YouTube on Thursday unveiled its first paid subscription channels as the Google-owned video service made a long-anticipated move to challenge streaming services such as Netflix.
The move puts Google into direct competition with services such as Netflix, Hulu and Amazon, which have been luring viewers away from cable and broadcast TV.
“Starting today, we’re launching a pilot program for a small group of partners that will offer paid channels on YouTube with subscription fees starting at US$0.99 per month,” a YouTube blog statement said.
The statement said this is part of an effort begun in 2007 “that enables content creators to earn revenue for their creativity.”
YouTube released a list of about 50 channels which were part of the program starting on Thursday. Subscription rates go as high as US$7.99 per month.
“Every channel has a 14-day free trial, and many offer discounted yearly rates,” a YouTube blog post said.
“This is just the beginning. We’ll be rolling paid channels out more broadly in the coming weeks as a self-service feature for qualifying partners. And as new channels appear, we’ll be making sure you can discover them, just as we’ve been helping you find and subscribe to all the channels you love across YouTube,” it added.
Subscribers will be able to access the channels from a computer, phone, tablet or TV, “and soon you’ll be able to subscribe to them from more devices,” the statement said.
Google bought YouTube in 2006 for US$1.65 billion. The service is believed to generate a small amount of revenue from advertising, but the content has been free up to now.
YouTube has gradually added professional content, such as full-length television shows and movies to its vast trove of amateur video offerings in a bid to attract advertisers.
The new paid channels include Acorn TV, which offers ad-free British TV programs at US$4.99 per month; National Geographic Kids, at US$2.99 a month or US$30 a year; and PrimeZone Sports, at US$2.99 per month.
Other channels offer programming from UFC (Ultimate Fighting Championship), Comedy.tv, and iAmplify Fitness.
A children’s channel from Sesame Street is also coming, YouTube said.
Absent from the list are the big media-entertainment firms such as Comcast and Time Warner, which offer their programs through services like Hulu or Netflix or their own subscription Web sites.
However, YouTube said it had “more than one million channels generating revenue on YouTube,” and added that “one of the most frequent requests we hear from these creators behind them is for more flexibility in monetizing and distributing content.”
ISSUES: Gogoro has been struggling with ballooning losses and was recently embroiled in alleged subsidy fraud, using Chinese-made components instead of locally made parts Gogoro Inc (睿能創意), the nation’s biggest electric scooter maker, yesterday said that its chairman and CEO Horace Luke (陸學森) has resigned amid chronic losses and probes into the company’s alleged involvement in subsidy fraud. The board of directors nominated Reuntex Group (潤泰集團) general counsel Tamon Tseng (曾夢達) as the company’s new chairman, Gogoro said in a statement. Ruentex is Gogoro’s biggest stakeholder. Gogoro Taiwan general manager Henry Chiang (姜家煒) is to serve as acting CEO during the interim period, the statement said. Luke’s departure came as a bombshell yesterday. As a company founder, he has played a key role in pushing for the
China has claimed a breakthrough in developing homegrown chipmaking equipment, an important step in overcoming US sanctions designed to thwart Beijing’s semiconductor goals. State-linked organizations are advised to use a new laser-based immersion lithography machine with a resolution of 65 nanometers or better, the Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) said in an announcement this month. Although the note does not specify the supplier, the spec marks a significant step up from the previous most advanced indigenous equipment — developed by Shanghai Micro Electronics Equipment Group Co (SMEE, 上海微電子) — which stood at about 90 nanometers. MIIT’s claimed advances last
EUROPE ON HOLD: Among a flurry of announcements, Intel said it would postpone new factories in Germany and Poland, but remains committed to its US expansion Intel Corp chief executive officer Pat Gelsinger has landed Amazon.com Inc’s Amazon Web Services (AWS) as a customer for the company’s manufacturing business, potentially bringing work to new plants under construction in the US and boosting his efforts to turn around the embattled chipmaker. Intel and AWS are to coinvest in a custom semiconductor for artificial intelligence computing — what is known as a fabric chip — in a “multiyear, multibillion-dollar framework,” Intel said in a statement on Monday. The work would rely on Intel’s 18A process, an advanced chipmaking technology. Intel shares rose more than 8 percent in late trading after the
GLOBAL ECONOMY: Policymakers have a choice of a small 25 basis-point cut or a bold cut of 50 basis points, which would help the labor market, but might reignite inflation The US Federal Reserve is gearing up to announce its first interest rate cut in more than four years on Wednesday, with policymakers expected to debate how big a move to make less than two months before the US presidential election. Senior officials at the US central bank including Fed Chairman Jerome Powell have in recent weeks indicated that a rate cut is coming this month, as inflation eases toward the bank’s long-term target of two percent, and the labor market continues to cool. The Fed, which has a dual mandate from the US Congress to act independently to ensure