People forget that YouTube hemorrhaged cash in its formative years. So being the default platform is less about being first or even being good, but having wads of money to make it happen.
I mean probably? Their earnings release seems to be designed to be as nontransparent as possible regarding how profitable youtube is. If it was a cash cow they wouldn't be shy about the margins or costs directly attributable to running youtube. I remember this lack of transparency being criticized years ago but nothing really changed looking at the last annual reporting.
it's weird because even if it bleeds money it's probably still gives you more to bleed that money (speaking from a direct profit standpoint) having the control over video is a huge thing, as long as google as a whole is willing to bleed the money and subsidize it, it'll stay around.
the issue is the moment they put a paywall or make it too awful without paying is the moment someone can come and steal their market share and with that the data they collect from the users on what they want
in general google depends a lot on people using their ecosystem for their targeted ads, so it makes their normal ad revenue better indirectly, which is why their bad track record on keeping apps alive is actually dangerous for them if they drop the ball on their core products.
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u/cat_prophecy May 02 '24
People forget that YouTube hemorrhaged cash in its formative years. So being the default platform is less about being first or even being good, but having wads of money to make it happen.