Video sharing sites that pay
I need to update what I have said previously of the "big 3" video hosting sites that pay you. Much has changed since I last talked about them as a group. I'll start with the big news.
Revver is defunct. Before you consider posting a video on their website, take a trip over to the forums. You'll see that Revver has not made any payments in months. Members are pissed off. Many people are even having trouble accessing the website at all (myself included).
Not to long ago Revver, along with a few other companies, was purchased by Live Universe. Every one of those companies has stopped making payments. It's not really fair to say this is Revver's fault. But the fact is that they don't pay anymore.
Not to mention that their advertisers are paying squat now. Even if they were paying, videos make on average about 30 cents per thousand views. According to many forum members, there was a time when you could make upward of $5 for that kind of traffic. I won't go into detail about CPM rates here, but ultimately the fault of this is the economy.
Metacafe got nerfed. Previously they paid $5 per thousand views. In an earlier post I called this amount "paltry". And compared with Break's old payment structure, techincally, it was. After doing more research though I have discovered that the figure was actually extrememly high, considering that your video could be about ANYTHING and still make that much.
Things have changed though. Metacafe further tightened their allready extremely scrict terms for video content. Veteran producers are now having trouble getting their videos accepted into the program.
They have also lowered the payment amount. Now they only pay $2 per thousand views. And that's IF your video gets accepted into the program (which it most likely won't).
As if that weren't bad enough, they now only count views originating in the United States. It was stated on their forums that only %30 of Metacafe's traffic is from the USA.
Essentially, producers are getting paid 1/7 of what they were before. Gone are the days when a man could make $100,000 a year producing videos for Metacafe. There will never be another Kipkay.
Break.com pays! Read my previous post for more information.
Youtube has entered the fray. They opened their partner program to the public. Apparently it's fairly easy to get accepted. Alot of Metacafe and Revver refugees have migrated to Youtube, and they speak very highly of it. I have no experience with Youtube's partner program myself, but I have read alot of good things about it.
They use the same payment system as Revver. That means you get paid when viewers click the ads that lay over your videos. The big difference is that youtube's community is HUUUGE! What would have pulled 1,000 views on Revver will get 100,000 views on Youtube. Not to mention that Youtube couldn't give a damn what your video is about. You could post a rickroll of blank screen and you will still get paid for it.
To wrap things up: I believe the "big 3" has become the big 2. I would not recommend that someone new to video production even attempt to make money at Metacafe. SERIOUSLY!!! The pros may have a chance at making some cash, but not your average get rich quick schemer.
Stay away from Revver for now. They might make a comeback in the near future, but for now they don't pay. Don't waste your time.
Break is good for a quick buck. The pros would still benefit by posting videos to Break from an exposure perspective. Videos that don't hit the homepage never clear a few thousand views, but every video that does make it is guaranteed several hundred thousand views, at minimum.
Youtube is probably the best option for everybody, schemers included. They have the largest community and a solid, residual payment system.
Other options include Flixya (which allows you to profit from videos you don't own through Google adsense) and blipTV. BlipTV is like Revver on steroids. I have heard good things about this website, though have yet to check it out for myself.
