If you’ve been paying attention to popular music these days, you’ve noticed that YouTube is propelling songs to mainstream success. “Gucci Gang,” “The Race,” “Rubbin Off the Paint”—all of these songs went from YouTube viral status to the Billboard Hot 100, launching the associated artists to stardom.
Well, stardom’s great and everything, but what about money? Surely getting tens of millions of YouTube plays must lead to riches, right? After all, don’t you get money every time someone clicks on your video? As it turns out, not exactly. As a musician, you can make money off of YouTube, and a lot of people do. But it takes a lot of views to make real money. The reality is that YouTube’s payouts are incredibly complicated and, often, incredibly small.
