I wasn't sure if I was going to comment on this until I read Marshall Kirkpatrick's take over on ReadWriteWeb. But he sparked some thoughts in me that I wanted to share. First, here's a quote...
The video uploading platform announced by YouTube last night may not have been what many pundits expected but it could mark a major turning point for both YouTube and thousands of other sites around the web.
By allowing website owners to combine an on-site video publishing option for their users with the huge number of people looking to discover new content on YouTube, the platform will create a mutually beneficial feedback loop that will breathe new life into both YouTube and the web at large. It's also got potential to show up all the other big platform plays we've seen to date.
and one more on Monetization...
One question that is still unanswered is advertising and revenue sharing. YouTube will likely use display advertising on the channel pages for their new partner sites and those partner sites can do the same back at home. Almost every video ad on the web is annoying and there's no reason to get those involved.
First let me say that I agree completely on the revenue sharing angle. It would be nice if YouTube shared the wealth but sites can still put ads all over their pages so they can easily monetize their content. They just have to give up any in-video ads. Given how hard it is for even established video creators to get sponsorship I think allowing YouTube to put one ad in the video is a small price for the bandwidth provided.
On the platform itself, I'm still split. This is a phenomenal opportunity for developers to build video centric sites for essentially no money. Bandwidth is getting cheaper but for sites wanting to focus on video it can still be pretty expensive. For hobbyists I think this is great.
On the other hand, I don't like HOW YouTube is doing this. To me, one of the keys to being a platform is seamlessness. If someone comes to my site and I'm using the YouTube platform there should be no way for them to know I'm using YouTube.
To be clear, I'm not objecting to the ads because the user could just as easily think they were from the web master. But the YouTube branding is a problem for me.
Years of embedded MySpace clips have given the brand a certain stigma. It isn't that people dislike YouTube its that they consider it a cheap way to get video and by extension any professional site that uses embedded videos with a YouTube logo comes off as unprofessional.
YouTube needs to realize that being a web platform means stepping back and letting the developer take center stage. Until YouTube does that I don't see this getting much traction with serious developers.
Addendum: From NewTeeVee.com...
You know how YouTube has its little logo overlaid in white in the bottom right corner of all its videos? Well, it seems to have gone missing. On both videos on and off the site, the files are playing free of any YouTube branding on top of the videos themselves. Meanwhile, the company logo has moved down into the frame of the player where the “menu” option used to be within embedded players.
So at least they've dumped the watermark. I still think any logo is a problem but this is certainly a move in the right direction. That said I still think my original point stands.