> If it followed the USPS model there would be a retention fee for the uploader and a transfer fee for the downloader, both based on size.
The problem here is that we're already only having this debate because people refuse to pay, even when what they're paying with is functionally intangible (i.e. their letting an ad play on their PC for 30 seconds.
So any model which relies on people physically paying real actual money* is doomed to fail to begin with because you're not solving the issue.
Most things are a sneeze compared to the budget of the federal government of the US, that doesn't mean that's a reasonable expectation for the US government (or any government) to run them.
YT Premium revenue goes to the same creators you watch otherwise but they get compensated more for your views than they do for any other person's views.
e.g. Linus Tech Tips posted up their share of revenue from AdSense in 2024; YT Premium made up 37% of their revenue despite being 29% of their views.
You pay to make the content. You would have to "pay" to make the content no matter where you hosted it. You don't pay YouTube to host it. That's a silly argument.
You seem to ignore that you would probably have no audience - or have a significantly smaller audience - were it not for YouTube hosting your content. They are providing you a service, but you seem to think that nobody - not you, not your viewers - should have to trade anything for that service, despite the hosting and streaming of video being one of the most expensive possible tech services in the world (bar perhaps running genAI models.)
I dunno it's just very annoying how a lot of people have memed themselves into this train of thought where the big tech companies aren't actually providing them anything of value, when if they decided to suddenly stop providing their services they would be up a creek without a paddle.
> 21st century nation states can better solve video scale delivery without middle parasites like Google.
If it's that easy, why has nobody done it?
(Hint: governments don't want to run YouTube, probably shouldn't run YouTube, and nobody else wants or can afford the immense costs that come with running YouTube.)
Making any profit at all on a service that hosts and streams 4K video from everyone to everyone over the Internet while also compensating the creators of that video is no mean feat.
> If people don’t think there’s enough value in YT, then don’t pay and don’t use it.
The most common throughline of all pro-piracy discourse is that there's a lot of people who feel completely entitled to free entertainment, and they will come up with all sorts of bizarre mental gymnastics to justify that as something other than "I want free entertainment and don't want to see ads."
I don't think anyone could articulate a coherent logical argument as to why they feel they should get YouTube's services, and the entertainment produced by the creators who are on YouTube, while not paying either of them through any means, other than pure selfishness.
They have somewhere near 10% share of the laptop market and the new Apple Silicon stuff absolutely cooks. For an afterthought, they're an exceptionally well-built and well-loved one that people enjoy using.
> (In my experience as an app developer, getting any traction and/or money from your app can be much more difficult than actually building it.)
This. The app I built has maybe 50 downloads despite me trying quite hard to promote it. It's very difficult work, even with the app being completely free of charge (save for a donation button).
They do that because shipping things that have (potentially) faulty lithium-ion batteries is generally frowned upon, so in lieu of returning them some (potentially explosive) e-waste, they have you destroy it to ensure that you're not just trying to get a second headset for free.