ANAHEIM — Today’s video creators have a wide variety of options when it comes to distributing their videos, from YouTube and Vimeo to Blip.tv, Hulu, Dailymotion, and beyond, yet many content creators are using YouTube alone. Yuri Baranovsky, co-founder of Happy Little Guillotine Studios, says “sticking to just YouTube isn’t the best option.”
We spoke with Baranovsky at VidCon about online video distribution. He explained how his company “has worked around YouTube.” Instead of relying on their partner program for advertising, HLG Studios has built a business on creating branded content.
“The partner program in general feels very abusive in some regards,” says Baranovsky. “Creators have to release videos every week, it’s not enough budget for them, the content suffers, they suffer, they can’t do anything else, they can’t polish, they can’t create better stories. It’s better to work hard to get that big sale up front.”
“I think for YouTube to retain its fans, they have to increase how much they pay. They have to get bigger brand deals for their creators, and they have to value the people that they pay. Just because it’s online doesn’t mean you can pay people less—that’s this weird perception that needs to change now. If we’re creating great content, you have to pay us as much as you pay TV people.”
