Over the past six years, I have spent a great deal of time researching the economics of creativity. From the early years of cinema to social-media monetization, I kept seeing the same things appear over and over again: systems designed to monetize labor and creations without necessarily compensating the people who create it.
One of the earliest examples I came across involved Georges Méliès and Thomas Edison. I didn’t know this when I started my filmmaking journey 20 years ago, but Edison and other American film companies were involved in copying and distributing Méliès’ films without his permission. A Trip to the Moon is probably the most famous example. An Edison employee obtained a print of the film and sent it to Edison’s laboratory to be duplicated. Copies were then distributed and exhibited in the United States, often without Méliès receiving the money generated by those screenings.1
The technology has changed but the economic relationship between creators and distributors is still fragmented. So when I saw YouTube’s monetization update yesterday, I decided I must start sharing some of what I’ve been researching.
Before we get started: I’m going to try to keep my emotions out of this, which is difficult. For reference, I’m already monetized, so this particular change will not affect me personally. It will affect people who are on the road behind me, including my students which is why I started this project to begin with.
Let’s Talk.
Right now, the primary YouTube Partner Program threshold for advertising revenue is 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 valid public watch hours over the previous 365 days.
Starting February 1, 2027, YouTube has stated it will raise that threshold to 1,000 subscribers and 8,000 qualified watch hours in the previous 365 days, or 20 million qualified Shorts views in 90 days.
Effectively this means the requirements are doubling.
Eight thousand hours works out to approximately 22 hours of watch time every day, 365 days a year.
YouTube has also stated that they serve advertisements on content from channels that aren’t eligible for the partner program. In that situation, the creator isn’t entitled to a share of that advertising revenue. Once you qualify for Watch Page advertising revenue, YouTube’s current agreement says creators receive 55% of net advertising revenue from ads displayed or streamed on their public videos.
YouTube is the advertising marketplace, distribution system, recommendation system, analytics infrastructure, and much of the relationship between the creator and the viewer.
There is another part of this relationship that became visible to me recently.
I currently have 2,500 people who have chosen to subscribe to my channel, but I don’t have any way to directly contact those people. The only way to contact them outside of YouTube is to get them on a mailing list like the one that sends out these articles. My channel has not meet the $100 ad revenue threshold for my first payout, I am about $7 away.
YouTube gives creators immense tools to communicate with subscribers, but the platform controls access to the audience.
In explaining the changes, Amjad Hanif, YouTube’s Vice President of Creator Products, said that YouTube wants to reward creators who are more consistently engaged with the platform.
He described the problem this way:
“We had a case where if you had only a few thousand views, you might have a few cents for that month. Instead, we’d like to design the program in a way where it rewards creators who are leaned in, who are driving views and engagement.”7
This was the first time I had heard Hanif’s name but the more I thought about it I couldn’t shake the words “leaned in.” What does that mean?
This isn’t true, but it does feel that way sometimes.
For me personally, I spent the past year working more than 40 hours a week, producing more than 125 long-form videos, and building a channel of roughly 2,500 subscribers. I just looked and I have yet to get 8000 watch hours and I am coming up on the one year anniversary of starting this channel. This means my current way of making would not meet their new threshold.
This does however, allow YouTube to continue serving advertisements on non monetized channels. This is something I have been trying to explain to those who work outside of a creative field. Here’s my new attempt.
Imagine you take a volunteer job creating material for a company you really like. You know the company makes money, but you enjoy what the company provides to other people, so you decide to do the work anyway. You were told that you can make a lot of money creating with us if you just stay consistent. You create something once a week. Over time, you discover that the company has found a way to make money monetizing your creations. When you ask if they will be sharing the profits they say your not necessarily leaned in as much as we’d like. We are looking for people that are more committed. We are looking for someone else that is willing to create for free for longer.
If the goal is to have better quality work on the channel, as they have stated with their new updates focusing on episodic shows, then how will this help? Why not lower the threshold and remove the “slop” that they keep discussing.
Broadcast television developed inside an existing regulatory and industrial structure, but the internet has developed at a much faster pace. Governments and institutions have been struggling to keep up with the changes in technology, while enormous amounts of the content that make these platforms valuable are created by people working independently. This creates a different kind of labor relationship.
How this looks for the creators you enjoy:
A creator produces hundreds of hours of content without being an employee of the company
The platform can change its policies at any time.
The creator changes their strategy.
Then the algorithm changes.
And everyone adjusts.
I have been attempting to do something different with YouTube, but this update got me thinking about how much of this economic sector is controlled by a website and an algorithm that creators have to continually try to understand. Around the time creators figure out how one part of the system works, the system changes and the process starts over. The consumer and the creator never understand how or why they are suggested the videos they see.
YouTube says it has paid more than $100 billion to creators, artists, and media companies over the past four years.
