Back in January, YouTube announced that it was launching around 160 channels of fresh, original content, that it would invest in to help it compete with traditional cable and network programming. Less than a year on, it’s axing over half of them.
YouTube injected $200 million into the project, which includes channels like The Onion and Jay-Z’s Life and Times. Seems the rewards haven’t been as forthcoming as they’d like: 60 percent are being axed, and YouTube will cream off 100 percent of incoming revenue from the ones that aren’t renewed.
As for what will and won’t make the cut, All Things D reports that it’s not revenue that’s the deciding factor, but watch time of the channels instead. [All Things D via Verge]
Image by Rego – d4u.hu under Creative Commons license
