Tom Harrington, a broadcast expert at the research firm Enders Analysis, says of YouTubing: “You’re completely at the whims of a platform, an algorithm that can change any time. If you do well, you do very, very well. And if you do badly, you do very, very badly, and no one ever sees your content. There’s incredible risk being on that platform and having your entire existence on that platform.”
Harrington thinks that many presenters would prefer the old, risk-free broadcast system, where they would accept payments upfront for commissions, rather than YouTube’s “performance-based” model. He adds: “It’s kind of precarious even for someone like him.”