strong libertarian streak where many people here believe all problems can be solved by a sufficiently motivated individual without any support or coordination with other humans.

That's not correct. As a libertarian i support unions (as long as they re not coercive of course). Collective bargaining is a fair and square free market mechanism. Instead it's Corporate lobbying of the government and regulatory capture that is unfair.

Re: Watch Out Google, YouTubers Are Unionizing

#79

Post by Dirlewanger »

callalex wrote: post #41

I wonder why the Screen Actors Guild (SAG) hasn't weighed in on this whole sector at all. The exploitation of entertainers is not exactly a new issue, and it has been tackled by existing unions before.

Probably because they're contemptuous of YouTubers. Can't blame them either, because they're basically competition.

Re: Watch Out Google, YouTubers Are Unionizing

#80

Post by stcredzero »

anon1m0us wrote: post #9

What they should do is collectively take their content somewhere else. As an aside, I'm seeing the same pattern at Amazon. People thought they were opening a business on amazon selling retail. Then amazon started selling the profitable products themselves, storing the products themselves, ... basically doing more and more of the work and taking more control and taking money from the people who helped them become powe…

People thought they were opening a business on amazon selling retail. Then amazon started selling the profitable products themselves, storing the products themselves, ... basically doing more and more of the work and taking more control and taking money from the people who helped them become powerful.

Isn't this a pattern with big tech companies and their walled gardens? "App devs thought they were starting a business on the bigco app store, selling direct to users. Then bigco started making their in-built versions of the popular apps themselves... basically doing more and more of the work and taking more control and taking money from the people who helped them become powerful."

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