YouTube Opens Partner Program For Indonesian Video Creators

Over the weekend YouTube announced via a press release that it has opened its YouTube Partner Program for video creators in Indonesia. The program allows YouTube members to place advertising on their videos and share revenue generated through the placement of those ads. The program provides tools and resources for partners to improve their video creation skills and distribute their works to more audiences and build a fan base.

Naturally, there are conditions that apply to this program although they are quite reasonable. Partners must abide by the YouTube community guidelines and own the rights to all the content, including the music used within their videos.

Videos that are not eligible include mash up videos, videos with no proper attribution or explicit permissions from the original creators, videos of people singing someone else's copyrighted songs, concert recordings, and so on. The list can be seen on this page.

David Macdonald, Head of YouTube Content Operations in Asia-Pacific, said, “Since launching YouTube in Indonesia earlier this year, we have seen amazing things from Indonesians posting their videos on YouTube. They are coming to YouTube to tell their stories — whether in the form of songs performed in their bedrooms, short films, comedy skits, footage of everyday life, or pet videos. These partners will now be able to make money from videos that find big audiences, and this will help very popular video creators build entire careers on YouTube. We hope this helps bring more Indonesian talent onto YouTube to share with the world.”

According to YouTube, there are now thousands of channels making hundreds of thousands of dollars a year with the number of partners making $1000 a month doubling in 2011. Overall, there are over a million channels earning revenue through the Partner Program. There's actually no invitation needed to join the program, just one qualifying video in YouTube and an AdSense account.

Roby Bagindo, creator of Macindos.TV and founder of Bagindo-KPS Productions, offered his thoughts about the program. He is rather skeptical of the program but is encouraged by the moves that YouTube is making in Indonesia.

Bagindo said, "From the first time I was told about it, I wasn't clear on the benefit because it's no different to regular users of blip.tv. The problem is, the way the income is calculated, it's no different to how it is overseas. When compared to the number of US viewers, we're far from it, so it wouldn't bring a significant income for video producers."

Blip.TV is a video site aimed at producers who wish to generate revenue from their works. It features original web series and helps to distribute videos to other sites including YouTube, iTunes, Roku and Google TV. Blip has partnerships with major advertisers such as Microsoft, Starbucks, Unilever, P&G, and more. In other words, it's a clearinghouse for video distribution.

Bagindo is hoping that YouTube would take the discrepancy in potential audience into consideration when determining the amount of revenue to be shared because Indonesian videos tend to be in Indonesian instead of English. As a result, this will generate far fewer views which would affect the amount of revenue Indonesian video creators can earn through YouTube. "It is far more difficult to gain 10,000 views for a single originally produced Indonesian video than it is in the US", he said.

However, he's grateful for what YouTube has brought to the table because it will empower Indonesians to produce more video content, adding to the diversity on the web, which is something that he's been working on himself.