So Google Bought Youtube

[gary]

Googles bid for world domination marches on with the purchase of YouTube. Rumour has it that they are going to put ads round the vids and share the ad revenue with the content creators.....

Still, dont think it'll make many millionaires as Im sure Ben will testify after his recent exploit with Digg

link (http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/businesstechnology/2003296960_googletube10.html)

[richardksa]

But YouTube is not alone any more. Any else try DailyMotion? They don't seem to a time limit on the little movies and there are some really interesting movies there. Some wonderful animations is anyone like that sort of thing, plus several clips of Spanish classes and high school spanish projects.

[gary]

At 65.000 uploads a day I doubt YouTube are worried!! The company started 18 months ago and has just sold out for $1.65 billion (i know an American billion is not as much as an Englsh billion but it will buy a lot ov sweeties)

I sit every day and try to have an idea like that, and every day I dont and get on with my relatively happy existance..... sigh!

[catavino]

Everyone seems to think it was a bad idea, on the other hand, Google hasn't had a lot of bad Ideas and the ones they have had, ended up makeing very little difference! Anyways, I've heard they are going to keep Google Video and Youtube both live, at least for now. Seems strange. Also why would you put adds on the youtube vids, but not on the google vids?

[Ben]

I don't think Google are stupid enought to do anything stupid either. I read an estimate (http://www.calacanis.com/2006/10/06/google-to-buy-youtube-perfect-match/) that if they just put ads on the youtube site alone they would cover their money in about 6 years, during which time they will be picking up huge kudos for owning the coolest property on the block. Amazing. The 3 guys who originally set youtube up walk away with around 200 million dollars each. Nice.

[Ben]

Here is some speculation on money, via gigaom (http://polls.gigaom.com/2006/10/09/goobed/):


Winners:

Sequoia Capital, which invested about $11.5 million (http://startups.gigaom.com/2006/04/05/youtube-snags-another-8-million/) in two rounds and owned 30% of the company, which translates to about $495 million. via who else, Dr. Kedrosky (http://paul.kedrosky.com/archives/2006/10/09/sevin_rosen_mee.html).
Steve, Chad, and Jawed - the three co-founders of You Tube, who must be walking away with at least $200 million each. They own close to 50% of the company

[ValenciaSon]

Hey Ben, you know I posted a suggestion on where NFS should go in the future based on Google's interest on You Tube, then I came across this thread. Anyway, has this acquisition given you any thoughts on the future direction for NFS?