YouTube has created a new feature called “News Near You” which uses the internet address of the visitor’s computer to determine the user’s location, and offers relevant local videos from within a 100-mile radius.The feature is just one element in YouTube’s push into news video. This summer, YouTube invited more than 25,000 news sources from Google News to become video suppliers, reports The New York Times. So far, about 200 have signed on to post news videos and split advertising revenue.
The video news push is similar, in a way, to Google’s aggregation of news stories from newspapers and other news outlets around the world. Google’s practice of gathering free news stories and selling advertising against them has led some to blame Google for the decline of newspapers. But YouTube’s news move is different in that it is not sending spiders to collect the videos automatically. Rather, news organizations are being asked to join in a partnership.
However, joining YouTube as a partner is unlikely to result in significant revenue gains for TV stations at first, because few of the vids will reach an audience of scale. Then there’s the fact that some TV stations, such as New York’s cable news channel NY1, would rather concentrate on trying to bring in traffic to its own site rather than hoping users will find their videos on YouTube.
In the meantime, a trend is evolving in which radio stations, universities, local organizations, churches and individuals are becoming news producers; it is mostly those groups that are having their videos appear via the News Near You feature, so far.
YouTube is, to date, still not profitable, but owner Google said recently that it was pleased with the company and that it expected YouTube to be profitable in the near future.
TV stations have been struggling to find the best way to monetize their local content online. TV revenue is expected to drop 17.3% this year. Local TV stations will only begin seeing a return to profitability as they evolve into local information and entertainment companies, according to BIA Advisory Services. TV stations have “extraordinary” opportunities to push local content through digital platforms, along with the ability to use their local sales staff to cross-promote events and programs for advertisers that need to reach the community.
“We are very optimistic about the online revenue potentials for TV broadcasters, particularly as they step-up their mobile and internet offerings,” Michael Boland, mobile local media analyst for BIA’s The Kelsey Group, said in July.
BIA projects that the industry will see online revenues of $556 million in 2009, and $1.1 billion by 2013, representing a 19.7% compounded annual growth rate for online TV broadcasting advertising.
BIA also suggested that the future strength of the broadcast industry may lie in the hands of the new leadership of the FCC, which it believes should revisit the cross-ownership and local ownership rules.
BIA calls News Near You “a double-edged sword for local media publishers,” which must weigh the benefits of publishing their content on YouTube and splitting ad revenues, versus trying to drive more traffic to their own sites.
