But Not Everyone Is Happy 6. YouTube strong-armed content creators. YouTube claims that 98% of its content creators signed up to be a part of Red, but that's because they were threatened with having their videos "hidden" from YouTube's free tier if they didn't (this probably doesn't apply to a channel with low monthly view counts).
7. Not everyone signed on. A lot of indie labels took a pass, as did Disney and their subsidiaries like ESPN. Their videos may disappear from YouTube as early as tomorrow.
8. The royalties aren't any better. And that's the reason why some content owners are taking a pass. It's still an anemic 55%, while the rest of the industry is at 70% or more. As an example of how little the payout is, Spotify has about a tenth of the monthly users that YouTube does, yet pays out nearly three times as much.
9. And the way they're calculated is worse. Another reason for the unhappiness is in the following statement from the company, which more or less lets YouTube determine what it will pay.
"attributable to the monthly views or watch time of your Content as a percentage of the monthly views or watch time of all or a subset of participating content in the relevant subscription offering (as determined by YouTube)."
The Bottom Line No one knows how many people will actually register for YouTube Red, but the speculation is that if only 10% of its 1 billion monthly customer base signs on, it will immediately have more paying customers that all other streaming services combined! Of course, they said that about Apple Music as well, and that hasn't turned out as predicted so far.
Content creators like artists, bands and labels may be unhappy with the terms, but at least it's another source of income, which is always welcome.
If you've read through to the end, you now know a little more about our Music 4.0 world than the majority of people in the music business today. Aren't you glad you subscribed to my list? | 
