YouTube quits the competition against Amazon and Netflix

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The platform announced that now its original series will be available for free as of 2020

At the end of 2017 and the beginning of 2018, YouTube announced that it would produce more than 40 original series with which the platform would compete directly with Netflix and Amazon Prime, with which it would seek to position itself in the global streaming market. The results were not satisfactory, so the company has decided to stop its attempts to compete with the dominant companies and will make its original content available for free as of 2020, according to information from Mundiario.

Leer en español: YouTube tira la toalla y deja la competencia contra Amazon y Netflix

Although it created a huge expectation and that, according to Radio Formula, it had personalities such as Channing Tatum, Anna Akana, Kevin Hart, Demi Lovato, LeBron James, Katy Perry, Ellen DeGeneres, Ryan Seacrest, Naya Rivera and Ralph Macchio, among others; the reality is that it did not manage to improve its income against the rise of the biggest competitors: Netflix and Amazon.

Why did YouTube fail as a series producer?

Not only for YouTube, but for other large, large companies, such as Disney, Apple, and HBO; it has been a great challenge to look for some space to enter the streaming market. You can not reduce everything to just one problem, but to two: creative work and budget.

Netflix struggled to make a space as a producer of original content, something necessary in the face of growing competition from Disney +, which will surely remove a large amount of content. Its only option to survive is making a name for itself as a producer, a goal it has achieved.

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In 2018, Netflix spent $7 billion dollars in the budget for original content and licensed content, such as Friends series, to which it invests 100 million dollars annually, according to the Expansión magazine.

YouTube can hardly invest that amount to produce original content without having a guarantee of the return of its investment, since it would require millions of subscribers who it would have to convince against the giants of the sector. According to Merca 2.0, YouTube's earnings in 2018 were $ 15 billion in advertising, more than twice Netflix's budget for production alone.

As if that were not enough, in addition to Amazon and Netflix, now Apple and Disney + streaming platforms are in the way, which gets Netflix in trouble. Now YouTube will bet to put its original content free following its model based on advertising, which reduces budgets and causes the cancellation of series such as Origin and Overthinking with Kat & June, as Hipertextual ensures. "While other companies are building a payment wall, we are heading in the opposite direction," said Robert Kyncl, YouTube's business director, in statements collected by Milenio.

YouTube is still in the process of restructuring in terms of content. The fate of all his original productions is still unclear about, but what is certain is that there will be a third season of its successful series Cobra Kai, whose seasons 1 and 2 will be available for free. This surely in order to win adepts towards the new season, as reported by La República.

What content can be seen for free on YouTube?

Cobra Kai, Kevin Hart: What The Fit, a secret project with Justin Bieber, documentaries about Maluma and Paris Hilton, new seasons of Liza on Demand, Impulse, coverage of Lollapalooza, as well as educational series, will be available to the public. The platform will make a staggered release in which it will announce dates for each content.

LatinAmerian Post | Luis Ángel Hernandez

Translated from "YouTube tira la toalla y deja la competencia contra Amazon y Netflix"