I got an email yesterday evening from YouTube regarding their partner program and some upcoming changes to it — the long and the short of it is they will no longer be allowing people to pre-sign the contract associated with the program; you’ll have to wait until you meet their stupid threshold to monetize before you agree to the finer points.
Here’s the body of the email:
Hi Kurisu Yamato,
This email is to notify you that you’ll need to accept YPP terms again once your channel is eligible for the program. The YPP application process, your channel watchtime, and subscriber count are not impacted.
At some point, you signed contract terms with YouTube regarding the YouTube Partner Program (YPP). Previously, we allowed creators to pre-sign YPP terms before reaching the minimum eligibility thresholds. We have since re-designed this process. Our records show that your channel hasn’t yet met the existing thresholds for program eligibility. In 30 days, if your channel is still not eligible for YPP, we will invalidate your contract.
Not to worry, though. When you do reach the thresholds needed for YPP, it’s just a few easy clicks to apply using our standard process. (Note you can always check your progress on the monetization tab in YouTube Studio.)
What this means for your channel
In short, nothing is changing for your channel. The only change is that you will need to accept YPP terms again when you become eligible. The way you use or experience YouTube stays the same. You still have access to all your creator features that enable you to grow your audience, build your community, and manage your videos. You can:
• Upload, edit, or delete your videos
• Read, respond to, or moderate your comments
• Analyze your channel performance in YouTube Analytics
• Get best practices and strategic advice from Creator Academy
• Connect to other Creators in the YouTube Help ForumThank you for being part of the YouTube Community! We look forward to your application in the future.
Sincerely,
The YouTube Team
I get the reason behind the email – it’s required as part of the contract I had digitally signed many, many years ago when I actually wanted to be a “YouTuber” with all the crap that entails, and this is Google acknowledging their end of the agreement – they legally have to do this, after all, since Google and I were in a proper contract which is being terminated via what I will describe simply as “special conditions.”
I’m fine with it – I don’t care and hell, I didn’t even realize (or consider) the Partner Program contract still active after the changes a few years ago. The thing about this that I find “pointless” is that, in the end, not a single bit of this actually affects my channel (what’s left of it) or my usage of the site in any real way. Thus, as a matter of practicality, nothing is different in my experience and usage of the site.
That’s really what I find hilarious, that the email says so much yet really, at the same time, says so little. I wouldn’t have thought twice about this at all in my life had this email not been sent. I really don’t care about the contract and if I bother to come “back” to YouTube I’ll only give a damn once I break the arbitrary threshold to monetize whatever I have on there again which, given the fact YouTube is an uphill battle unless you follow their “best practices” (read: whatever flavor of the week shit they want people to do at any given point in time) and as I’ve mentioned in detail before I’m just not interested in doing such. Not now, not ever.
Right, that’s all I have to say about that one. I just found it a bit humorous, and it’s been a while since I took some time to give YouTube and the big G the digital middle finger, if an ironic one, all things considered.
