YouTube channel: MM2786, est. 2008
uring one week this past fall, the official YouTube Trends blog reported views in the millions for videos chronicling everything from corn shucking to Muammar el-Qaddafi's death. Considering the Bay Area-based platform’s staggering 800 million visitors per month, its planetary reach has long been a force to be reckoned with. Every minute, 48 hours of video are uploaded, much of it a tonnage of ill-conceived detritus. To counteract the sometimes shoddy and random videos, YouTube launched a partner program in 2007 that is made up of 20,000 content creators in 25 countries—from makeup artists to fitness instructors to political video bloggers—who are incentivized to keep up their production by receiving revenue from advertising on their channels. In other words, if you make awesome one-of-a-kind videos, you might be taking checks to the bank. As a whole, YouTube operates under the premise that compelling content— created by the people and for the people—is the future of media. “Where TV studios sit around, carefully selecting their shows for the season, we don’t,” says Margaret Healy, head of partner social engagement at YouTube. “We enable total creativity and let the viewers choose what’s most appealing to watch.” To embolden an ever-evolving, highly visionary lineup of entertainment, YouTube holds a cash carrot out to its best video innovators. Though the company remains mum on the actual percentage paid out to partners, it reports that in 2010, “partners generated more than 100 billion views and drew in millions of dollars.” “It’s a virtuous cycle of more and better content and revenue,” says Phil Farhi, a senior product manager at YouTube. “Everybody wins.” If you make the cut, that is. The first rule of the program: Be original. Consider Oakland resident Nicholas Pitera, the 3-D modeler at Pixar Animation Studios in Emeryville who gained a happy-accident type of notoriety in 2007 when one of his first YouTube videos—fuzzy footage of him singing both the male and female parts of the Aladdin duet “A Whole New World”—went viral to the tune of 26 million views (and counting). Today, the 24-year-old’s undeniable Internet currency includes 253,656 avid subscribers who follow his YouTube channel to watch him belt out Disney movie songs and bear witness to his remarkable falsetto, which elicits mostly worshipful but sometimes bigoted comments. The Michael Bublé doppelganger has also performed twice on the Ellen DeGeneres Show. “YouTube really levels the playing field for talents who might not have the right industry contacts,” says Pitera. Despite all that, Pitera was rejected by the Partner Program. “Ads couldn’t be placed on any of my cover videos. So it wasn’t worth it toYouTube to partner with me,” he says.
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Approximate subscribers: 66,000 Signature videos: “Take Me Away” and “How to Love” Prediction: “In the future, I think that TV and the Internet will be pretty much the same thing. We're seeing that already with Hulu, Google TV, and Apple TV.” say never: “Britney Spears songs don't sit well on my voice. Love
As production values grow, YouTube is becoming less like the Wild West of online videos and more like an eclectic meritocracy. Meet the locals hell-bent on using the company's partner program to make it big.
the girl, but watching me cover one of her songs would not be entertaining.” TV off: “I’ve tried out for almost every TV talent show you can think of, but they’ve never worked out for me. I don’t worry about it too much. I guess TV isn’t the way I was meant to become famous.”
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Michelle Martinez chanteuse
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Famous By Leilani Marie Labong photography by gabriela hasbun
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