That’s an enormous amount of money, no one is saying it isn’t but the total doesn’t explain how that money is distributed. Recently I learned that YouTube has millions of creators using the platform, and the amount any individual creator receives depends on a number of factors including views, audience location, advertising demand, content type, eligibility, and other variables. Only creators who meet the relevant requirements and are accepted into the YouTube Partner Program receive the applicable revenue shares.
That creates a distinction between the people producing content on the platform and the people participating in its formal monetization system.
Before going much deeper, I don’t want this to be only about money.
I’m interested in what kind of creative economy this system creates.
This is where my research gets more speculative. I don’t know what social media will look like in ten years, but the current model puts a significant amount of control in the hands of a relatively small number of platforms.
Platforms that control distribution, discovery advertising infrastructure, and the analytics.
Platforms that establish the requirements for participating in the revenue-sharing system and can change this at any moment. Creators build businesses on top of that infrastructure, but the underlying rules belong to the platform and that has created an entire industry dedicated to understanding those rules.
These are channels about YouTube strategy. There are courses about thumbnails.There are consultants who specialize in retention. There are tools that analyze titles. There are AI systems designed to optimize existing videos. There are entire businesses built around helping creators understand the platform. At a certain point, I started wondering whether I was spending more time learning how to make YouTube happy than learning how to make the things I actually wanted to make.
You might read this and think I’m telling you to walk away from YouTube.
I’m not.
I’m actually going to start posting more. If they want a flood of videos then lets give it to them. Over the next semester I am going to start talking about the economics of creativity and answering some of the questions I’ve been asking throughout this process. I want to document what is actually happening when you try to build something inside these systems.
I’m also going to experiment with building things outside of them as well. This fall, I’m working with other filmmakers through Bronson Presents as part of VHF 21, that means experimenting with collaboration, distribution, and ways for creators to work together rather than operating entirely as individual channels.
There are a lot of questions, and I wish it was a simple answer. Unfortunately we are only around 125 years into this art form, and so much more will change. In thinking about this I want to ask you some questions.
Either make a video and share it below, or answer in text:
How much control should a creator have over their audience?
How should revenue be distributed?
What happens when the platform changes the rules?
What happens to the content when a creator stops posting?
What happens when a creator spends years building an audience on a platform they don’t control?
Can a sustainable creative career happen at all when the distribution system is controlled by someone else?
Those are the questions I want to explore over the next 6 months. In doing so I will be releasing a free film and photo school full of lectures and tutorials. I will be releasing films as part of Bronson Presents and splitting the ad revenue with the filmmakers.
The most important thing I’ve learned over the past year is that creators are often trying to solve these problems individually, and that will have to change if we want to sustain. Let’s start working together and see whats possible.
If you have a question, drop it in the comments. If you’ve learned something interesting put it below.
Let’s find out what happens when creators start examining the system together instead of trying to figure it out alone.
Jerry
My first feature The Horror will be available for free on Youtube this Fall, check out the trailer above and watch the full film on August 27th, 2026. You can grab it on Physical media right now by clicking HERE
Footnotes:
These are things I read or referenced in creating this article. I put them here for you to stay informed.
AFI’s catalog documents how Edison cameraman Alfred C. Abadie obtained a copy of A Trip to the Moon in France and sent it to Edison for duplication. AFI Catalog — A Trip to the Moon · TCM — A Trip to the Moon ↩
YouTube’s current YPP documentation lists 1,000 subscribers plus 4,000 valid public watch hours in the last 12 months for the main advertising-revenue tier. YouTube Partner Program eligibility ↩
YouTube’s new policy takes effect February 1, 2027. The new main-tier requirement is 1,000 subscribers plus 8,000 qualified watch hours in the previous 365 days, or 20 million qualified Shorts views in 90 days. The Verge — YouTube Partner Program changes ↩
YouTube states that it can serve advertisements on content and that creators who have not met the relevant YPP requirements are not entitled to a share of that advertising revenue. YouTube Creator Academy — YPP Overview & Eligibility ↩
YouTube’s Watch Page Monetization Module provides creators with 55% of net revenues from ads displayed or streamed on public videos. YouTube Partner Earnings Overview ↩
YouTube provides creators with information about some recent subscribers, but only subscribers who have made their subscriptions public and subscribed within the last 28 days appear in the Recent Subscribers list. YouTube does not provide creators with a general subscriber email list. YouTube Help — Check Your Recent Subscribers ↩
Amjad Hanif discussed the changes to the Partner Program and the goal of rewarding creators who are more actively engaged with the platform. Business Insider — YouTube Partner Program changes ↩
Amjad Hanif’s professional background includes product leadership at YouTube. His public professional biography describes experience leading product teams and working across consumer and enterprise software, marketplaces, fraud detection, and reputation systems. YouTube — Creator Products ↩
YouTube announced in September 2025 that it had paid more than $100 billion to creators, artists, and media companies globally over the previous four years. YouTube — Made on YouTube 2025 ↩
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